All Forum Posts by: Drew Markert

Hey @Mitch Jorgensen welcome to BP!  You're absolutely on the right track - house hacking can save you thousands of dollars every year in rent, allow you to build equity, benefit from appreciation, and you gain experience as a landlord without the risk of a sole investment property.

Similar to yourself, I recently graduated with a Finance degree and just bought a 3/3 duplex to house hack in Milwaukee. To give you some perspective, the PITI on the duplex is $1,275 and the other unit will rent for around $1,050. I won't be completely living for free, but having another roommate will take care of it.

One thing I would do immediately is get connected with an experienced agent and start analyzing deals every day.  When it's time to pull the trigger, you'll be confident that you're buying a good deal.  It seems we're in a pretty similar situation in life so feel free to shoot me a message if you have any questions.

Hope this helps!

Drew

@Tyler Smith sounds great, see you then!

Hello BP!

The Milwaukee Real Estate Club is having its first meetup to kick off 2018 on February 1st.  @Daniel Hyman has graciously agreed to host this networking event at his office in Milwaukee. For those who have not yet been to one of our meetings, here is what makes us unique:

• 1.No entry fee
• 2.We don’t sell anything
• 3.Our focus is on growth and relationships

As any successful person will say, it’s not what you know, but who you know. New relationships can be invaluable to your growth, both personally and professionally. Please RSVP and we look forward to seeing you there!

Hey @Nickolas Boylan welcome to BP!  I'm with @Andrew Bartelt on this one.  It's important to know what you'll pay now, but if your goal is to one day move out and acquire more rentals, definitely run the numbers as if you're not going to live there.  

Based on the purchase price, I'm guessing it's in a nice area, so you should probably be able to get more than $1,000 with 3br 2ba in each unit.  Another expense to consider is the water bill.  For most duplexes the landlord pays for water & sewer, and a 3/3 will use a decent amount.  I recently purchased a 3/3 and the water bill is about $125/mo with both units occupied by families.  

That said, it looks like this duplex would have slightly negative cash flow if you moved out (based on rent of $1,000/unit).  You could also look into Airbnb for extra income.

Hope this helps!

Drew

Hey @Rachel Brewster welcome to BP!  I opened the accounts under my personal name with a standard checking/savings account, however none of my personal transactions will be with these accounts, as they're set up just the property.  

@Andrew Kerr Good call!  I'm glad to hear it's working out :)

@Ola Dantis That's an excellent point - at this point, I don't plan on carrying a balance unless an unexpected expensive repair comes up.  Thank you for the input!

@Adam Ramsey Nice!  I have my accounts set up the same way.  

@Mark Holencik That's also a good point.  It would make more sense to apply it to the balance if you would have to pay taxes on the income

@Mark Holencik agreed - I would only be using the credit card for expenses related to the rental side of the property

Hey BP,

I recently purchased my first duplex to use as a house hack.  I have separate bank accounts set up for the property but was wondering if I should get a credit card as well?  There is about $10-15k of rehab work and it would be nice to capitalize on rewards while building credit.  Since I only have one property, I'm not sure if it's worth it at this point.  I'm leaning towards getting one, but would love to hear some other opinions!

Thank you!

Drew

@Craig Curelop both units are a 3/1.  I haven't thought much about Airbnb for the complete other half, but I'm looking into this more - thank you for the insight!

@Joshua Martin thank you for the kind words!  It's located near 92nd and Howard.  Not sure if that's the greatest place for Airbnb (about 20 minutes to downtown & airport) but there's a few in the area.  I'm definitely open to the idea of using the other unit as an Airbnb altogether - it should be quite simple to test and I could always go back to long term tenants if it doesn't work out.  How has it been going with your fourplex?  Do you have all of the other units on Airbnb?