All Forum Posts by: Walter Ichikawa-Doyle

Very interesting! Thanks for this @Kimberly T. . I'm pretty sure there's no such thing here in Japan, but I'm going to double check!

Walter

Wow, this is interesting. @Kimberly T. , are you saying that you can't advertise with terms like "great apartment for a young person" or "great for families"? That this is considered discrimination as you described?

I can sort of understand the married/unmarried thing, but the above blows my mind! Even the married/unmarried should be able to be justified by the extra work involved to qualify the tenants, one member of the couple as opposed to two individuals I would think... interesting.

Walter

Hi @Karl Turner @Karl Turner

Welcome to BP and congratulations on taking action! As I'm sure you've noticed, there's a ton of information here and a ton of very helpful people. I don't know much about investing in the UK but if you have any questions about investing in Japan, fire away!

Best of luck,

Walter

Hi Adam,

I don't blog, but I do a kind of news gathering service of articles that might be beneficial to my potential clients. I then broadcast that on FB and LinkedIn groups with a linked to our homepage. Then every couple of weeks I send out an email summary of those articles to our email list. The posted articles on FB or LinkedIn are good for google ranking, but don't really bring in the customers. The most beneficial thing I've seen is getting involved in forums and commenting on other posts in LinkedIn groups you become a member of. The ability to comment insightfully or with a good answer works toward establishing your credibility, which, of course, is dire, and a couple of other people have mentioned as well.

Welcome Christy!

Sounds like you've got a plan in place and are moving forward, good job! Based on your plan, I'd like to recommend a book, "More Than Cashflow - The Real Risks & Rewards of Profitable Real Estate Investing" by Julie Broad. She's been a contributor here on PB for a while (in fact most of the book has probably been various blogs here) but the book is a good read and puts a lot of thoughts and assumptions in perspective. She's from Up North so it's slightly Canadian slanted, but still a valuable read (imho). Best of luck!

You're doing the right thing with the eviction @Ivan Burley and you've got everyone's support! It's your business as you've said and only you can make it successful!

Wow, congratulations. What a great setup on the financing!

Ditto to Aaron suggestion... go buy this place at $92,000 and get it while you can! Good luck @Henry R. !

Hi Russ,

I would suggest that it really depends on your goals. Do you want to be a landlord? If you're planning to keep one unit after 5 years, why not keep both? Mortgage pay down should be sufficient after 5 years, along with appreciation, to allow you to refinance and pull out some equity for repairs/renovation or the downpayment on a new property. But also, you need to know what's keeping the vacancy rate so low in the town (assuming it's Nelson)? Will you be able to maintain the two sides for 5 years without having to put your own money into it? Are the older unit and the cabin/shop rented out with good long term tenants or at least occupied again shortly after move-out? If your research tells you the areas going to maintain a low vacancy, you have no tenant problems, your going to be in the area for a while (assuming your doing PM yourself), hold on to both sides until you foresee a time when the vacancy rates not going to be so high or when your ready to pull out some equity through the sale of one side. Have you asked other Canadian investors @ http://myreinspace.com/public_forums/forums/61-General_Discussion.html

Sorry to babble on but there are a lot of ?s...

I agree with this thread, pics are beneficial and make it more "real"... not just real estate. Great post, @Karen Margrave ! @Jerry K. , your posting is voted most intriguing by me!

All in all, great to see everyone!