All Forum Posts by: Jake Chenoweth

@Nicholas L. Unfortunately, in my area, house hacking is not possible. And my wife would be 100% against it. I also don’t know that I would be up for it.

@Jerry W. don’t be disappointed in me but I still haven’t started and I kick myself knowing when the interest rates were low was the time to get in. However, my wife and I just had our first child a year ago and I have been focusing on him.

I will say though I did make an attempt of an 8 unit apartment complex here in my town. I actually reached out to the owner and attempted seller financing. However, he forwarded my information to the agent and she reached out. She told me that I wouldn't be able to get a T-12 or current rent roll unless I had proof of funds (which I did not). So I actually reached out to guy on Facebook I never met (through REI group) who had his own established REI business and he helped me. He sent me an excel spreadsheet with formulas to figure if it was a good deal or not. And we found in order for it to be a good deal I would have to offer 600,000 less than listing. I didn't even bother with that offer cause it seemed like it would be a "slap in the face" offer.

It’s the only other complex in my town worth owning. It comes with I think another 3ish acres of inhabitable woods. I’m not 100% sure if I’m the future that area would be able to become habitable though.

I’m not currently invested in real estate but I plan to dive in (I’ve been saying this for a few years now but I’m not really in a good place for investments especially what I want to invest in).

But I guess I might be a little confused on how “cash flow” works and how you use that money.

I guess I’ve always thought that you collect rent and basically just put it in your pocket (and obviously report that income you’ve made on your taxes at the end of the year). However, I know you need to set some aside for your expenses i.e taxes, mortgage, repairs etc.

But I've been thinking that if you create an LLC and put your properties in that business name you are now able to write off business expenses and are basically "living" of the business. You don't technically pay yourself, you just make "business purchases."

If anyone could please advise on this I would greatly appreciate it! I don’t wanna throw myself into something that I don’t have a good general idea on.

Thanks in advance!

@Jerry W. Thanks Jerry! I think if I got into it and if the first one failed she would pull the “I told you so” out. However, if it ended up working out I think it would spark her interest and she would want to learn more and keep gaining properties. We’re both supportive of one another but our views on money are different (which isn’t a bad thing, but neither good lol). She does want a new car so guess I could say the rental property would technically be paying that car payment right? (Depending on the cash flow). We did just buy a new house and I might focus on paying the mortgage on that instead of investing at the moment. I do lawn mowing services on the side (not many yards yet) but I plan on using that money for future down payments on rental properties. And I do have another guy at the firehouse that seems to have a decent amount of money sitting around so I think I might try and see if he wants to partner up. Any tips on how to approach that?

Well my other big dilemma is we just bought hopefully our “forever home.” So a little of our capital went to it. So there’s not a whole lot money to go into the RE portfolio currently.

1. My wife is super against REI and I've tried to get her to look into it but she has not been persuaded. What's the best way to persuade?

2. I have some deals that I’ve been looking at in the town I live in and think they’d be a good opportunity but I don’t have the capital and tried find a private money lender but no luck yet. I can’t put 20% (~ $17,000) down what is the best way to do this deal, barring I talk my wife into it?