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All Forum Posts by: James Wilcox

James Wilcox has started 111 posts and replied 1292 times.

Post: Hello, how are you? Hi my name is Quentin.

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Quentin Raisor:

Hey everybody, I’m new here. I’m Quentin. I just picked up the book on investing in real estate with no (and low) money down. I’m looking to start this journey with a full head of state and I’m excited to pick each and everyone of your brains

Welcome to the BP forums. Any questions you got I am happy to help. Even those specific to Lex or the KY markets. GL in all your future REI ventures.

Post: Pre Event Intro - If you're coming to BPCON2024 let us know who you are!

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Dan H.:
Quote from @Dan H.:
Quote from @Brooke Andrea:

Does anyone know where next year will be?  I couldn't make this year unfortunately...

They usually announce the next year’s location at the closing session of the current BPCon.   I suspect this year will be the same, so look for next year’s location at the end of this year’s BPCon (so in just about a month from now).  

 
best wishes. 

 @Jay Hinrichs

After the closing keynote they announced the location of BP2025 and Jay will be happy to hear it is in Las Vegas (he has advocated for Las Vegas at least a few times).

I will say I enjoyed the lower attendance of this year compared to Orlando.  They were selling books 50% off so they would not need to haul them home.  Similar for many of the give aways; if you wanted a dozen BPCon shirts you could have got them.  This year was even smaller than San Diego.  I could find people fairly easy.

Add the excitement of a hurricane off the coast (resort shut down at 9 PM so workers could safely get home). 

I would say this was the least organized BPCon (no cevent App, poor email distribution, my workshop that was $300 had about 20% attendance rate) I have been to, with the worse room problems (both ac and hot water problems in my room), and the hurricane issue (they cancelled the meal but many of the restaurants required reservations that we did not make because we were expecting the meal), and in my opinion worse keynote speakers even when one was a repeat (I like David Greene keynotes, but …), I enjoyed this BPCon more than the others I attended. 

I suspect bpcon2025 to be much larger than this year.   Not sure how it would compare in size to Orlando.  I will likely be there but would prefer it to be small rather than large.


I expect I will see some of you in Vegas.  Jay, it would be my honor to meet you.  

I agree that Vegas will likely be much bigger. Going international is more challenging, and I'm sure the weather kept some people away. I prefer larger crowds, but like you mentioned it wasn't all bad.

The communication on where to go and what to do could have been better, but I still had an amazing time! See you in Vegas!

@Casey L Klauser sorry missed your meet up. If you do anything more virtually I would be interested in attending.

Post: Anyone from Louisville at BPCon?

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Brent Logsdon:

Is anyone from Louisville KY at BPCon?

@Brent Logsdon sorry I missed this. Not from Louisville but my roommate was. There was about 6 or 7 of us from KY to my best knowledge.

Post: Creative investing options

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Matt Soares:

Hey all, I'm looking for a lender or private investor that could help my wife and I get things started. We have our 1st house hack in Northern KY and are ready to start looking at BRRR's and multi-family's. Hoping to find someone to work with that can help with the deposit, the property purchase and renovation costs. Thank you, Matt

It depends on the location and project for many lenders. I can connect you with some hard money lenders who might be interested. You should also check with local lenders about renovation loans and compare your options. Keep in mind that traditional banks probably won’t cover your down payment/more in full, so you'll need to find a solution for that. Having some of your own funds invested is what many would expect.

Post: Thoughts on my start into realestate?

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Leah Ramsey:

Hello BP community!

I absolutely love reading and learning about realestate. Last, 2-3 years it’s the only thing I read. Every book and podcast has been checked off.

I am finally ready to dive into it, slowly…

I belive I am a buy and hold kinda girl and house hacking is where I will begin.

I’ve went backwards than most I am 45 but now my kids are grown therefore house hacking is do-able.

Honestly I could house hack forever, but I have a boyfriend of 10 years.

Eventually it will be time to make a move together….

Thoughts on my ideas please and thank you SO much!

I would love to start with a fourplex, but I feel that is out of reach for me.

We are considering: (my guy and I)

Each of us buying a duplex. That is owner occupied starting 2025.

I will test (if approved) STR or MTR…on the other unit, but also Besure it works for LTR.

We both have good credit, DTI is way low, great jobs, and money saved to start this process.

Here in Lexington KY I feel it’s hard to find duplex in a decent area unless it’s over $500k.

We each prefer under $300k for a duplex. We prefer 2bedroom 1.5 bath.

We also want to invest here in KY.

A few perks about my guy, he works for a builder, investor. He is Property Manager. We will pick his bosses brain eventually.

I plan to start my process January 2025 on my duplex. My guy will start closer to May 2025 on his.

I should mention my guy owns a primary home already as an inheritance that at this time we have no plans to touch. It’s in a GREAT area and in the future we do have plans for that, but we have an elder family member living there. I would assume we would need to change that to a rental before he starts his duplex process??

That home has $45k balance. At this time we aren’t pulling funds from that home. But we do have that option in year 3 and after.

Other than that we have no debt.

So, any upgrades to our duplexes will be from our cash.

This is our plans for year one and two.

Year one I get a duplex, then again year two. My guy will be doing the same.

Year 3 we plan to make the move together and build (my guy works for a builder so huge discount there)

After year 3 and we are settled and married and living in our home and we would have our duplexes we would love to continue into flipping, or BRRRR maybe one per year…. I would love to find a storage facility for sale one day or even one cabin in TN, but that's later goals. For now it's duplexes and our home. Year 1-3.

We have 4 kids all older between the two of us.

Our ultimate goal is retirement and generational wealth.

Each kid will inherit one duplex and we want to teach them as much as possible.

Does this sound like a good plan,

Or am I missing anything?

Buy and hold, and have some cash flow eventually (enough cash flow to continue this journey year 1-2) but definitely appreciation.

If we can't find duplex is it a bad idea to consider SFH with basement? We would each flip our basements and STR or MTR 1st floor and we would live in our basements of the SFH.

By year 3 we hope to each own 2 duplexes.

I would prefer single family homes I may be wrong but does single family appreciate better than duplexes? But, I also think what if STR or MTR goes good.

I don’t see a family allowing that in their basement. So for now I feel a duplex is best for our goals.

The home with the $45k balance might be our forever home once flipped the way we want it in year 3, but for now it’s occupied by a family member and we don’t want to change that…..

We want to use our cash now for these duplexes and save that for our home in year 3. Then after settled move into other projects each year to pay down debt.


also, from FHA one to two on our duplex we would need to refinance out of that loan, correct? Or I guess the 2nd loan would be conventional? We would like our home year three to be FHA as well.

 @Leah Ramsey Sounds like a great plan! I'd love to chat more about how we can make this a reality and discuss some key considerations specific to the central KY market based on what you have posted. As an investor-focused agent, I have a solid reputation in this area. Feel free to send me a DM, and we can get things moving. I'll be attending BPCon24 soon, so I will be MIA for a bit, we could set up a call for later next week.

Post: master leasing to Non-profits...

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Tony Hughes:

Hey BP Community! I remember listening to a podcast episode of someone who would rent their LTRs to a non-profit at market value so they could use the housing for people in need. Does anyone remember the guest and podcast I'm talking about? I want to say he was from Louisville, KY but no amount of searching is helping me...

I don't recall the specific episode you're referring to, but based on my experience, renting to non-profits hasn't worked out well. I've rented to several in Kentucky, and none of them turned out successfully. I have found that also be the case to most investors I have talked to here.

Post: Check my work

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Tyler Kesling:

Yeah, that makes sense. No idea why they would state they're $200 under comps and not doing it themselves so maybe I'll see if I can get that $100K and send you 25% for the lead. Win, Win, Win. My initial infant level of knowledge would tell me it's a combination of being poorly managed (I calculated they're spending nearly 65% on expenses to only have $305K NOI on 95% occupancy at $875/m, if that's even the average rent/unit currently occupied). I had read 50% is a fair number to use for calculations which would raise the NOI by, drumroll...15%, but this is purely speculative) and perhaps the funds or energy to go through an upgrade if they're looking to get out of it anyway. Sell as is type of thing. This is in Lexington KY which AI says have grown 5.1% YOY but the latest data I saw for this particular zip code is a year old and says it's the lowest in Lex with a median of $900/m so +5% only gets us to $945. Look at me, figuring this out as I go in real-time!

I've since learned that the DSCR maxes at 10 units but even those are rare so just take that out of any equation. I'm still not 100% what the advantages to that are anyways, even on a 2-4 units but I still have a lot to learn.

So what percentage would you tack on to your fund raising to cover taxes, insurance, and upgrades? Is that just case by case or is there a general rule of thumb for each property class? 

I didn't do a full read into all you wrote but if something in Lex I can give you an idea. 65% expenses on a MFH isn't that crazy and probably on par with what to be expected. It depends on the class of property. Based on what you said that would be a C class property.

Post: Any PML/ Contractor/Investors groups in Kentucky?

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Jim Wilson:

Hi Biggerpockets Community, glad that I created an account with biggerpockets. Aside from this any recommendation about groups that  should join or actively participate to maximize my reach? I am a CPA and a private money lender, Thank you!

As mentioned FB is a good resources. Also, look into KREIA up in Louisville.

Post: Hello Bigger Pockets Community

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Dallas Thomson:

I'm genuinely looking forward joining this investment community. My husband and I are now in a position to start acquiring some rental properties. We're looking in the Lexington/Richmond KY area. I've come to Bigger Pockets to learn some tips, tricks, and hints about real estate investment and to connect with folks who have similar goals. 

@Dallas Thomson Welcome to BP and forums! I can help you with your goals since that is specifically what I do. I can also connect you with the right people in the market and give you all the tips you want to be a successful investor in the central KY market. Just DM or give me a call 

Post: Pre Event Intro - If you're coming to BPCON2024 let us know who you are!

James Wilcox
Posted
  • Real Estate Agent
  • Bowling Green KY ~ Lexington, KY
  • Posts 1,343
  • Votes 573
Quote from @Rene Hosman:

We're so excited to be hosting all of you at BPCON2024 in Cancun this Oct 6-8th! The best part of the BP community is that the fun doesn't start or end with BPCON with options to connect and learn year round - so let's start before we get to BPCON with a round of introductions. I'd love to learn about the following from all of you coming to BPCON

😁 Your Name
🧠 What would you consider your area of expertise - real estate related or not!
🙌 What are you most looking to get out of BPCON 2024
🤝 Fill in the blank: If I could make a great connection with someone who is an expert in _________ at BPCON2024 then I would leave BPCON happy
🗓️ What session are you most looking forward to? Reminder: here's the event schedule

BiggerPockets banner that says Register now with logoRegister now for BPCON 2024

James Wilcox with eXp Realty. Kentucky licensed agent. 

My area expertise is all investment real estate especially have a fondness for STR and MTR properties.

Looking forward to meeting new people from all over. 

Looking for an expert in campgrounds or RV parks. 

If anyone from KY is going to BPCon LMK. I am looking all Kentucky people together at the event. I did this last year and it was awesome.