All Forum Posts by: Jeffrey Long

@Steve DellaPelle LTR market here isn't too shabby right now. I would only sell personally if I had equity I wanted to releverage. 

@Russ Luce We should talk man. Had no idea you were on BP and wanted to get into the game.

Cheap is relative. Cash flow is the bigger question for an investment.

I'm a licensed realtor operating in the North Myrtle Beach area if you require any assistance locating the right property.

@Margaret B. That's been my experience with most beach vacation properties and I live in Myrtle Beach. Management fees are high, though to be fair they are very time-consuming to manage, HOAs are high to maintain all the beachfront insurance and amenities, and you have to compete with a lot of investor money coming from up north. Everybody wants to say they own a beach property. 

In general the more glamorous the property is to own, the less profitable it is in terms of cash flow. 

It's overpriced, just like every other market right now unless you've got boots on the ground to shop the market hard.

This is the perennial question of leverage. Would you prefer safety? Put the bigger down payment and get the lower APR with option A. Would you prefer to save the cash and put it towards getting a third property? Pick option C.

It all depends  on who you ask and if they have a conservative or risky strategy.

@Beth L. lots of good vacation rental opportunities in North Myrtle Beach and Cherry Grove.  Your friend's condo is in Little River just on the West side of the Waterway so probably wouldn't normally be considered a true vacation rental.  I'm not personally fan of Atlantic Beach to the South and Myrtle Beach is very spotty and case-by-case.

Hi Beth,

You really need to watch out for high HOA fees on the beach, assessments, restrictions on use, and high vacation rental property management fees.

I'm a licensed agent and investor in the Myrtle Beach area. Feel free to shoot me a message if you need any help.

Myrtle Beach is my home market, but I do long-term rental not vacation rentals.  Vacation rentals are a very different risk/reward scenario from long-terms. I know of several properties on the beach I could buy right now and turn a tidy profit with what things are going for during the Summer months, but I also lived here during the recession and saw 80% of those same vacation rentals go into foreclosure.  Vacation rentals, especially resort markets, even more so in seasonal resort markets, are extremely vulnerable to economic headwinds.  The first thing people cut from the budget in bad times is the vacation, and Myrtle Beach is a blue collar vacation area. 

TL;DR version: Buy vacation rentals at the bottom of the market, not the top. 

I agree with @Teddy Smith. To get those prices you'll have to do a significant amount of off market prospecting. In Myrtle Beach a decent 3bd/2ba SFR will run you at least $150k if you're getting a pretty good MLS deal, maybe 130k if you go out to Conway. Good 2bd/2ba condos can be had for $80-100ish but the HOA will typically wipe out most profits at current rental rates. 1 bd/ba for $50-$60k.

Plenty of BP threads on Cozy if you do a search.  Consensus is generally pretty positive and their people are active on these boards.  Takes a while for payments to go through to your account and no support by phone, but generally a great service in my opinion considering the price (free). 

I use it for managing my rental properties.  Postlets (zillow) + cozy syndication + craigslist tends cover most of my bases for vacancy advertising.