All Forum Posts by: Johnathan P.

Hey @Cristian Garibay, just a quick pile on. I completely agree with @Chris Mason and @Jeff Zimmerman. I’m currently repositioning myself in life to be effective in the investment game. Part of that is getting out of two places that were’t good investments and were purchased using the typical mentality of a home buyer. Funny enough, the one in Florida is called a townhouse because you own the property just outside the unit. The one in California is called a condo and the community owns the property just outside the unit, we just have exclusive use of it. Regardless though, they are both obviously under HOAs which can complicate things (it has for me). Also to corroborate what was said, they haven’t appreciated as much as the single family places around them and are beholden to the HOAs. If you can find a multi family in a neighborhood you would feel comfortable leaving your future wife alone in and it pencils out financially, that would be great (I’m having a hard time finding those in Fresno). Also, of course it all depends on the situation but I wouldn’t recommend going with a 2 bedroom either for your situation, unless you could possibly renovate it to make it into a 3 bedroom 2 bath. That could be a good value add! Avoid some of the mistakes I made before discovering Bigger Pockets, it can take a long time to recover from.

@Sara Blakely, yeah maybe we can! I didn't see much in Ventura. It sounds like the meetup CJ and @Kevin Phu mentioned could be good! Maybe they can post a link for more info on that meet up? A Ventura meet up would be good too since TO is a bit far. As a side note, my thoughts and prayers go out to the people impacted by the fires in Ventura. I hope you are doing alright Sara.

@Andy Saquing, I would like to invest closer to home but I also want to get a multi plex in Fresno/Clovis because I have to travel up there a lot and I would want to stay in one of the units. I'd like to invest down here as well since its close to home but I don't know what niche I could go after here.

@Jeff Zimmerman, thats great info. Thanks!

@CJ Berina, thats good info. I did see that meetup and will look into it more now! Yeah maybe we can meet up and chat one day if you are in town.

Thanks @Rob Drum!

@Dmitriy Fomichenko, those are great links. I do need to finish the beginners guide. Currently working my way through the podcasts, which contain a ton of great info.

I have similar thoughts @Joseph M., I'm betting on the high speed rail being there as much as I am my social security when I can start collecting it. I do hope they will both be there one day though! I know Amazon is planning on building a factory in Fresno which could be a little bit of a boost to the city. I'm not sure how much success they are having with the downtown revitalization... There are a couple apartment buildings up for sale in downtown that seemed to be part of the revitialization effort. The area surrounding the  buildings is a little rough though. I do hope the area improves, it could be great.

I will look into that @Account Closed, thanks for the info!

From my experience, all of the sites listed up till this point are good options. One big consideration is to know if pricing is going to change after the first year or so. Some hosts like to follow the cable company model of giving  you the first year at a really low rate but then your pricing goes way up after that. Also, what if you do want to scale up in the future, how much will that cost?

Another great option to consider is Amazon’s hosting services. They offer world class hosting and if you are starting off small, they have a free tier (no catch, just some limitations) so you can create a site at no cost. Additionally, you can scale up as required and as you expand, their platform gives you a great number of flexible options. You can host a completely custom made site or you can use one of their pre made sites, such as from a Wordpress template.

You can see a quick tutorial here for setting up a (free) Wordpress site in a few minutes:

Amazon Wordpress Tutorial

Its definitely worth a look!

Thank you @Trexie E. and @Jo-Ann Lapin. I do want to get involved in a meet up at some point soon.

Yes I'm hoping to find a good first rental in Clovis that I can at least bring up to a B level. I'm fairly certain its going to have to come from off the market though. Lots of work to do.

Greetings to the Bigger Pockets community. My name is Johnathan and I’ve actually had an account with Bigger Pockets for a while but I haven’t been active on the site until now. Over the past few years, I’ve been traveling and training a lot so I didn’t have much time to give to real estate investing. Now that my wife and I are getting settled in one place, we are getting serious about real estate investing and getting out of the rat race. She is currently studying for her real estate license and I’ve been listening to the podcast (I have to drive a lot) for the past few months and I have learned a wealth of information from Josh, Brandon, and all the other contributors.

Even though I am just getting started, I purchased the pro membership. I figure the education I’ve received through the podcasts thus far is worth much more than that, so thanks to all who put the podcast together and participate in it. Additionally I wanted access to the calculators and previous webinars which is very valuable. Together, they are great mentors!

In the near term, my wife and I are looking for our first actual investment purchase in the Clovis, CA area. We are excited about finding a place and are already using the calculators to analyze properties.

I look forward to interacting with the BP community!