All Forum Posts by: Joseph Cacciapaglia

Market inefficiency is where profits come from. Right now many sellers are panicking. I've already seen several sellers take deals well below what I thought possible, because they're staring into the unknown right now. The savvy investors I know are starting to make a lot of low offers, because some sellers are actually taking them. I believe some of these will end up being below the actual market bottom. Some of the best deals I saw during the GFC happened in 2008, long before the bottom, but right when the panic was highest.

Im in San Antonio, which is performing relatively well compared to several other markets I follow. Despite that, we still have plenty of nervous sellers, and not many buyers out there trying to capitalize on it.

One thing I would recommend is to start off just like any other noob: house hack, buy a SFH or duplex, etc. I started my career as an analyst for a public REIT and worked as an employee for several institutional real estate companies over the years. One problem I saw a lot of people run into was they all wanted to start off doing deals similar to what they did in our day jobs. This is too big a leap for most people's first deal, so most of them never got started. Looking down on "small" deals is a trap that a lot of people in your situation fall into.

How much does a new subscription to Airdna cost? I only pay around $100 a month for my market. I think it's a pretty great value. Have they upped the price for new subscribers? I haven't found a free version that I like as much.

 Thanks. I've been using furnishedfinder.com for rental comps, but hadn't noticed they have a market data section. It confirms my fear that it's a very small market. 

I've hired several high school students to assist in my real estate business over the years. Find an investor or an agent that works primarily with investors in your area and tell them you want to work for them part-time. Offer to help with their administrative tasks, social media, or whatever they may have for you to do. It's hard to find motivated part-time/contract work, so whenever someone approaches me like that, I try to find something for them to do. 

You could also probably take the real estate licensing courses online (depends on your state). That way you could take the exam as soon as your 18, or whatever the minimum age is in your area. I just recruited a recent high school grad to join my team. If you happen to be in San Antonio, feel free to reach out.

My market, San Antonio, tends to fluctuate between A- and A+ over time (I've been tracking for 3-4 years), so I'm not sure how useful the current grade is at any give time. If you pick a B+, and it fluctuates the same about, you could end up with a B-. A lot of my clients have found great STR deals here, so I think the A rating is probably justified, but I don't spend a ton of time looking at other markets anymore.

I picked San Antonio for myself about a year earlier, looking at a number of factors related to real estate investing, but not STRs in particular. Frankly, I think people spend way too much time trying to pick the perfect market. There are deals to be found everywhere. Start with the first A market that catches your eye that also has a median home price within your budget, and start talking to professionals in that market.

There are a few members on here that run meetups. I believe both @Manaia Alalamua and @Rick Pozos have them regularly. I don't ever attend meetups, but would be happy to connect.

Canyon Lake STRs seem to underperform STRs in San Antonio, based on what I've seen. We manage several properties in the greater San Antonio area, but not a lot in Canyon Lake. The seasonality makes it a riskier endeavor as well. I spend a lot of time helping clients find STRs as an agent, and have rarely found great deals in Canyon Lake compared to San Antonio. The thing to really lookout for there is that Airdna is pretty unreliable, because it fails to take into account lake views and water access. It's really easy to make a bad buy there, compared to San Antonio, where you don't have that same nuance.

That's an area where our management team finds it difficult to attract and maintain well qualified tenants, unless the property itself immaculate. Not having central AC or laundry hookups are both big negatives as well. While the rent to price ratio may look good, the vacancy will probably make it a tough property to manage profitably.

Also, in general when helping clients find investment properties, I feel it's my job as the agent to provide rental comps. We usually only get the MGMT team's input on rents once we're in the option period. I think it's unrealistic to expect managers to provide rent estimates on several properties prior to controlling them. That's probably why you've struggled to find that service in two markets now.