All Forum Posts by: J. Martin

 Bob,

Discounts that large aren't super common in my experience in this market for an existing (not newly built) property. More common for large apartment buildings than small. However I did notice that this complex had particularly bad reviews, and the majority of the good reviews were left on the same day last month, after years of bad reviews. Odd..

https://www.yelp.com/biz/the-verdant-apartments-sa...

Fire alarm apparently goes off frequently, lots of broken gym equipment, not enough maintenance people, and someone saying that homeless people sometimes sleep in the staircase.. Good times!

@Account Closed,

What do you think about this location?
3700 Casa Verde Street San Jose, CA 95134
http://www.verdant-apts.com/
Is this just a mark-em-up, mark-em-down ploy on the rent prices?

A1

Beds / Baths1bd / 1ba

Rent$2,345 - $2,880

Deposit$500

Sq. Feet681+

A2

Beds / Baths1bd / 1ba

Rent$2,445 - $3,005

Deposit$500

Sq. Feet756+

A3

Beds / Baths1bd / 1ba

Rent$2,515 - $2,690

Deposit$500

Sq. Feet827+

A4

Beds / Baths1bd / 1ba

Rent$2,465 - $2,660

Deposit$500

Sq. Feet695

A5

Beds / Baths1bd / 1ba

Rent$2,630 - $2,680

Deposit$500

Sq. Feet764+

My handyman actually decorated this one, trying to copy the style of some of my others. I don't really like the artwork. But thanks for working with me on the accent wall! I love it!! And take some brighter pictures Minh!! Don't quit investing to be a staging photographer!! lol

This is a real bed. Not a sofa bed. But I always tell my handyman to get sofas that also fold out to beds, whenever buying one..

Recognize this one?

Eh?

You probably don't recognize this one below Minh.
This is the very first apartment I lived in when I moved into my first 4plex I bought in Richmond.
It's about 3 blocks south of the BART station. A 2br/1ba. I rent this apartment for about $2,500/mo furnished, for 2-3 months at a time. It is the smallest of 4 units. I purchased the property for $375K on New Years' Eve 2012. (Happppy New Year!!!)

As I look at the pictures, there are some things that need to be worked on. Will do another post on that..

@Koosha T.,

I'll be up at @Al Williamson 's Summit at the Guild in 2017 (save the date yet Al..?). Definitely plan to be there if I don't see you before that. Not sure why you can't tag me. Maybe my name is too short?!? lol Thanks for the kudos! Glad you like the posts :) I've been traveling lately and was busy with the Summit, but give me a call or text me a few times and I'll get back to you :)

Here's the most recent data for Sacramento for job growth, economic conditions, and home price increases in the Sacramento / Roseville / Arden / Arcade Metro area. It looks like the highest % gains in home prices are over, like most geographic areas coming off the bottom, although an 8% annual clip is not bad. Will the economy get a second wind of accelerating job growth?

Or will job growth follow declining economic conditions, and decelerate? What happens to home price increases when job growth decelerates? (Not that right y axis is different scale than left)

@Account Closed,

"We Are Only One Decision From a Totally Different Life"
So true! :)

LAST ROUND TO PICK A DESIGNER!!
TAKE THE NEW POLL HERE:

https://en.99designs.de/contests/poll/rlfe8l?urlca...

All of you who voted.. Thank you so much! Now round 2 above!! Vote one more time please on these tweaked designs :)

@DG A., @Onna-lisa Kyom, @Colton S.

https://en.99designs.de/social-media-pack/contests...

Round Two!!
What do you think?
Click on the link and let me know!

https://en.99designs.de/social-media-pack/contests...

Any other awesome folks in San Francisco, New York City, Austin, Boston, Seattle, San Diego, Los Angeles or Sacramento please chime in on this and vote (click link above).

THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!

I will share the results of the polling on this thread..

 Aaron, welcome to the Bay Area BP crew! As Jonna said, there are lots of awesome investors here in the Bay Area, and I definitely recommend meeting other locals at meetups too. We usually meet up once a month in SF with my group, and @Ryder Meehan has a meetup in SF focused on out of state investing (I'll actually be speaking there next month on furnished rentals)

Thanks for the shout out Jonna :)

@Edwin Merino,

I did rent a scooter! It was a blast!

I didn't quite make it that far.. And in the air flying over Hong Kong now, so looks like I won't be able to make the 20 hour trek down... But I plan to be back in SE Asia this winter :)

@Luis Alfaro and @Doug Napieralski,

Welcome to BP! @Chris Mason is referring to my sublease/furnished rental business. It does really well in the SF Bay.

You asked what is a good way to start, and I think he recommended this as one way to build capital if you don't have any. However, it sounds like you are running multiple businesses. So hopefully you have some capital.

What do you want to do in real estate? What kind of RE business do you want to have? What kind of lifestyle and workload do you want? The one downside about the furnished rental biz is that it doesn't teach you how to flip properties, buy properties, or wholesale. And sorta has to be done around the clock.

I recommend checking out the book on Airdna if you are interested

There are still people making money flipping, wholesaling, etc. Although the auction/foreclosure market definitely dried up. Either way, best of luck!

Check out some San Diego meetups in the "Real Estate Events and Happenings" forum, or look on Meetup, and go meet some local investors who are crushing it!! :)

Best of luck to both of you lifting off....

 It worked for me. But my only caution would be that B-C properties tend to be more volatile in price, % wise, over the economic cycle (up and down, it appears).  So if you get in near the later portion of an expansionary economic period, (we might be somewhere in that general range right now) you may have to ride out the price swing on that cash flow.

. Fine if you have it and are good with that reward/risk rather than waiting. I'm a waiter right now. But I'm also not in a hurry to get in the game.. Because I'm in, and traveling the world right now ;)

Depends how bad I sound!! lol

Sure, you can post it.

Can you email it to me please?

Looking forward to your next meetup Johnson! :)
*BTW, does this kind of record turnout at meetups mean it's the beginning of the end!?! lol

Sorry I missed you all!!! I'm sure it was a great time!

In Hanoi right now! ;)