All Forum Posts by: Julie Williams

@Ginger Mermer

Some different points:

You have to start somewhere. I started learning about real estate as a hobby not to lose my mind in the early pandemic, and it is so complex and multi-faceted I will be learning until the day I die. I still ask dumb questions. There are so many to ask! 

Banks and lenders do not typically count real estate investment income or new self employment income of any kind, towards qualifying for a conventional loan, until it has come in for two years. I asked a couple of lenders if this was true even if I bought a multi-family with established tenants and provided the lender with leases and copies of the seller's/landlord's rental deposits and they said yes! This creates a dilemma for the real estate newbie, who like me is renting or living in some other housing situation they do not want to stay in. Do we buy a personal home first, and delay investing? Or do we buy an investment property first and postpone having a place we own to live in, for two years, an especially critical question now with interest rates going up fast? And then there is house hacking...living in a unit of a multi family or living in a single family house for two years to avoid capital gains taxes and then putting it under an LLC and renting it out. Most banks do not allow an individual's mortgage to be transferred to an LLC.

As far as the economy going down..maybe. The real estate market is certainly going to stop going up like a rocket. soon. It simply is not sustainable, especially as buyers are priced out of the low end of the market by rising interest rates. Whether properties appreciate slowly, go flat or lose a little value (I do not think is will be much) is anyone's guess and will have regional variations. The strength of the economy depends on what aspect of the economy you are looking at, what industry you are in and what part of the country you live in. In the Northeast, downturns have a terrible effect on working poor and the lower and middle of the middle class, but don't hurt the upper middle class and wealthy people much, if at all. There are just tons and tons of wealthy people here. And unemployment is at an historic low in most states. 

My credit rating went to hell when I had to abruptly close my business to help a sick family member. It's a bad time to buy a car, both new and used cars are at a premium, but I found a great hack for rapidly improving a credit score. I bought a car with $9000 down, which made them not consider my income or horrible credit rating, and lessened the high interest rate they charged people with credit problems. I got a six year loan and paid off the car off in two years. My credit score went up 150 points and I now qualify for all but the pickiest credit cards and quality for a mortgage. If you can't afford a new car, you could buy a used car and do this. Given the circumstances that wrecked your credit, I would also call each creditor, apologize, explain, and ask them to remove the negative comments from your credit report. Good luck! 

@Ginger Mermer

Some different points:

You have to start somewhere. I started learning about real estate as a hobby not to lose my mind in the early pandemic, and it is so complex and multi-faceted I will be learning until the day I die. I still ask dumb questions. There are so many to ask! 

Banks and lenders do not typically count real estate investment income or new self employment income of any kind, towards qualifying for a conventional loan, until it has come in for two years. I asked a couple of lenders if this was true even if I bought a multi-family with established tenants and provided the lender with leases and copies of the seller's/landlord's rental deposits and they said yes! This creates a dilemma for the real estate newbie, who like me is renting or living in some other housing situation they do not want to stay in. Do we buy a personal home first, and delay investing? Or do we buy an investment property first and postpone having a place we own to live in, for two years, an especially critical question now with interest rates going up fast? And then there is house hacking...living in a unit of a multi family or living in a single family house for two years to avoid capital gains taxes and then putting it under an LLC and renting it out. Most banks do not allow an individual's mortgage to be transferred to an LLC.

As far as the economy going down..maybe. The real estate market is certainly going to stop going up like a rocket. soon. It simply is not sustainable, especially as buyers are priced out of the low end of the market by rising interest rates. Whether properties appreciate slowly, go flat or lose a little value (I do not think is will be much) is anyone's guess and will have regional variations. The strength of the economy depends on what aspect of the economy you are looking at, what industry you are in and what part of the country you live in. In the Northeast, downturns have a terrible effect on working poor and the lower and middle of the middle class, but don't hurt the upper middle class and wealthy people much, if at all. There are just tons and tons of wealthy people here. And unemployment is at an historic low in most states. 

My credit rating went to hell when I had to abruptly close my business to help a sick family member. It's a bad time to buy a car, both new and used cars are at a premium, but I found a great hack for rapidly improving a credit score. I bought a car with $9000 down, which made them not consider my income or horrible credit rating, and lessened the high interest rate they charged people with credit problems. I got a six year loan and paid off the car off in two years. My credit score went up 150 points and I now qualify for all but the pickiest credit cards and quality for a mortgage. If you can't afford a new car, you could buy a used car and do this. Given the circumstances that wrecked your credit, I would also call each creditor, apologize, explain, and ask them to remove the negative comments from your credit report. Good luck! 

@Marcus Auerbach I agree about photos, but if you get a good smart phone and research photography and lighting tips online, and buy a couple of hundred dollars worth of lighting equipment, you can take great photos. If you can't master that, for God sake pay for professional photography. The first time I took a Matterport dollhouse tour I was blown away, fascinated and looked them up. They are not even that expensive, and as a buyer, I actually feel like I have walked through the house, which considering I am looking two or three hours from where I live, is fantastic. I cannot believe how bad some of the photos are for rural and small town properties, or that people use sales agents that have listings online with bad photos. I have seen photos of a kitchen where you see a single room photo, say of the kitchen sink, and a few feet above it and below it! Upside-down photos...blurry photos...lots of photos of the family pets...taken by someone who has a real estate license.  

@Patrick Giblin I got that $1500 figure from a friend who is a traveling nurse who works in New Hampshire and Vermont (actually in the Burlington area). She has also done gigs in Maine, Florida, and in Tennessee. She has had to go over that, I think as high as $900 over, to find housing. She has stayed in furnished apartments, a room in an apartment with other nurses, a room in a home, hotel rooms and an RV. And looking a Furnished Finder to see what is already available in different parts of Vermont, what the places look like, and how booked up they are, many of the apartments aimed at travel nurses are over $1500 a month, sometimes far over. Then there are people who charge $1200 for a two bedroom apartment...

Most of the travel nurse rents are much higher than the monthly housing allowance, which is generally $1500/month. I think the travel nurses make up the difference? Something to find out. 

Please explain the per diem? What does it cover? Why is it tax free? 

Thanks @Patrick Giblin

@Patrick Giblin

@Patrick Giblin Any insights are welcome. I live in coastal Massachusetts and I am trying to move to Vermont. I moved a family member who has dementia and Parkinson's cross country to a wonderful residential care home in Vermont with the intention of moving there. I think towns will have to work with landlords with medium term rentals for travel nurses as there is already a severe nursing shortage in the state and there have also been cases of travel nurses canceling contracts with Cottage Hospital (which is across the Connecticut River in New Hampshire) because they could not find housing. In Vermont, 30 days + is not considered to be a short term rental, although some towns may have local regulations that are stricter. 

@Greg R. I tied to edit a post and ended up deleting it. I also rent, after selling my childhood home in 2019. Luckily my sibling found a house (with a harbor view!!!!) at a decidedly townie price and we split it. Out landlady will downsize in to it in July 2023, so at some point I will have to bite the bullet and wade in to the fray, but perhaps things will have calmed down considerably by Fall 2022 or Spring 2023. We were to leave by July 1 2022, and she extended it to Sept 1 2022 and were beginning to panic, but she decided to keep us on longer. The cost of lumber, since she plans an addition, did not hurt our request. 

@Zeona McIntyre Thanks for the input. I will keep looking. I thought I had found a property today, that needs $85,000+ of work, but I talked to zoning and the town defines homes with more than 2 unrelated adults as boarding houses and it would require notice to neighbors and a zoning hearing for change of use. Boarding houses have more stringent fire safety requirements and are subject to a room tax. In some towns the owner is required to live on premises. Oddly, the state defines a boarding house as more than 4 unrelated adults. The house is a 4 minute walk to a good hospital, with other much larger major hospitals that have a hard time with staff housing a 20 and 30 minutes drive away, and staff from those end up commuting. Plus there are nursing homes, assisted livings and three hospice offices within a 30 minute drive. It was a disappointing conversation. I like the numbers with 3 nurses in it way better than with 2 nurses in it. 

I have analyzed dozens of distressed properties in the $79,000 - $230,000 range in Vermont and Western MA. I have gotten good at looking at pictures and videos and If it looks OK, walking through, making a laundry list of things that would have to be repaired before renting it out so I could get a good rent, attract a quality tenant and have fewer repairs while it was occupied. As the market heated up, there started to basically be almost none that were worth buying. Purchase + closing + repairs was over the ARV, sometimes far over, in almost all cases. When that wasn't the case there was some other deal breaker like backing on a highway (since I intended to house hack and live in it two years before renting), a failed septic, on the flood plain, etc., etc. I have only paid a contractor to look at three properties in a year and a half. (This is a great thing to do since your real estate broker or agent will push you to submit a "clean" offer, with no contingencies.) Of course, now I wish I had bought ANY of those dumps because in all but the most drug ridden towns in Massachusetts and Vermont, homes have gone up 25%-100% in value depending on the home and the town! If ONLY I had a crystal ball! If you can do the work yourself, you have a contractor in the family or you can find an off market deal you might come out fine even now. One thing to do is look at growth in the market (although that will probably slow way down soon it does indicate a place is in demand) and the quality of the school system. Don't buy in a place with bad schools, as appreciation will likely be poor and the cost of repairs will outstrip your equity building up. Good luck!