All Forum Posts by: Kate Jones

Hi all,

I live in the Northern Kentucky area near Cincinnati and look for some creative ways to start investing in Indiana and Ohio in addition to Kentucky. Are there seller finance opportunities in and around Indianapolis? I guess it would be tough given the current market situation, however any insights are appreciated. 

I prefer to start with low risk strategies then after a few deals transition to self buy BRRRR.

 Hi Kate!

Definitely no to biz cards, co name, website, etc.

All you need is courage + either:

1) To be financially qualified with 2%-25% cash (plus remodel) of total purchase price through a conventional (or similar) financing program- This is always ideal/best for buy and hold strategies and usually best for flips because the cost of financing will be lower. I work with an exceptional mortgage broker in Sedona.

2) To have more cash (30%+- of purchase price + remodel) and flip through a hard money lender. This is more ideal for individuals who do not qualify for conventional or similar financing. I have quite a few clients buying property through a hard money lender, a stone's throw away. Hard money lenders are all about trust and relationships. As you do more deals with them and they learn they can trust your real estate judgement, the terms get better with future deals. This is essential, at some point, for investors planning to buy more property, down the road.

Your first steps:

Step 1: Connect with an exceptional seasoned investment specialized realtor in the area where you want to purchase. This is 1 of the most important steps, as an exceptional realtor will help funnel and guide everything else. They should connect you with the best lender reps, contractors, other workers down the road, run income VS expenses, and almost anything else needed within reason. On your first several+ deals, this is your main mentor- so pick a really freaking good one.

Step 2: Connect with the top recommended mortgage broker and get pre-qualified or pre-approved. This is free and this is your 2nd mentor, on the financing side. Depending on your financial situation, the goal is either cheap and less money (lower points and/or less money down) or lower monthly payments (interest rate, etc), to increase cash flow. If you need to go through a hard money lender, you should either flip 1-3 properties, or talk with your realtor about another 2-6 month exit strategy (involving refinancing and paying off the hard money ASAP).

Step 3: Chat with your realtor about properties that make sense, based on your goals/strategy, and start making offers.

Beyond that, continue to lean on your realtor, so that your property gets efficiently remodeled (if necessary), and either quickly flipped or on the rental market. If it will be a cash flow property, an investment realtor should have some great insight on boosting cash flow as much as possible. For example, I encourage my clients to lean on me as often as they like, to run STR cash flow audits. I dive in Online, as well as on-site walk throughs and provide specific suggestions for them to improve marketing, furnishings, home improvements, rental rate adjustments and anything else that would help, and what approximately the outcome should be, post-changes. Most of the time, changes are free or very economical and considerably boost their income.

Final advice. Don't over think it and get stuck analyzing and preparing. Lean on seasoned pros to help you work the numbers and find the deals. 

Example: I work with several hectomillionaire+ clients that are extremely busy people. They spend a relatively small amount of time considering real estate purchases, and even less trying to "find" deals, because they strive to work/team with exceptional people who do this for them. Because of this, they can trust those people to do the leg work and put in the time to bring that value and high level of success to them. These individuals are all about the numbers. Money in VS money out in solid market areas.

The challenge is that most people, including realtors, are not seasoned and great at mathematically doing the work of calculating returns and analyzing potential... accurately. It's difficult to find these exceptional people you can depend upon. This a place where the higher net worth individuals spend some of their precious time, so they can leverage their time better after these conversations and then benefit from the new relationship.

Kate, I'm excited for you and wish you the best.

Go get 'em!

We take videos and created a free Youtube channel to store them on - so we don't have to worry about storage space.

You can set the channel to "private" or "unlisted". We use unlisted, which means only those we share a video link with can access the video. This avoids privacy issues with tenants. You should update your lease though, so you're allowed to share this info with owners and use in court.

We currently have 12,000+ videos stored on Youtube.

 I have hundreds of rentals to deal with so organization is definitely key. There are far too many photographs to store in property management software. As @Lynn McGeein mentions, your photos should be pretty detailed. Here's my process:

Take enough photos to show every angle. From the outside, I take photos that show every wall, window and screen, and the landscaping. I will usually take a picture of the lawn from at least two corners, looking towards the opposite corner, so it captures the entire space. Same with rooms. My pictures have to show every inch of flooring, walls, and ceilings. Kitchen cabinets all open, then all closed. Appliances from the exterior, then the interior, as well as a photo of the label in case I need to share the model # with a technician. Doors are captured front, back, and along the spine where they are most likely to show damage from being kicked in. Inside the sink bowl and under the sink to show plumbing. I take a picture of water running to show that I tested for proper drainage and leaks. I take a picture of window treatments open and closed. I take a picture of every window that clearly shows no cracks and that the screen is in place. An average 3bed/2bath house will take 100+ photographs. I have some homes with over 300 photographs. It takes less than 30 minutes to photograph a home once you get a routine down.

Photos are organized by property, then unit (in case of multi-family), then date and purpose:

123 Straight Street   
     2020-01-27 After cleaning inspection and marketing photos

     2021-07-10 Johnson inspection

     2022-12-30 Johnson Move Out Inspection

     2022-01-15 After cleaning, new marketing photos

1726 Mayberry St

     Common areas

          2020-01-01 Common area inspection

          2020-06-10 Wind storm and roof damage

          2020-09-06 Stairwell painting           

     Apartment 1

          2020-01-01 first inspection and marketing photos

          2020-04-03 Rhenquist abandoned

          2020-04-12 after cleaning, new marketing photos

     Apartment 2

     Apartment 3

     Apartment 4

I hope that helps!

This is something we make sure we do every time. Definitely take lots of pictures (especially of the appliances, since we've had instances where these were switched out by the tenants). We also do a video of each room, that way we can always refer to it once they move out. As far as storing these goes, we just have a dedicated hard drive to save all these. 

I haven't gotten my first property yet but I am currently putting a lot of effort into preparing for it. Yesterday I went to a lender to talk to a loan officer on how to prepare myself to get qualified right away on my first property. He told me that I need a little bit longer of a credit history (I am 21 and didn't start building credit until last year), to keep my debt to a minimum (I essentially have 0 debt except the $50 I keep on credit cards to build my credit each month), and to study the market I want to invest in. 

Other than that I am reading every book/listening to every podcast I can from Bigger Pockets and others. I am putting together my "plan of attack" as a landlord. By "plan of attack" I just mean what I would allow and now allow, how I would screen my tenant, how lenient I would or would not be, etc. I also have settled on what strategy I would like start with, but I am still trying to pinpoint the exact area I want to invest into. I am thinking either Arizona or Texas. In a month I am taking a road trip to Arizona to see as many cities as possible in person, along with as many neighborhoods as possible to start narrowing down my options. 

I am still in the learning phase as I gather capital for a down payment and build my credit history, but I still keep my brain open to multiple strategies and ideas as I learn about real estate. I went as far as living in a trailer to decrease my expenses as much as possible. Just trying to make use of every extra bit of time I have in order to get my first property as quickly and reliably as possible. I have never been afraid of taking action, so actually getting the property doesn't scare me. I am more on the excited side if anything. 

I learned as I went. I had some things but not all things. When I bought my first property I rushed to form my LLC. I didn't have a website at the time or business cards. I knew contractors and had a great agent. I wish I had a CPA sooner! The key is to take action. You're going to learn new things as you go no matter what. It's impossible to know everything you're getting into when you start. But as you go, you learn and make more connections. Now i have a website, business cards, LLC, contractors, agents, ads, and lenders, but it all came little by little.