All Forum Posts by: Ken Nyczaj

For anyone whose interested I'm doing my first marketing campaign tomorrow. Nothing huge, but it's a start:

Sending out 200 5 x 7 blue pastel envelopes with yellow letters, some handwritten in pencil and some using font that looks handwritten in red ink. Stamps will be first class stamps, mixture of USA Flag and Animals. Return address will be included on all mailings with the address being that of my LLC's Resident Agent (company name will not be listed).

Lists being sent to: Landlords going through or that have gone through eviction in the past 6 months. Driving for Dollars candidates in my local community (exterior physically distressed properties). Scanning county property viewers in neighborhoods I know well, looking for people who bought in the 80's or 90's for a low dollar amount- I'm assuming they have a lot of equity if they bought the property for $80,000 or less, 20 to 30 years ago. Yes I'm fishing a little, but hey I like to fish.

All yellow letters say a simple message "if you know anyone interested in selling, please call me at" It was a technique I heard on the second podcast about not being too assertive in your direct mail message. Each letter has my cell phone number and I will be taking calls directly, should be intersting to see how this goes.

I'm keeping track of mailings on separate lists (type of motivated seller) on an excel spreadsheet and plan to mail out once a month. The goal is to close on two properties from these 200 letters. 1 property to my LLC for buy-and-hold, 2nd property to my LLC for fix and flip, working with two different sets of investors for each strategy.

Also, will be doing an EDDM in the next week or two, targeting whole communities we are interested in. Three separate communities, around 3000 doors.

Thanks for reading. Will update. Questions appreciated.

@Account Closed

Call your counties Planning and Zoning Committee. I had a similar question last week to split a SFH into a 3 bed 1.5 bath and an in-law suite 1Bed 1Bath. Unfortunately, our offer was rejected but on the positive side, the county said it was OK with proper permits. Since it's already a duplex that area is considered R2 zoning, multifamily must lie in a R3 zone, but these are all questions your county can answer.

Our county gets more strict if you add additional non permeable structures to the existing structures, but we weren't planning to and it sounds like you don't plan to add-on as well. An additional impact fee may apply to do this.

Hope this helps.

@Josiah Collins The buyers could be direct marketing to sellers and making an offer w/o a real estate agent. Then taking the offer to a PML or HML or Bank to see if the financing can be approved.

@Jonny Morris

I was in your same position at first. Trying to set up multiple entities before I even had my deal flow/ marketing goals established. Long story short, my business partner and I set up one LLC to buy and hold all properties. We were getting ahead of ourselves by thinking you need one LLC to purchase, rehab, rent, collect rents, property manage and another LLC to hold assets. Our LLC was set up and established a few weeks ago and we have just begun our marketing campaign. Find a portfolio lender in your area, we found one and the rates were OK- 5/5 ARM or 10 year fixed at 5.5%.

I think one LLC is fine until you get up and running, then it may be a good idea to set up a separate LLC to then hold all properties in a different LLC and do the managing in the second. Creating multiple LLC's is easier in a state that allows series LLC's which mine does not, not sure about yours.

I would definitely use an attorney and do it right. If you're thinking about real estate as a lifelong financial investment, than $500 to set up an operating agreement is a must.

@Russell Brazil

Thank you for your responses. I'm going to call the planning and zoning administrator and ask a few questions. The street this house sits on has a mix of multi family, single family, and commercial properties with businesses on the first floor and apartments up top.

Due to the types of structures surrounding, it makes me think this area is permitted to have R2/ R3 zoning. Next store is what looks like a large house but has four apartments built within. They do all have street numbers and actual addresses though.

We would more or less be creating an in-law suit.

@Russell Brazil

Could you elaborate? The bank that gave our LLC the pre-approval on this property knows of our plan and hasn't backed out on financing the deal. Should I call the county planning and zoning department?

My business partner thinks if we call it an in-law suit there shouldn't be any problems.

Hello everyone, One of the houses I’ve had my eye on lately has the potential to be split into two separate dwellings. Currently, the house is a 4 bed 1.5 bath. And the back master bedroom was an addition built on at some point which is approximately a 20 x 20 room. It already has a rear entrance built in with steps leading up to the door making it a prime candidate for this. My equity partner who is a GC seems confident he can make this into an efficiency with a full bath, kitchenette, washer/ dryer and place for a bed. We would take down another wall to increase its SF to About 500SF without losing the 3 bed 1.5 bath on the main side of the house. So one side is 1 bed 1 bath around 500SF and the other side 3 bed 1.5 bath around 900SF. Anyone have experience with this? We are investing in Maryland. I’d imagine the electrical and plumbing needs to be done by a licensed contractor which isn’t a problem- he has subs that are licensed and he is a licensed GC. Any additional permits need to split a house? Plus whole house is on oil heat which I don’t believe can be split with two separate meters so our plan is to block the duct to the efficiency side and put in its own heating element, Propane wall unit or Electric wall unit. Efficiency side Tenant will be billed separately for this unit. One last thing! We must cut out the sidewalk for a second driveway which gets the county involved. Anyone have experience calling the county to cut and ramp out a sidewalk for a second driveway? On top of all these expenses the numbers do work especially with the two incomes. We’re estimating around $40,000 in expenses with him doing the work. We are 50/50 equity partners and he is very experienced so I trust his numbers. Thank you

Podcast #39 "Dirt Cheap Land Flipping...."

The name is deceiving and I thought it wouldn't apply to buy and hold investment, but it honestly had some of the best marketing advice for any investor and Seth Williams had tips that nobody else uses.

It really is worth listening to every single podcast no matter what the titles is.

@Keegan Beck

In the BP Podcast 2, the person who was being interviewed had a good tip to not sound too aggressive- something like- "I buy houses in your area, if you know anyone who would like to sell please call me at..."

That why it's not a direct market to them and they may feel more at ease answering your message. Just a thought...

None yet. Recently created a multi member LLC and have been looking at houses the past two weeks and will start making offers after this weekends showings.

In my written business plan, my short term goal of this year is to have 2 SFH as rental properties within a 15 mile radius of where I live. Luckily, my business partner is a licensed GC and can do the PM while I'm out of town for work. I'm definitely hungry for my first one!