All Forum Posts by: Kyle Parks

Cleveland rents can definitely be outsized but the deals are not what they used to be pre pandemic. My first purchase was a lakewood duplex for 110,000 and we hard negotiated it down from 115. Little did we know at the time 8 years later it would be "worth" triple that. 

Everyone in Cleveland loves THEIR neighborhood. I'm biased. I love Lakewood. I could have lived wherever but i love this city. Unfortunately its become far less punk rock since pandemic price skyrocket. 

My advice is get a real estate agent who is also an investor, make sure to walk the properties yourself (if that means flying into town that couple of days and flight cost may save you tens of thousands, the number of out of state investors I have met who are up **** creek without a paddle are numerous)  and run your numbers forward backward side to side for every strategy. do you have a back up plan to your back up plan? 

IMO Real estate investing is FUN. I LOVE this ****. but its also HARD. Realiy Hard. 

@Tom Grieshammer I own a duplex in Lakewood that is an airbnb and does great. I also manage 8 other units in Lakewood, all perform well. Also a few in Cleveland, Lorain and Cleveland Heights. I own long term rentals in Cle and Elyria , D neighborhoods where street selection is king. 

Cleveland in a general sense is a minefield, if you buy on the wrong street you will get your legs blown off.  

Lots of people love ohio city and tremont. I much prefer Lakewood. I think Ohio city got ALOT of money put into it during the pandemic but it still kinda sucks IMO  - W25 is great but lorain development has slowed / halted and detroit is still a used car lot past hingetown

I also personally believe Cle property is currently over valued for 'plug and play' deals (duplexes in lakewood 300k? people dont have $1700 a month for a 2/1)  

If you have any specific questions reach out via DM i may be able to steer you in the right direction 

 You can definitely make 15-20% more with MTR the question is not if you will make more, its all based off of execution and the property you are trying to do it with. The name of the game is 1/1s set up for nurses. 

 The realest take on the greater Cleveland market. 

My best deal to date was a beat up single family in Elyria. Out of state investor, turn key. They owned it for a couple years from what I could piece together. House would have been worth about 70 except for the fact that the previous tenants completely destroyed the place. I got it for 27. We took a full 40 yard dumpster worth of **** out of the basement, cleaned smeared feces off the walls, had to replace like 5 sheets of drywall. Paid interior, exterior, refinish floors ect. The place was not great before these people moved in (from the photos on zillow) but was a biohazard when they moved out. 

Most of these managment companies exist to put anyone in the unit and get their 10%. Lots of stupid money coming into Cleveland. Teaming with a "Realtor" is not a winning ticket. You need someone who knows the neighborhoods, has been through the winters and embraces the blight. My 2 cents anyways. 

EDIT : The reason this deal was a home run for us was that we did all the work ourselves. If we had to hire a contractor it would have been a bust. Easy massive value add. 

 Reminds me of my first DIY reno. 2nd floor clawfoot. Took 20-30 min with a sledge then came out in giant "shards". It's funny thinking of all the work we did when my wife and I started without any tools. 

As for the tub - there's a product on the market called ECOPEL. It's like 150 on Amazon and does a decent job of coating a bathtub. Used it a few times on cheaper rentals, results were great.

Now we remove all cast iron tubs when we purchase properties. These things always have issues and im quite frankly over trying to solve them down the road. far easier when we don't have tenants or airbnb guests.

Anyone but Truebooks, they scammed me. 

I can't tell you who to hire, but i can tell you who not to hire. 

Steer clear of TrueBooks out of las vegas. They screwed me out of $6,500 AND i had to hire another firm. best of luck

@Dave McLean

To add to james' comments

Tons of people seemed to be speculating during the pandemic and thought prices could never go back down. Right now seems to be lots of people stuck and stubborn. Cleveland is a minefield I suggest you come visit before you buy. My best deal so far was a tenant trashed house owned by out of state investors. I have nowhere near the experience of but from my own experiences it seems these smaller PM companies try to get anyone with a pulse into your unit and when it gets trashed they charge you again to fix it up.

There's tons of upside to investing here but make sure you do your homework

@Bob Stevens

For a mid range furnace (carrier) I just got one put in for $3200. Inflation has prices on equipment up 30%.

Painting a house that size I would guess around 1500-2k+ paint

@Ana Franchi

Just saw your second message. You need all that in writing. Business is business.