All Forum Posts by: Leslie Anne Morris

I buy stuff based off of my portfolio performance and historical market conditions. Of course I had to do something to get to that point. I’d recommend working with an agent who is also an investor in the market you’re considering. When I got invested in Pigeon Forge I was able to access historical rental reports that the city puts out because it’s a vacation market and they track that sort of thing. 

 Oh!!! Ha ha ok. Got it. It notified me and I thought it was a reply to my comment specifically. 

I didn’t read all the answers because I’m literally boarding a flight. But, I would do the smallest down payment that I was personally comfortable with. Get into one deal. Get your feet wet. 

In order to pick market you can either go with what excites you or go with top performance metrics (see my bias here). 

If beach resonants and will add some additional satisfaction and quality of life stuff then do it. It would be more like a lifestyle asset. 

If you plan to self manage get a coach and pay to learn. Don’t mess around with teaching yourself. Keep the remaining cash as cash reserves for now, maybe do some forced appreciation or value add and get the property that’s in the best location with the lowest price per sq ft. Get an agent who is also an investor in the exact thing you are looking to buy who has a good performance record. 

Do it for a minute and make sure it works - weeks / months / years - you’ll know. Then 10x in same market since now you have your process and team. OR you could pivot to another market but only if that will bring you personal satisfaction and you won’t be self managing. That’s my two cents!

I’ll go against popular belief here and tell you my recent deal. Dec 2022. Paid top of market price, ended up with 10% rate at closing table - couldn’t back out. No contingency would allow that. Would have been in breech of contract. Closed. Forced appreciation - this is key - had my remodel / rehab team kill it in design and value add.

But then literally two months later a drunk driver hit my cabin. Tragic. No cash flow for 2 months. Insurance kicked in thank goodness - interviewing my agent on YouTube tomorrow.
So then we are back up and running and it’s literally all rainbows. Just filmed an episode of a massively popular TV show there. I signed an NDA so can’t disclose what it is yet but it will be airing soon. 

July did awesome but it’s my first super good month unfortunately and I had stayed there a week with my family.

Anyways, that’s my story. The key for you to takeaway would be the forced appreciation / value add. Focus on what you can do and not what you can’t. Fear will have you back out. Do keep in mind though that you’re going to need cash and cash reserves to weather that storm. So for that reason it may not be for you. Only you can decide. 

You're teaching yourself another job. Self managing STR isn't passive real estate investing. It's a hospitality business. It can be done of course, particularly if you're only 3 hours away. Once I hit 5 cabins that I owned I created a property management company. So if you plan to scale get a PM.