All Forum Posts by: Lior Solomon

Thanks for the info @Chris C.

I will look into it.

Thanks @Chris C. for the info.

Are you investing in Albany? Troy etc?

Thanks,

Lior

Welcome @Greg W. to BP

I guess it makes two of us.

I'm also looking for MF in Charles Village, couldn't find anything exciting though yet.

I'm also thinking of buying a SF in that area and turning it to a MF. Still could get a hold of what is the timeframe for zoning a SF to MF.

Good luck!

Lior

@J Scott thanks for all the info

I definitely picked a lot of info to think about.

It seems that a mentor can speed up the learning curve and ease up the pain :)

Thanks again!

@Ned Carey thanks for the feedback. what are your favorite neighborhoods?

That makes perfect sense @J Scott

To summarize, I would break the problem into three:

1. As for the property as a cash flow I overlooked the numbers assuming that I can add another unit to turn it into a positive cash flow. I also ignored the fact that a students apartment with one bathroom might cause a lot of damage.

I will keep your advise and @Scott McClelland and keep on looking for properties that either for sale on a lower price in the neighborhoods around (which are probably less hyped and overpriced already) in case I want to strategize this purchase for cash flow.

2. As for appreciation forecast I should add more data points such as building trends (any idea where can I get this info?), in order to prevent an overproduction scenario.

Do you think I should get info about how easy is it to get construction permits in a certain market? is that a factor?

Let me know if there is more data points I should add.

3. the 2nd bullet should effect the 1st bullet only if there is a strong proven facts that appreciation for this property will outpace inflation.

I'm coming from the software industry and I truly believe it is possible(and probably there are veteran investors already doing so) to create an algorithm and automatically scan the market and the data sources for trends based on known data points exactly as the stock market does.

My sincere thanks

Lior

I hear you @J Scott

Can you please elaborate a little about how did you picked up your first market and what are the tools and sources you are using to analyze and target a market?

Here are the parameters I was following and the sources I used, I would really appreciate your feedback before I go in shame back to the drawing board:

1. Population above 200K - just because I assumed that they will survive recessions better then suburbs.

2. Owners / Renters - the ratio between renter and owners in the targeted market. I got this info from the census bureau

3. Unemployment rate trend - looking for markets that seems to be recovering and would lead to more population coming in. I got this info from the census bureau

4. Taxes rate - I used neighborscout for this

5. Education system - I used neighborscout for this

6. Crime rate - I used neighborscout for this

7. Average salary over average property value - I used neighborscout for this

8. Vacancy rate - neighborscout (here baltimore gets a really low score)

9. Appreciation rate in the past 10 years, 5 years and last year - census bureau

10. Average rent over average property value - average cap rate - neighborscout

11. Distance from my location - I thought I should start with something that won't require more then 2 hours train, though I'm not planning to manage it myself but using a PM.

I gathered all the cities around and scored them on a spreadsheet and that's how I started focusing into the city to find the right neighborhood.

Again I'm really sorry for the green questions but I'm taking my first baby steps and your feedback is really valuable.

Lior

@J Scott I can support my assumption by the following resources:

Population growth:

http://www.bizjournals.com/baltimore/news/2013/03/14/maryland-sees-population-increases-in.html

Unemployment rate:

http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z1ebjpgk2654c1_&met_y=unemployment_rate&hl=en&dl=en&idim=city:PA240050:PS420950&fdim_y=seasonality:U

I really appreciate your time J.

Lior

Welcome @Dorian Mccray

I'm also new to BP and looking to invest in Baltimore MD.

Good luck!

Lior

@J Scott Charles Village neighborhood gain 37% in the past 10 years in total and lost 19% in the past 5 years(Neighborscount.com).

Considering the unemployment rate going down in the past two years in Baltimore and the market in general I thought it's a good idea buying now and enjoy the ride in the next couple of years.

Does that makes sense?

Thanks @Scott McClelland

I'll try to look around CV neighborhoods probably there are less expensive properties in a walking distance.

It takes sometime to get used to the fact that you are looking for an investment and not a place to live in. I believe that's part of what attracts me to CV, it's a really nice place that I wouldn't mind living there myself.

Again, thanks for the reality check, and the patience for newbies