All Forum Posts by: Mackal Smith

Great response Maggie.

Westen, Maggie is right on. Do you want passive income from buy and hold or are you looking to flip or wholesale? All of these are open to you in the St Louis market and fortunately, BP has great advice for anything you want to do.

I'm a buy and hold type guy mostly in South City, in fact I just spent the whole afternoon with my realtor looking at properties and found 2 I'm putting offers out on.

Feel free to ping me. (AND spend a lot of time on the forums and listening to the podcasts). There's really no better place to learn than BP...

good luck!!

Hey everyone,

So this is my 3rd (and 4th) property acquisition in St Louis. I'm a local investor and really love the 2 properties I have. I've always said I really want to own properties I would not mind living in if I had to. This goofy property is sort of an exception to the rule however the numbers look so good that it is hard to pass up. That's where I'm looking for feedback.

This is a 3 family contained in 2 different buildings. I "L" shaped building (single story with a crawl space - no basement) has 4 bedrooms 2 baths and rents for 800/mo. The second is a 2 bedroom with dining room that rents for 550. The third is a separate house on the same lot that rents for 650 (2 bedroom, but huge rooms). One bedroom is downstairs, the second is upstairs but it is a gabled roof so the bedroom has minimal headspace on the sides *and* has a bonus space which could be a crib space, playroom, or another bedroom.

That is not the weird one though. That "L" shaped property almost looks like it might have been a series of 1 bedroom flop rooms at one point for migrant workers or something. Each room has an exterior door and they all eventually make up the 4 bedroom. To be honest, that 4 bedroom could easily be turned into 2 large 2 bedroom 1 bath units (there are already 2 baths and the plumbing is in place for another kitchen.

Here's the thing. The whole complex is 48K. So the numbers look great!. I had my property manager walk the property with me and the area is very blue collar with lots of families (definitely not blighted) but in this neighborhood, it is obvious that 75 years ago when this was built there were no building codes. You have nice looking properties setting next to less nice, but overall a B grade neighborhood. My property manager believes that she could get these rents easily.

My issue is that so far the properties I have bought are nicely laid out and easy to rent. This one is so weird it has me freaked out a little. The other thing is the buildings are obviously brick but they installed new vinyl siding in 2015. I used to install siding, so I can tell it was done well however I can't tell whether it was just cheaper to install siding that tuckpoint the entire building, and I can't tell what is underneath the siding.

I just got back from an afternoon of looking at properties. I offered on another duplex today, but I'm torn on whether to offer on this one also. Looking for advice.. how is your experience with weird properties? The thing about this one is that for the money, all the units are HUGE. It will take about 15K in repairs (new heating units and partial roof.)

Feedback welcome!!

thx

Welcome to BP Ben! I just moved from Ballwin out to St Clair MO. I'm a buy and hold investor primarily in South City. I have a few multi-family buildings now and I have offers out on a couple more. Happy to meet you for coffee some place one of these days and talk about real estate... (my favorite topic). Good luck, stick to the forums, podcasts, and blog posts here on BP. Great wealth of knowledge and a great bunch of folks always willing to lend advice...

Welcome Aaron!

I'm also from the St Louis area. I invest primarily in the city. (Specifically south city around the Dutchtown area). I'm a buy and hold investor but if something comes along to flip I'll do that too. Reach out some time and we can do coffee..

Good luck, the site, podcasts, and forums are a great way to get educated!

Well, I do them on my own (sort of...). I found a really great investor/rehabber/realtor. She and her husband are both realtors as well as owning a Property management company and rehabbing and holding (and sometimes flipping) their own properties. She is well connected with other investors here and she knows the city really well. So, sometimes she sends me properties that she knows about or that may have just hit the mls, I also have a profile set up on Listingbook with the criteria I look for and if I find something there I usually ping her as well. Sometimes she has seen the property and knows what I look for so she can help me rule it in or out. I also have friends that invest and occasionally they reach out to me. All that said, I guess I have a lot of ways I find properties.

The properties I buy generally require little work (not quite turn key, but also not a complete rehab) but no matter what they have to match what I'm looking for in terms of numbers. I always buy them cash flowing and I don't bet on appreciation at all really.

I'm not afraid to put a little work into a property right now, but until I retire in a couple of years, I'm not going to do heavy rehabs until then. Right now, I use a property manager for my rentals. They are all multi-family in the South City area. I'm buying a couple more this quarter and getting them in shape to be cash flowing well by mid year to third quarter. Ultimately in the next couple of years I should end up with about 25 units. That's really as big as I want to get. The plan is to use that extra income to augment my retirement and to travel when I retire from my current job.

Happy to help, or provide additional info...

Thanks!

mac

Hey Kristen,

I see that you are in West County. You're definitely right that out here we don't have much inventory in terms of duplex or 4 family units however, don't overlook areas closer in to the city. There are some really nice places in Dogtown and close to the CWE where you can pick up nice properties that would definitely cover most of your mortgage and are absolutely as safe and secure as West County.

For someone just starting out, there's really not a better way to get into both home ownership and investing...

Welcome Kristie,

I'm a buy and hold investor in St Louis. Ping me if I can answer questions any time. Welcome to BP. You'll get a lot of info here...

Hi Stephen and welcome to BP! I just moved from Ballwin (right near Chesterfield in Meadowbrook Country Club) out to Saint Clair MO. I got a lake house out there I just couldn't pass up...

What areas are you looking to invest in? I'm a buy and hold investor also. My properties are all in the South City Area. I have some decent cash flow properties and soon acquiring more. Reach out and touch base if you would like. I'm happy to talk about how I got my properties, cash flow, or anything else you want to know about.

Welcome!

mac

I buy properties pretty close to that area (primarily a little more east and a little south in the Dutchtown area). That price seems high to me. For 120K,  a single bedroom quad should really be pretty turn key. Your rents are pretty much right on (500 to 550 for single bedroom in that area is about right). I couldn't really tell but are they central air or window units? Do you have an accepted offer yet?

As an example, I just had a deal a couple of streets over from the nice restaurants area on South Grand. It was a 2 bedroom quad unit completely turn key with rents at 700/mo for 152K. You can make some money with your property, but be aware that in that area your property values will be about the same in 5 years as they are now. That area is good for cash flow and good for buy and hold. Just make sure that you're ok with the income *and* be sure and plan on reinvestment and vacancies. Will you have a management company take care of it for you or will you be managing it yourself?

Welcome Ronald,

I'm an investor here in STL. I have a couple of properties around the South Grand area (and offers out on a couple of others). I just sent you a connect request also. Welcome to BP!