All Forum Posts by: Matthew Powell

Real estate can be a tough business. In all honestly my wife is the bull dog in our operation. From day one she handles rough situations/agents/contractors/etc way better than I do. She just sticks to her guns and gets done what needs to be done. If she feels lines are being crossed she is not afraid to let them know it. 

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment in Welches.

Purchase price: $158,000
Cash invested: $60,000

Our lovely Mount Hood Chalet is located in Welches, Oregon. This house was bought through an auction. It was our first experience using Private lending. After some elbow grease and a lot of learning, we were able to get this home back to a beautiful rentable state and on a long term loan with an ARV of $325k. Given it's location, we decided to jump on the vacation rental train. The cashflow fluctuates from month to month depending on the season.

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

My wife is a principle broker and she had a few clients that owned short term rentals at the coast. She saw the potential for investing on a short term rental based off of their experience. This particular property needed a lot of work and the auction was starting at a low price.

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

This property was listed on the MLS as an auction property. We played the back and forth bidding game through the online auction.

How did you finance this deal?

We used a Private Money lender. This was a cash only deal to the condition of the property.

How did you add value to the deal?

COMPLETE renovation. The home didn't have working electrical or plumbing. The entire home was gutted and started from scratch.

What was the outcome?

This property now acts as a short term rental on a very popular mountain in the Pacific Northwest.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

It's important to really stay on contractors and hold them accountable. We had several issues with a couple of the contractors that delayed this process by several weeks.

Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

My wife Leilani Powell made this deal possible. Without her this property would not have been in our portfolio.

@Gayle Melnick

This is something I was extremely worried about when we first started investing. I really think it depends on the lender you are using. My wife and I have been about to provide lenders enough comps for rent in the area to show that we are confident in what the proper will produce. If the property you are purchasing already had rental history we have been able to provide the lender those documents.

@T Sanch

My wife and I had the same debate before we first got started.

If your over all goal is to create passive income then you want to get started as early as possible. It’s going to take time to build yourself a portfolio large enough to fully sustain the lifestyle you want.

We have decided to focus on buying and holding using the BRRR strategy. The more properties we have under our belt the soon we will be financially free.

If we run across a flip opportunity that will give us a good chunk of change to put towards a buy and hold property we will do a flip with the strict purpose of using the profits to invest in that.

There’s a recent BP episode with Thach Nguyen that has a really lively way of explaining the benefits of this. Follow him on social media. His way of thinking and investing is a perfect model for our situation.

@Benjamin Kirkpatrick

Ah yes! There are definitely more art galleries around than previous years.

I have lived here my whole life and have seen Portland transform from the City of Roses to the City of Tents and Trash. It has all happened so quickly. That being said Portland is still a desirable City for people to be in. It’s close to the ocean, rivers, hiking, fishing, mountains etc. So there will always be a demand for people to live in Portland due to its geographic location. For us personally the city combined with the strict tenant laws is too high of a risk for us to invest. If you venture 45 minutes in any direction away from Portland you will find much more affordable opportunities that don’t come with such high risk tenant laws.

There are a lot of apartments popping up what seems to be overnight. I can’t speak for all of them, but I know a good portion are affordable housing units to help combat Portland’s homeless problem.

Home values in Portland are the highest I have ever seen. As long as there’s no crash coming in the future I don’t see values going down at all.

@Aaron Hollingshead

I am from the Portland, Oregon are and I refuse to even look at deals to hold in the area. New tenant laws have made things extremely difficult to rent. I have been able to find good deals within 80 miles of Portland. Take a look at the surrounding towns. You might be pleasantly surprised.

Portland has definitely changed a lot in the last 10 years. Things were difficult before COVID. Your venting is definitely how a lot of Portland investors feel at this time.

@Joe Splitrock The 3 sheet rule is definitely the way to go.

We also use the removable duvet covers that are much easier to wash. Having multiple of everything is always a good idea. Washing things takes time. Worst case scenario we have had to remove the laundry and finish it outside of the property do to time constraints. Having extra bedding can help you in a time crunch.

Having washable mattress tops is an absolute must in my opinion. Much easier to clean and replace a mattress top if needed.

@Eric James that’s interesting I hadn’t heard that. Would this rule only apply if I were to be purchasing a home that already has lease agreements?

@Caleb Heimsoth hmmm trying to see how people can purchase 30 rental properties in less than a year. If I could pay cash and own 30 properties free and clear in less than a year that would be fantastic.

One day I’ll be at that point, but until then each mortgage I take out will count as a debt to me. If some banks are not requiring a 2 year history for the loan then it won’t be a problem. I’ll try calling more banks and see if I can find ways around it.

@Preston Quinn as of now we are holding properties under our personal name.