All Forum Posts by: Matthew Song Loong

Relocated to Zurich in May. Besides that I need time to raise capital for a next move in RE, I also want to wait to see what prices are going to do the coming year or so: They're already declining in quite some countries...

As for renting out, the tenant has quite some protection, which gives the landlord more responsibilities too, such as getting rid of the snow from the pavement around this time of the year...

Yup, got a bit of cryptos too, it seems that high net worth individuals/investment funds are moving into there too.
So far it's making money, with a volatile correction here and there...

The lockdowns were good moments to profit from weaker currency in Czech. Turkish Lira must also have weakened quite a bit, although they often prefer payments in Euros when I was there last year. Otherwise, I hear it's quite nice there...

Bonjour :-)

We have a house in the French countryside, keeping it up for vacation rental, a nice vacation for the family and for social distancing during the covid crisis...

Quite expensive, but it's able to maintain itself at least

Anyways, I believe you do renovation to sell it at a better price?

I know a guy in Southern France, my dad used to do business with his parents and I'm dealing with his brother now.
Not sure if "his" region has high yield properties (I'm there more "for fun"), but I can always connect you

Bonjour :-)

Property Management is quite a broad term: from cleaning/maintaining the property yourself with a bucket of water and a toolbox, to keeping whole apartment blocks up, running and financially sound.
In Europe, the ROI is often low (unless you're doing renovation projects maybe, but these can have other challenges), which forces to keep operating costs low too: DIY as much as possible, or as cheaply as possible.

In some cases, it may be harder, if the property is a bit further away etc. In that case, it also depends on the type of property, but for short term rental, there's the rental agency with all the contacts: just pay for whatever has to be done... May not be too profitable, but heck, it's always nice to have a vacation home abroad :-)

I'll most likely miss like 20% year-over-year here in Europe (Czech Republic, France), compared to a non-covid year, which doesn't sound too bad to me, as hotels are having hard times now.

Yes, this is one of the moments when I understand why banks are so risk-averse, and how one can still benefit from it. I do realise I'm also a bit lucky to rent out with lower risk, and lucky that people still love their vacations :-)

Oh yes, tons and tons of people being afraid of the responsibility, the so-called risk, the fear of not getting paid rent... Heard all the "excuses" all the time... What would they rather do? Have millions to buy a high-profit business. Yeah, dream on.

Let stay asleep & keep on dreaming though: less competition for me :-p

After calculating my business plan, I found out that taxation is quite killing for business.

I wanted to set up an LLC to get more capital, to get around the 45% limitation for individuals. I'll then be able to get two apartments.
What happens then is that I have one privately owned apartment (can't move to LLC due to mortgage), and an LLC with 2 apartments.

The separate "entities" (sole proprietor and LLC) generate less income than the VAT / Sales Tax threshold.
However, both entities combined will. This of course will force me to charge VAT, making my "product" less attractive etc.

I didn't intend to "disaggregate" with a company on purpose, but there may be a chance the tax office thinks differently...
Especially if I'll have to use private money to (potentially) back-stop the negative cashflow of the LLC...
Anyone any experience with being Sole trader AND having an LLC to rent out property?

Located in Czech Republic here, 5 years of experience, just in case it may help :-)