All Forum Posts by: Mark Byrge

@Matthew Stapleford I'm a huge fan of ESS along with their call center service. I'm also currently switching over to their gate system as well so that the whole setup is fully integrated. If you have an existing gate, it MAY already integrate but mine were not compatible. I'm extremely pleased with their service and their support. I can forward you my sites to checkout if interested, I believe I'm unable to post them as they will get flagged... Having the call center has really elevated our business and allows us to concentrate on expanding rather than taking day to day phone calls. They are also trained to deal with customers and are much better at it as that is all they do all day every day. They upsell tenant insurance and deal with the day to day annoyance calls as well. Highly recommended.

@Daniel Brown while I don't know if any blogs, posts, or books, I can tell you it's VERY doable as that is the model I follow. Many sellers are open to seller financing with low down payments which allow you to purchase the property and make the necessary changes required to raise the value of the property and allow you to refinance into long term financing or sell for a profit. I bought a small 60 unit in 2016 for $195k that just appraised at $380k. We currently have several others that have doubled in value since purchased. Many times you can find properties that need very little repairs and simply just need marketing and proper bookkeeping put in place. Many owners have a propensity to hide cash payments which lowers their NOI causing the value of the property to plummet. $5k of unrecorded income will result in a $62k loss of value at an 8% cap rate.

@Charles Wisniewski

Scott Meyers is a great resource as well as Mark Helm on YouTube has well over 200 videos on all things Self storage.

Good luck!

@Chris Stranad go to the Trachte website. They have cost estimators right there. Very informative website and had tons of info and calcs for all different scenarios.

@Phil Gilkerson @Scott Meyers is a great resource as well as Mark Helm has over 200 short videos on YouTube that's all things Self storage. There will be a few others that will pipe in here as well, but I have no experience with them. Scott was who got me originally thinking about storage and I've attended a few of his seminars. There's also a huge trade show in Vegas in September SSA EXPO and there is one in April'ish for the ISS Expo. Great places that will make your head spin!

Good luck! I love it!

@Liza B. I've got a 60 unit in a town of about 200 but also pull from surrounding areas. Also have a 134 unit in a town of 2500. And others similar to these. I'm currently at our 96 unit in a town of 865. It also does well with outside storage as it's close to vacation destinations in northern Michigan.

Good luck Jason! Let us know how it goes!

@Jason Black same here as well.

@Mike A. We have taken over several and have put out notifications to all our customers that we are moving to cashless and have received minimal pushback. We push the credit card system that our software provider (Easy Storage Solutions) provides, and we tell them we take checks or money orders as well.

We always use security as our main reason and that we do not want an employee having to sit on large sums of cash, and are no longer taking cash payments to provide a safe environment for our employees. If they say they cannot do credit or check, we explain that most convenient stores and post offices sell money orders.

We've never lost a customer due to it and most likely the places down the street will have the same/similar policies.

@Stone Garrett this is maybe a 1 in 100 chance, but if I'm available I will meet them. Otherwise I can give a one time use code to allow them into the property. I take their drivers license and info, and also have cameras on site to be able to monitor activity and let them know as much also.