All Forum Posts by: Nate Bell

@Ben Zimmerman

You nailed it. Couldn’t say it any better. Folks on here scoff that I cashflow $200/door on a $350k property, but it appreciates 5% per year. $200/month is practically meaningless to me; that’s noise for me at this point with 6 properties and a good paying job. $17k/year in appreciation? Yes please, more please.

The haters will say that you can’t bank on appreciation, but that’s like saying you can’t bank on the stock market going up at an average rate of 7%. I have a $200k property that loses $100/month, but has appreciated $60k in the 5 years I’ve had it. You do the math.

@Dulce Beltran I own and love my Chevy Bolt. It is so much fun to drive! I also put up a 7.4 kw solar power system on the shop next to my house to power it. With all the federal and state rebates, it’ll work out to the same cost of a very cheap Kio Rio or something like that in the end. No one here has mentioned yet that you’re doing the environment a favor, there’s value in that, and that it takes people like you and me adopting the technology to convince others to do so. Here in the PNW, most or our electricity comes from hydropower, so my car is almost entirely greenhouse free (yes, I know, the salmon are suffering). It’s money well spent in my mind.

@Brian Sullivan

Don’t walk away from your $9K at this point. You’ve got a new house in what seems like a desirable location- not a terrible situation to be in. Joe V hammers on the cash flow approach and has a tendency to make people feel foolish for doing anything other than what he does. Yeah, you’re not crushing it on this one, but you’re still going to have someone paying a mortgage for you on a nice place that should need little maintenance. I’d keep it and just try to do a little better next time. You’ll look back on this as a success overall and a minor blip right now.

@Joey Allison

Pay off or sell the cars. Then, wait for the economy to dip a little more, and then go find a partner(s) to invest your cash in a large multi family deal.

@Chris Mason

@Jay Heinrichs

I can demonstrate by email record that this lender waited five weeks after I gave them direction to initiate an actual application, send me disclosures, etc, but told me multiple times,” yep, we’re on it, everything’s fine, moving right along.” And yes, I escalated it to supervisors and they immediately went into Cover Your A$$ mode.

Columbia Bank, Mellisa Case... don’t go there.

@Nate Bell

adult *care* home

I’ve purchased an abandoned adult car home and am going to be converting it into eight 1+1 apartments. Cheap property, huge rehab costs. It’s in a smoker-friendly state and the units will be about $550/month not including utilities. My question is this- should I start out trying to get non-smoker tenants? How long did you hold out before you acquiesced? Does it make a difference if I put smokers upstairs and non-smokers downstairs. In a perfect world, I’d not allow it. It’s hard to tell what would happen long term- will non-smokers ultimately not want to live there because smokers are in the building, eventually converting it to all-smokers and destroying my investment?

I know, it’s a little dramatic. But really, I’ve had a lender just totally underperform, lie, dodge, stall, and then blame me, and I’m about to miss a closing date as a result. I’m now either gonna lose my earnest money and all the time and money I’ve invested into getting my offer accepted, or I’m gonna have to pay through the nose for a hard money loan to get the property. This group of misfits is gonna cost me $3k-$8k. This is a mid-size bank in the Pacific Northwest.

Other than just not doing business with them anymore, and telling all my friends, is there anything else I can do to make their lives as miserable as they’ve made mine? Better Business Bureau? Social Media? Flaming bags of poo?

@Oren Markowitz

Be careful here- what you're talking about doing isn't a true BRRR. David will buy a property with cash and pay for the rehab with cash, and then finance it. He only pays for closing costs of the loan once- you'll pay twice. I'm working through a $200K loan right now, and the closing costs are about $7500. Paying that twice, on a low-value property, would hurt.

Also, make sure whatever lender you’re working with for the refi has a low or no seasoning period.

@Russell S.

This also costs you $300/hr for someone who’s just bluffing. I’d ignore it and they’ll lose interest.