All Forum Posts by: Nicholas L.

@Brad Tull

understood, but just to help you think through it, it's not about whether you can support the payment or not, it's about whether the investment makes sense.  

i'm just making numbers up, but if your rent on a property is $1000 and your all-in cost is $1500, and you're negative $500 a month forever, that doesn't make sense, even if you can afford to cover the $500 with cash from another income source.

i also agree with not using up all your cash, but that just means you might need to wait and save up more cash.  i know that's not what anyone wants to hear right now, but the huge rise in home equity over the last 5 years has made equity seem like it's free money and it's absolutely not, in fact it's extremely expensive.  

i have a HELOC myself, but if i use it it's for something short term and then paid back quickly. if you can't do that, you're just paying interest and the bank is getting rich, not you.

@Apostoli S Hillas

start with a house hack

@Paul Baldwin

makes zero sense to me - why would anyone put down that much cash just to have the higher risk of sub to?

and how would you wholesale an on market deal?  are the seller and agent even interested in that?

@Nithin Thampi

just post the numbers here and you'll get lots of feedback... no need to pay anyone

@Marcus Auerbach

i peruse condo listings in FL periodically and what i see more and more is a lot of 'low' prices with sky high monthly HOA fees. i really don't know how that plays out. @Jay Hinrichs what do you think - will those old buildings be able to recover with new owners that can better afford the HOA fees?

@Reyna Ayala

hire a PM and let them worry about it

@Brad Tull

if you're buying entirely with borrowed money it will be extremely difficult to be profitable even in the long term. especially if you're saying you'll use a HELOC - HELOC money is expensive money.  during the draw period (typically) you won't even be paying down principal unless you make extra payments.

so unless you have cash i would wait.  but let me know if i'm missing something

@Mark Towey

a couple things - from the seller's perspective, it means the seller doesn't have to wait the full 30 years to get the proceeds, and from the buyer's perspective, hopefully in that 5 years appreciation and maybe some updates have increased the value such that when you refinance you don't have to bring any additional cash.  

if you find a seller that wants to wait longer / spread payments out differently that's fine too.

@Kisaki Nicole Kaopua

rather than looking for a mentor or partner, i would start by building a network.  if you're not doing so already, i'd go to meetups and just work on making friends and business contacts.  note: some meetups will be pitch-oriented where there will be networking but also a sales pitch.  my advice: go to those, meet everyone you can, politely listen to the pitch, and don't buy anything.  i did this early in my career and it was helpful.

another option would be to build your own working group / beginner mastermind of people in your same position.  that way there's a level playing field, no one is trying to take advantage of anyone, and you can all learn from each other.  i bet there are lots of other investors in Virginia in your same position - you just need to find 3-5 of them to do this.

hope this helps - happy to help further

i used to live in Northern Virginia and still have a rental property there 

@Dan Porat

check out anything by Tarl Yarber.  he does some incredibly detailed walkthroughs on BRRRRs and flips and he covers the types of costs that are often overlooked.  you can find him on YouTube and he was on the BP podcast a few times.