All Forum Posts by: Nichole Kinard

@Russell Holmes

Listed our land on Hipcamp! We’ll see what happens. I think we could get some bookings. The state park down the road often books up. We’ll start small and go from there. Thanks for the information and idea!

@Russell Holmes

Hey, thanks for all that! What’s the minimum we’d need on site to get started with some tent camping sites? Like I said, we only have utilities available in the front of the property and no current permanent structures on the property. 

Should also mention that the front third has power and would need septic. The back has neither. 

We own 50 acres of wooded landed in a rural setting. Eventually, we’d like to build a few houses for ourselves and extended family but that will be a lot later. In the meantime, it’s a beautiful plot of land with a nice creek running through it. It’s rural but within about 45 minutes drive of three bigger towns. Ideas to make it income-producing we have that would comply with current zoning are an event center (wedding venue, etc) and a campground (cabins and primitive). We don’t want to strip it for timber. What are some other creative things others have done with this type of land? The goal would be to have the land at least pay for itself. 

I have so many questions! I am stuck in market analysis. We want to own the business and the real estate. To pick a location, I understand I want to evaluate median income, a large population of those approaching retirement age, and a decently dense population. What I don’t understand is how to overlay all of that information to pick a good spot and I also don’t understand the appropriate thresholds for each of those indices (income, percentage in the target age group, and how dense). What resources do you use to do market analysis and what are the nuts and bolts of using those resources to actually narrow down a location?

Seems like everyone chooses Arizona 😂 but I am 100% sure assisted living is needed in Georgia too. 

@Charlie Cameron What's your podcast?

I have a lead for an off market single family home. It belonged to the seller's mother who recently died. There is currently an elderly 20-year long tenant who has taken good care of the home. He obviously wants to stay in the home but pays way under market value for local rents. In short I want to know ways that you have made deals like this work and/or any creative solutions for keeping a tenant in place. I'm not sure what all info you'd need to give relevant advice, so here's some random info about the property. 

- The seller has no interest in keeping the property (I guess that makes her a motivated seller?) but not in a rush to put it on the market because she's busy. 

- A nearby similar property just sold for $350K but was updated. This house is not updated. Local rents are only $1800-$2000 but the area is up and coming and is conveniently located. All that to say, I highly suspect appreciating home values and increasing rents in the coming years, but current rent is lagging behind home price.

-  The current tenant only pays $900 and can only increase a little because he pays with his SS income. 

- If I were to find some creative renter solution and low-ball the market rent at $1700, I could only put in about $180K total assuming a conventional mortgage to generate acceptable cash flow.

So, apart from increasing rent and managing the property myself what are ways that I could make something like this work? How could I create a win-win for the seller and myself? Creative financing options? Other things an inexperienced real estate newbie wouldn't think about? When negotiating with the seller, what are things that make it worthwhile to buy in an area where rents are lagging behind home price? Is there a good opportunity hidden somewhere in here? Maybe I'm too hopeful but I don't want to pass it up if there's a way to make it work for me. 

@Chris Seveney Thanks, that’s helpful and helps me assess my situation a little better. My dad lives in the area where I want to buy and is a contractor, but maybe with the time my husband and I have personally, we would consider a smaller, more cosmetic repair on a house rather than jumping into our first big rehab.

@Nicholas L. Thanks for responding. That is a little discouraging, but I do appreciate you being frank.

So if I do have a sum of money in savings to invest and don’t need a primary home, what could I do with it in real estate? Doing nothing with it even where the market is right now feels unacceptable, so I want to find a way to get into the game. Just gotta figure out where to start. What do you think would legitimize getting into buying LTRs despite the market? More time and attention to offer to it? Ways to finance it with lower interest rates? What if I can give several months to it? I want long-term investments not necessarily immediate cash flow and I want to start now.

We could consider a house hack but we have 4 kids in tow. I wouldn’t want to live in a house with 4 kids that weren’t mine! I wonder if anyone out there has successfully house-hacked with a family.

@John Mason what do you mean by invest in the side?