All Forum Posts by: Nicole W.

@Marco Santarelli 

Have you invested yourself in the Norada Capital Management notes? If so, what success or loss have you had with in since Covid19? Are there other notes you feel perform better than these?

PS: Also I take into account keeping away from rent control areas.

I am in Los Angeles too. I just bought a few SFR in Central Az (Phx Metro area). I wasn't looking for duplexes but you could buy 2 SFR for around 400Gs and the rents are around 1500-1550 a piece. I know of a good real estate agent/Property mgr if you want to PM me. What I like about Az is it is only a 6 hr drive from L.A. and has low insurance (good weather) and lower taxes. Also Capital gains taxes are better. I have invested in Fl, NC, Va, Ok and Tx. They all had higher insur (hurricanes/bad weather) and taxes. I have learned the hard way to really investigate the insur/taxes and to seriously take them into account as they really cut into your bottom line.

I use TurboScan. I love it! You can turn anything into a PDF or JPEG and text or email it from the app. I use it for everything when I want to fax something. You just take a picture with the app of the pages. It will allow you to add pages so that you have the whole set of documents in one place. It is free. 

Hi, I had the same goal of getting rentals to a point where I could leave working a 9-5pm job (though I really enjoyed what I did the whole time I did it). I just preferred the idea of running my own business and putting my time into it expanding. It took me about 26 yrs to do it so I it is a lot slower than some other investors I've heard. I am also in Ca. Back 26 yrs ago I read a book (name?) that advised to price out 100 homes before making an offer so you would really know what a good or bad deal is. It suggested talking to people in the neighborhoods and if you saw someone taking down a for sale sign to ask how much it sold for, how long, etc. Back then there were not reports available like there are now. We picked areas we were interested in all over LA, out to Palmdale and to Riverside. We saw someone in Hllywood removing a sign and stopped to ask what it sold for. Turned out they were out of state investors and had given up on selling it. It was a fixer upper 10 unit apt. We bought it from them right there for a low price borrowing the funds from a family member. They wanted out and we wanted in. That was the best move EVER! A few yrs later after we were looking again and having trouble finding Ca properties that worked with my conservative cash flow/NOI #s. I wanted to hold them if the prices went higher or lower. I decided to look out of state and bought a few houses that way. The big real estate crash hit on top of the insurance (hurricanes or mold in those areas), tax rates (many non-Ca states increase taxes with values going up), rents going down (due to the huge amount of inventory) in a few areas and I sold some of those at that time as they were not cash flowing anymore (big learning curve there despite my conservativeness). I still kept a few where the weather was better (insur lower) and . My friends laughed at my conservativeness and some of them made a lot of money not being so. But over the loans have been getting paid off on the ones we kept and they cash flow has gotten way better due to values and rents going up. Due to my working schedule the apt didn't have all the renos it really needed and I had an opportunity to sell it for a great price and due to having it paid off I was able to buy some SFR for cash with great rents. It removed us from needing the city inspections and the rent control situation we were in. With having tenants who were there a long time the rents couldn't be brought up to current rates. Anyway, fast forward we are now making enough income to just do this with our time and have a lot of time to do some other interests we have. Just put your attention on it around your work schedule which is way easier to do. I myself stick with assets that cash flow and not 2nd homes etc that don't. I know there are Air BNBers. I tried shorter term rentals a long time ago and felt it took too much of my time vs just long term rentals but now things have changed and there are businesses that service AirBnBs. Anyway, hope this helps.

The pricing of housing goes up and down over the years. If something is overpriced is relatie. I find it best to just analyse the prospective purchase and if you cash flow along with putting aside 5% for vacancy and a % for maintenance (this amount varies between diff investors but I figure in at least 800.00 per property min a yr to put aside). If it cash flows, I go with it. If the interest rates are high I just refi when they go down if it makes sense. That way I can hold onto any property when the price is good or bad. I don't get caught up in emotional bidding wars either. I found some new construction homes that worked for me and the rents are really good right now all around the Phx Metro area so the higher prices are being balanced with the higher rents available at this time. 

I advise just finding deals that work for you financially (don't take part in emotional bidding wars outside what makes sense $-wise) and buying them with low interest now then should the interest go up later, keep finding deals that work for you financially and buy them with higher interest. No need to go into analysis paralysis. Get into and stay in action. Be productive. 

I bought several houses through the network in 2006. Yes, the market crashed after that and that was a national issue, not a Marshall Reddick triggered event. I did due diligence on each new home that was purchased. I knew what I was getting into and figured the rents against the expenses etc. All was fine at the time of purchase. In a short time before the crash there were extreme weather issues pushing insurance very high and then there were appraisal scammers in certain states pushing the prices up causing higher taxes. These caused a tight situation for any investor who was trying to buy and hold using the rent to pay off the expenses/mortgages. Then the real estate/mortgage crash occurred and along with it the rents decreased due to all the houses on the market. That is what occurred. It was not due to Marshall Reddick. He actually was very learned and helped pass along really great info. There was a great network of realtors/property managers. He basically had great teams set up and was ahead of his time. He also did instruction on how to ensure you made money and kept a safety margin. Anyway I sold 5 of my 9 properties that were effected the worse at that time by all those factors, I didn't take all the money out and bail like I saw others do. I actually paid everything that was due on my part by selling those with equity and paying off the ones with minus plus kept my credit high. I still have the others and they have all since recovered, tenants have been paying my mortgages and I have great equity in all of them. The rents are all much higher and have a great cash flow from them. It was my responsibiltiy to ensure what I was investing in was sound for me. I didn't forsee all those different parts having a perfect storm. I learned a lot from that and now leave a lot better margin and stopped investing in the areas that are prone to the insurances & taxes skyrocketing.