All Forum Posts by: Mike O'Connor

@Brendon George we absolutely do... I will shoot you a message!

Just seeing this - thanks for the post Jose Perez!

Hapeville is a great rental market, so I think that you'd end up doing pretty well on this one. I am not sure the condition of the property, but I would anticipate that you could get those rents up a touch ($1099 or so).... that would obviously be determined by the quality. The units that we lease up in that area do not sit for long at all.

Best of luck!

Mike

Hey KC - there are a bunch of great ATL specific groups. There is an in-person group that meets 1x a month on a Wednesday with the next one being tomorrow at 6:45 at the Ivy Buckhead. You should check it out. Shoot me a PM and I would be happy to shoot you more details.

Mike

Hey Stephen - I will PM you.

Hi all - my business partners and I are looking to pick up 10-20 rental properties this month in the Atlanta (and surrounding) area. Our primary focus has been on MF properties with rents sub $1k, so we are venturing into a new area where we do not have as much expertise. We are looking at properties that fit the below buy box... does anyone have any good recommendations on places to source these deals (aside from the MLS), or people I should be reaching out to? Thanks in advance!

Buy box:

- 3/1.5+

- 1950 build or newer

- $20k rehab or less

- Most metro Atlanta areas

- Rents can vary, but we prefer things that are $1,250 or higher. We will entertain anything above $1,000

Mike

@Brian Lewis there are a ton of indicators that you can look at, and you named a few. However, and you mentioned it in your post, don't get paralyzed by your analysis. The objective of your rental strategy it sounds like is cashflow (you are specifically citing multifamily). Don't overthink it - determine what your return expectations are and start looking at specific properties and running the numbers. If it makes sense, dive in! You need to make sure that you know the area you are working in well (you can talk to people who work in the market) to make sure you aren't buying in bad pockets, but there are tons of investors working in many of these large cities already, so there must be some upside to it.

Atlanta, for example, is a great city that still has great returns when compared to other major markets. Just like other cities, you need to be careful as the city is block by block and street by street. However, tons of institutional money is being pumped into the city, and those guys are doing there homework!

Give me a shout if you'd like to talk about the Atlanta market. I'd be happy to chat through it / multifamily with you.

Mike

@Leon Lee that's the one!

State Bank and Trust is also a really good one. Happy to provide names and contact info if you'd like.

Leon - yes, I did parter with a few other folks. It was myself and 3 others, so we each took 25%. I saw that as a necessary hedge since it was our first venture into multifamily. Looking back, we could have done it with less, but I am glad to have partnered with the people I did, it has helped us scale. The banks did look at our past experience and also heavily factored in the property and the debt service coverage.

The biggest challenge with finding a larger deal is that there are less of them. "Larger" multifamily properties are also very popular right now so finding a good deal is getting tougher and tougher.

Jumping in a little late here... I wouldn't worry to much about what comes first... lender, broker, deal... I would network in all of those circles simultaneously and if the right deal comes around, the chips will fall into place. The downside to using a single agent on both the buy and sell side is that agent is going to be getting a larger commission, thus they are more likely to "force" the deal. Not all agents will do this, but some will so be careful. Also, on the larger deals, it is not as common to have 6% for commission on a deal. Usually there is a smaller amount on the table and often times the buyer has to bring money for their broker. Lastly, I wouldn't shy away from looking at larger places. My first rental was a SFR and then the next property I bought was a 32 unit complex, followed by 100 units, followed by 16 units... if the deal is good, you will figure it out! The key is to build a team. I would suggest finding a business partner (or partners) that compliments your skill sets... it will help you scale. Shoot me a note - would love to chat further about what you're looking to do.

Mike