All Forum Posts by: Bob Collett

Paul, good luck on your new venture. Before you get too deep into it, please note that NORMS does NOT allow agents to use the MLS feed on their websites. Thus your market is effectively limited to brokers only.

Good luck.

Bob

Kevin... great question. I too would like to see some testimony form folks who have purchased form a turrnkey provider and sustained 5 to 10 year ROI consistent with the advertised 1st year ROI.

Jason, thank you for your service.

Our strongest assets are our people and their cultures.... the number of authentic ethnic establishments. We have bakeries and sausage shops and import shops and of course the famous West Side Market. We have strong first generation immigrant communities... About 7000 Albanians for example... Ukranians and Poles as well as many form other Baltic states. A strong Hispanic community, a Puerto Rican community, Guatemaleans, Hondurans. Our rich Arabic community has both Christian and Muslim form Egypt, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon and the rest of the Arab world. We have Africans especially form West African countries, Asians form Cambodia, South Asia, Vietnam, Laos.The list goes on and on. (There are plenty of others, but these are among those that make up our rich cultural fabric). I love renting to first generation Americans because I'm 2 to 3 years, I will be selling them a house!

The three best yet least appreciated assets are the Cuyahoga Valley National Park and the Cleveland Metropark system with their hundreds of miles of hiking and biking trails, and Lake Erie... one of the worlds great sources of fresh water, clean, a mecca for fisherman and boating enthusiasts.

Cleveland is the only major city in the country with a national park within its boundaries... no kidding.

Welcome.

Allison

Welcome to Cleveland. I find that the easiest common denominator for comparing properties is to assume all cash investment for the purpose of analysis. Then, a 12% to 13% ROI (net income after expenses/total amount at risk) in a good neighborhood would be a success assuming you are not loaded up with deferred maintenance. Let me know if you want any neighborhood opinions.

Good luck.

Bob Collett

I was very pleased with the photographer I used in Independence for my head shot. He was very reasonable. Let me know if you want his name and contact.

Lisa, Welcome to Cleveland. I am a licensed property manager and have lived in Cleveland my entire life. I am happy to answer any questions you might have about the good areas, the bad and the ugly. I am also happy to answer questions about the best way to invest here in Northeastern Ohio. Cleveland is a great place to live and also to invest, but there is also quite a bit of hype, and many investors being sold a bill of goods that simply do not pan out as expected. As a property manager, I often inherit properties from bad actors and work hard to try to get underperforming properties up to par.

Good luck

Go Tribe.

Bob Collett

Charles... another approach is for you to buy the home, do the rehab,etc.  Make sure that market value includes your acquisition cost, plus holding cost (taxes, insurance, etc), plus your rehab cost, and then about a 25% to 35% profit margin on your total investment. This is about what you would (or should) expect to make on your own flip.

You can structure the deal as an option to buy the house upon completion for a certain amount as calculated above. The cost of the option would be an amount to cover you if they back down (example: $10,000 or 10% of the expected final price).  This way, if they back down for any reason, they loose the "option" amount, which will the allow you to sell their "custom" home to someone else and have less risk.

I am not an attorney, so make sure you get an attorney if you decide to go this route. I am sure one or more will comment on this idea for you.

If the numbers work, I would do this deal myself!

Good luck.