All Forum Posts by: Robert Arquilla

@Candice T.

Candice,

Select neighborhoods yes. That’s where my rental is.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

@Roselin G.

Like others have said you should be able to get a detailed scope of work from him which is different than a price break down.

I can somewhat see his point of not wanting to give that. He’s probably afraid that you’ll take that to another builder and say can you beat these numbers.

Is he the only person who gave you a quote on your project?

I would suggest a couple different ways of dealing with it.

1. Reassure him you aren’t going to take his numbers to another builder and that you picked him because he’s a reputable builder and you want to work with him but you just want to add or subtract some work from the project. See why that does. If that doesn’t work try option 2.

2. Play hard ball and tel him you’ll get other bids on the project then and chose between quotes that way.

3. Just find someone else and tell them your expectations about a price breakdown before they come to look at your project.

Good luck

Hello everyone!

  My wife and I and our 2 young kids currently live in Ohio.  My wife is very family oriented and her family as well as my family is 10 minutes away from where we currently live, except for her sister who lives in Florida.  Well over the past couple months I wanted to explore other job opportunities with a recruiter just to see what else is out there and what the market would pay me. Well the recruiter sent me an opportunity but it mentioned 10-15 years experience so he said yeah that would probably be an issue for me as I only have 6 years so I didn't go through with it.  

About 2 weeks later he called me back and said they wanted to meet with me anyway.  I ended up doing well in the interview and now they want to fly me to Savannah GA to do a site visit and additional interview with that team so I'm assuming that I am probably in a good spot to get the job. My wife wasn't too happy about it and her having to move away however the job is almost double my current salary so she wouldn't have to work anymore and we would be within driving distance to her sister. Needless to say she's warming up to the idea because she can quit her job which has been stressing her out over the last couple years as a teacher.

We would be saving more money each month even with her not working and the increased house payment.  On top of that I'm hoping to rent out our primary residence mainly to have an exit strategy if this job somehow didn't work out we would have a place to come back to and wouldn't have to buy another house in this still somewhat inflated market.  But it should also bring in a decent amount of cash flow as well, and there is equity in it if we ever needed to sell.  My mother in law is a realtor so I'm hoping she can assist with renting out primary residence as well as the other rental we have and I can just pay her a finders fee. 

My long term goal is to build a real estate portfolio that would allow me to quit my job and go full time into real estate, while allowing my wife the flexibility to choose the work she wants to do or continue to not work.  My concerns are now she will not have a retirement through her employer which puts a lot of responsibility on me to make sure real estate works out and we can build enough for retirement.  I just feel like I'm behind as far as retirement savings goes because I was in the military and couldn't save much while in then got out and went to school so I missed out on 7-8 years of saving and market gains.  

While I think this can be a great opportunity I'm wondering what everyone else is thinking as an outsider looking in?  What would you do? Anyone have kids (4, 7) that they moved to a new school, how did that go? Anything I maybe haven't thought of? Anyone live in Savannah that could tell me about unexpected costs I might run into?

As always I appreciate everyone's input! 

 Shane thanks for the validation. I don’t think the Airbnb market here is very popular but it seems like there would be enough people that visit the park that would make it worth it. That is as long as the silo home idea doesn’t cost a fortune. My thinking is I could be the one Airbnb everyone wants to book when they do come. 

I agree with the notice.  How much longer is the lease?

Hello all! 

A little about me to frame the post.  I have been working in commercial construction for almost 6 years now.  Last year I bought my first single family rental (B- neighborhood) after about 5 years of listening to BP podcasts and it has been doing great.  Very good cash flow and it has definitely appreciated over the year I had it.  I just went through a tenant turn over and it went pretty well.

Now my grand plan. I have found some land that is zoned for multi family and I recently heard about the VA 0 down Construction Loan. This has me very interested in moving out of my primary residence and building a silo home or duplex on this property. When I do this I would rent out my primary residence which is in a A neighborhood and would probably net 400-500 per month in cash flow. A little bit of background about my area, It's a small rural town about an hour from Cleveland and 75 mins from Pittsburgh. We have a small state park that about 2 million people visit each year (this number surprised me). A lot of people come to camp and fish there. There are a couple air bnbs that seem to do okay but there is nothing unique about them.

What I'm asking for is help/thoughts/ideas with this:

1. Has anyone had any experience with building silo homes? Any ideas on cost per square foot? Im thinking if I create a unique listing on Airbnb (After I live in this for a year to meet the VA loan requirements) I can create a competitive advantage by having such a unique property and demand a higher price per night as well as keep the occupancy up.

2. My other thought was to build a duplex or triplex on the lot but I think that would be a little more expensive and not quite sure if it would cash flow.  I have a lot of research to do on this and talking to a couple builders to pin down the details.

3. Another thought/ long term plan I had was to make it a mini unique airbnb multifamily as in, have a silo home, then maybe put an airstream on it and lastly maybe an A-frame cabin.  Its a little over 5 acres so there is some space that I think 2-3 places would work.

Thanks for the input!

 Ill check that out.  I saw something that mentioned if the housing is federally funded (which mine rental is not) i would have to provide and front the cost for accommodations but I don't think that applied to me.  

Great info though thanks for sharing I'll check out that link.

 Michael,  

Do you recall what modifications the landlord would be responsible for?  I'll have to look into that more.  I always heard that if modifications were needed I would need to allow the tenant to make them but at their expense.  And like you said they would be responsible for returning to the original condition upon moving out.

Good points though I will ask if they require any accommodations and see how that will work out if they do

 Nathan,  

Thanks for your input and back story.  I will definitely ask for references and try to vet the company thoroughly.  It sounded like in the past they were great (living in the same house for 10 years last time) but I want to hear from that landlord as well as from others as well that this company has placed clients in.   

Again thanks for the help!