All Forum Posts by: Ross Gortney

@marianne - thanks very much.  Good question on the taxes.  The short answer is...I'm not taxed differently than a resident except that I need to consolidate all of my worldwide income and tax deductions and then pay tax on the remainder.  This is part of my normal tax filing anyway because the US (not sure for other countries) now "requires" reporting of all income earned worldwide.  This they use to tax you above certain limits.

Concerning my duplex purchase - the sale price was $170,000 and I paid a 25% downpayment plus closing costs and some repairs which in total amounted to around $50k.

Happy to answer any other questions!  Thanks.

Ross

I've been reading and listening to the media from bigger pockets for the past 5 years, and at the end of 2017, I pulled the trigger to buy my first rental property.  What was unique was the fact that I live in Shanghai China, and the property that I bought is in Atlanta, GA.  I won't gloss over it and say it was super easy and everyone can do it, but I will share the facts around my situation that helps all to understand better.  My mom is real estate agent in Atlanta, and the possibility to buy the property came through word of mouth from my mom's friend and then to me.  This makes everything much easier.  I was lucky to be in contact through the seller by my family, and also this seller was really motivated to sell without going to the open market.  I bought a 2 unit duplex with 2/1 on each side.  The rent at the time was 710/unit, but after some research, I learned that the market rate is more 950/unit.  I upped the rental rate to 810 on the first contract and looking to get it up to 950 or so within 2 years.  When I can reach the market rental rate, the monthly cash flow will be around $500/mo after all expenses (mortgage, maintenance, taxes, etc) before tax deductions which will leave the bottom line higher by 1-200/mo.  It's been a promising buy in my hopes, but we will see over time.

Ross

I'm new into RE investing, I live in China and bought my first duplex in Dec 2017 in Atlanta.  Overall, I found the process much easier than expected to do it remotely.  Just about everything can be done online and by easy phone calls at night (morning EST).  But, you don't see the place for yourself.  I made a walkthrough one time around Thanksgiving before we made the sale, which made me feel better and really understand what needed to be done to fix up the place.  No real major ticket items.  We had an appraisal to effectively negotiate the sale price, then the bank required an appraisal to make the loan, then I had a detailed inspection with 50 page report, then the insurance company also did a broad inspection with a report to grant coverage.  Lots of inspections...  I'd take more risk in the future knowing how the process works while communicating remotely now.  I also found a great property manager that handles everything and communicates well by email.

Hi Kevin,

It's good to hear another investor in China is interested to dig into the markets in the US.  I'm live in Shanghai and I'm looking to get into the Atlanta market as that's where I plan to move next after leaving China in a couple of years.  I'm also new to the BP forums.  Houston seems like a great place to invest, and as others said, the low prices of oil don't seem sustainable (at least until oil is really washed out of the feasible portable fuel market) in the coming 5-10 years. 

Ross