All Forum Posts by: Ryder Meehan

Hi BP'ers,

I'm planning to expand my portfolio into St. Petersburg, FL in the coming weeks and would appreciate any contacts there with connections to wholesale properties or solid deals.  I'm looking for rentals so ideally multi-family and since I'm remote nothing that takes too much rehab.  Please message me if this is your market!

Best,

Ryder

Thanks for the feedback here Dawn and Brian.  It's sounding like at least one trip upfront would be smart to see the properties and meet/build a local team.  

My experience is good in tenant leasing but less so in rehab.  The deals have plenty of margin to comps but I'm trying to read up on managing rehab. I also have a cousin who is a handyman locally which gives me a bit more confidence.

I'd love anyone else's experience on investing remotely if you've gone down that road.

Hi BP!

I live in San Francisco but have family in St Petesburg, FL involved in real estate where there market looks to have much better cap rate, investor friendly pricing and none of this California rent control hooey.  I own a handful of multi-family rentals in Dallas, TX so it's not my very first rodeo but I am still getting my chaps broken in.

My realtor in FL has scoped and sent photos of several properties that look great on paper from the finances - low price, high rental potential and favorable comps.  I'm at a point where I'm ready to start making offers but am a little uncomfortable going in site unseen personally.  A flight from SF to Tampa is around $500 and 8 hours each way plus I'm no contractor so don't know how much more I'll know than an inspector I could send.  Additionally, the best priced properties need some rehab before being rent ready.  So the questions I'm posing are:

1. Is it a good idea to buy rental properties not having seen them and being across the country from them?

2. Is it worth the $500 trip and several days trip to see them myself before making an offer?

3. Would the trip be better spent after purchase to manage the rehab and tenant leasing?  Maybe I really do need to make two trips?  I've got a day job so fitting these in are all weekend and vacation time.

Long term I plan to hopefully move to St. Pete once I have a nice portfolio there a couple years from now.  Until then, any advice would sure be peachy, ya'll.

-Ryder

Hi all,

I'm excited to have such an amazing network of beautiful minds here on BP. I've been a real estate investment dabbler for the last 5 years and currently own a 4-plex, 3-plex and SFR in Dallas as rental properties but am currently living in San Francisco for work.

My goal is to keep expanding my portfolio and passive rental income through more multi-family or well priced SFR in Dallas or in my next planned market St Petersburg, FL. Any one with a good wholesaler or connections to a motivated seller looking for a buyer would be much appreciated. If you're living in SF and investing remotely I'd also love to connect to bounce ideas off each other.

I'm looking forward to sharing knowledge and ideas on BP!

Cheers,

Ryder

Hi David, I'm in a similar situation where I live in San Francisco so couldn't afford a walk-in closet here nor would it make sense since even if I owned here the cap rate would be negative.

I'm originally from the Dallas, TX area so I've been buying there since I have family around and I know the neighborhoods well. Unless you know a local you'll likely need a property management company to help you out but they take 10% of the rent typically plus a month's rent when they have to find a new tenant for you. It definitely cuts into your profit. I own a 4-plex, 3-plex and SFR and only use a prop mgr on the 4-plex since the others are newer construction and the areas are in high demand so there is easy re-rent. The 4-plex needs regular repair and tenants are more likely to not pay on time so it would be hard to do remotely.

I haven't owned a vacation rental so don't have experience there but wouldn't recommend it.  With the frequency of finding new renters it's high touch and hard to do remotely.  If the deal is good enough then you could still take it and rent it out on annual leases if the area is desirable.  For my 3-plex I have turned over a few renters and re-leased remotely.  I have a key lock box there and post the opening through Rentec (it posts it all over to CL, Zillow, Trulia, etc) and I get 20-30 call and emails within a few days.  I let them tour the vacant apartment by giving the key box code over the phone and take applications also through Rentec as well as background check.  If it was a sketchy area this would be pretty risky but it's an affluent place but I have family or a long-term tenant reset the key box after showings.  I also considered using TaskRabbit for someone to show the place for around $50/day so might try that on the 4-plex if I get ballsy.

In evaluating the deal originally I looked at comps, local rental rates and cap rate.  Admitted the 4-plex has close to breakeven with the prop manager, the 1 turn over cost me about $2,000 since the unit was vacant a month, they took a 1 month fee and the re-key plus cosmetic fixes that the prop mgr won't be as frugal as an owner would be.  Overall I'd still do it again.  I like the idea of building up a portfolio someone I want to live in the future like Florida then ultimately moving there when I'm bored with SF.

Hope that helps!

-Ryder