All Forum Posts by: Stefan K.

Simon Campbell thanks for the tips! I like the marble idea, hope my daughter has one I can grab on my way out this afternoon.

I know the A/C units have dates on them (if you can read them), do you have any tips on evaluating a roof? Half of the houses had permits for reroofing, so I have a gauge on when it was last done. But not sure how to address the ones without permits. On short sales, I can ask, but on REOs I assume the answer is they don't know.

I feel good about my cash flow projections. Tried to keep the projected rent on the conservative side to give me a little padding. I'm worried about wasting my time because of inspection issues or the house won't finance because of something I should have seen up front but I missed.

I don't know what I don't know, I worry about what I should have known and didn't see.

Kelly N. Thanks! I'll get a pic up soon.

These are SFR, all but one is empty - a short sale with current residents. These are block homes outside of Tampa in the $35K - $60K range. Most won't have any fancy updates/upgrades done due to the price range.

The biggest deal breaker I can see in this area is sinkholes - so I know to look for cracking and other settlement issues and spots where it looks like these types of things have been given some lipstick to cover them up.

Windows is a good note. I'm bringing my wife with me too. I was excited that she wanted to be part of the process, plus I know she's good at some of the things you mentioned like layout, closets, parking, etc.

On flooring - a lot of these homes have ceramic tile in the common areas and carpet in the bedrooms. Is there a preference for keeping down longer term costs? Is tile throughout better or more expensive to fix?

So many thoughts/questions and I know there will be more once I walk through.

Thanks for your help!

Newbie checking out 7 potential rental properties this week. I'm wondering what I should be focusing on when checking them out. Carpet and paint are easy to identify and estimate and I've checked the county permit site to estimate roof and A/C age when available. What else do you focus on?

One of the properties has a garage converted to a BR, which was permitted and another is on a pond. Should either of these things concern me from even a liability standpoint?

Just trying not to miss to much my first time out. Nervously excited about beginning this chapter in my life.

Thanks for the welcome and well wishes. Checking out 4 properties this afternoon. If any look good I'll post them in the deal analysis section.

Hello BiggerPockets! I've been lurking the boards for a while, trying to learn as much as I can as I've been creating a plan to eventually retire my wife. Thank you for sharing all of the useful information that you all put out there everyday.

By day I'm an accounting/finance guy (CPA/MBA) for a Fortune 100 company. By night, I'm scouring the net looking for my first buy and hold rental property (and my second and my third...).

I've finally widdled my list of houses to go look at this week to 7. Started with a lot more and then weeded out houses in flood zones (especially due to FEMAs announcement that flood insurance will be going from hundreds to thousands!), neighborhoods I didn't like (by driving them) and houses that dissappeared a day or two after they were listed.

My list is down to the following:

1 - private sale
1 - Bank owned REO
1 - Homepath (Fannie)
1 - HomeSteps (Freddie)
2 - Short sales no contracts yet
1 - Short sale possible back up contract

Very excited to get out there and check them out. My projections have them all in the neighborhood of $200-$300/mo cash flow and 17%-25% cash on cash return. Fingers crossed!