All Forum Posts by: Sam Lewis

Welcome Nate, I don't think $500/month cash flow is hard to do in our area. I currently have 2 and soon to be 4 that cash flow $700/month. 

As long as you buy right you should be fine. I also recommend Stephen K as a PM!

Vaccine or no vaccine it doesn't matter can't you see this is part of the script? For the record this vaccine will not be entering my bloodstream.

As a buy and hold investor, let's focus on what we can control - deal flow, expenses, tenant placement, and local market analysis. 

To be quite honest even in a worst case scenario, I haven't even planned on using a 1031 exchange. Who knows maybe in 10 years if it still exists, but at this rate I could keep acquiring smaller single unit rentals with little no issues on growth and cash flow. 

You bring up a good point - if you aren't too familiar with a specific area I would utilize an agent to vet deals but not necessarily bring the deals to you. Of course you'd want to make sure it was a win win for the agent as well

I would not rely on an agent, if I were you I would be building rapport with wholesalers

If you make sure the agent you work with mentions this to your lender, you shouldn't have to do anything else. Simply note you are a first time home owner, want to put as little as 3-5% down, and would like the seller to cover 3% towards closing - up to 3% is allowed for owner occupied homes.

I don't think you would need a property manager for a home you live in. I recommend Brian Quick - HQ Property Management (give him a Google search), but I wouldn't rely on a PM until you have a couple properties, unless you ever moved out of state or out of the area. 

As for your last question - a good agent will present a strong offer to the seller so they are more willing to provide up to 3% back towards closing. I always like to show a pre-approval letter on the first page of the offer, noting a full price offer, then on one of the final disclosures, I propose the seller to provide 3% back towards closing. First impressions matter!
 

I echo Alan that joining a local REIA is a great way to meet other folks who are involved in real estate in your area. Househacking is definitely the way to go to get started... granted I was always told by mentors of mine that living in a property is ideal before going through with a non-owner occupied investment.

Ideally you can purchase a property with as little as 3-5% down, and ask for 3% back from the seller. You live here, and rent room by room and cover the mortgage and more.

As cliche as it sounds, think of real estate as a deep pond with a ton of lily pads to jump on. Aim for a lily pad where you can safely land (and not sink). If your first jump is smooth, you'll be more willing to jump to the next, more advanced lily pad.

My first home was my baby step lily pad. Now I am a BRRRR investor on town homes in Baltimore County

That being said, where can you see yourself living and having roommates? I typically recommend a location that is within 1 mile of a public university, 1 mile of a private university, 1 mile of a hospital, and 1 mile of a major company headquarters. That shouldn't be hard in Baltimore City, but again, things change quickly block by block - so I would consider changing the criteria to 0.25-0.5 miles, and finding an agent who knows the city really well (disclaimer: not me). 

If you can get 2 out of those 4 you shouldn't have an issue of finding roommates who you wouldn't mind living with - I would prefer doing it in the county though!

Welcome to BP @Chris Hijazin! 

A little over 2 years ago I was able to leverage a 300K+ househack in Baltimore County with 14K out of pocket. I did a 3% down owner-occupied FHA down payment, and had the seller pay me 3% back towards closing. Granted, this didn't cover all of the closing costs, but it allowed me to bring less money to the table.

Quick note about the surrounding Baltimore area - there are plenty of ways to househack, however multifamily is not as common in our area than in others (as often discussed in BP books, podcasts, and forums). 

In 95% of cases, I recommend finding a single family home (SFH) in the suburbs of Baltimore (think Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Howard counties, depending on where your work is) and renting to 20-somethings.

Key criteria for a successful SFH househack:

• Suitable zoning criteria, i.e. room rental laws (county by county)
• Within 1 mile of hospital, major company HQ, public university, and private university (to attract 20-somethings)
• At least half as many bathrooms as bedrooms (i.e. a 4 bed / 2.5 bath could work, but 4 / 1.5 could get sticky)
• Plenty of driveway space / street parking (1 per roommate)
• Plenty of kitchen space (since the kitchen is the most occupied room other than individual rooms)
• Basement or side entrance entry point (i.e. if you wanted to turn the basement into your living space, you could enter from a side entrance)
• Un-involved neighborhood community (cul-de-sacs can be the worst spots)
• Turn-key quality (i.e. you won't need to fix much of anything when you move in)

This list is by no means exhaustive, but things to think about when you work with an agent on a SFH househack. I generally recommend the following suburbs of Baltimore for solid rentership: Columbia, Glen Burnie, Towson.

So in summary, if you found a househack in the range of 200-350K, I'd expect to have 12-17K saved up for an owner-occupied, first-time home ownership structured deal in the surrounding counties of Greater Baltimore. 

Jon covered it completely. It's all about how quickly you'd like to grow. So you have two extremes - one being purchasing deals and financing with private or hard money, fixing the property up, renting it, and refinancing the property, or the other extreme - find fairly turn key deals (paying top market dollar) where you can finance with 20% down, and immediately rent out the house to a tenant. 

One extreme allows you to receive a cash-on-cash (CoC) return of 25-75%, and the other allows you to receive a cash-on-cash (CoC) return of 10-20%.

These two options are by no means exhaustive of the creative ways investors build their portfolios

I agree with everything Ozzy mentioned. Double emphasis on the water bill statement

Cozy.co is what I use to collect rent and bill tenants for any maintenance issues (not due to general wear and tear).

You can also use it to track maintenance requests, screen tenants, have them record insurance policies, etc.

Did I mention it was free? : )