All Forum Posts by: Sam Van Horebeek

it depends where the foreign investors come from.  Chinese investors are particularly interested in knowing which schools are in the area.  They believe that good schools will increase the value of the asset in future and it will attract more tenants faster.   Good luck

@Steve DellaPelle Agreed with all the feedback given so far. One important item that you should first figure out is your risk/return ratio. How much risk are you willing to take for what amount of return?  The higher the risk, the more return you can achieve with any investment, including real estate investment.

San Francisco, New York, Boston,...are considered to be 'safe' cities with long-term appreciation and relatively low risk.  These cities will not have a high rental return though (but appreciation will be/should be there). This is because they are large metropolitan areas with diverse industries, attracting many people to work and live there, etc.

Other cities such as Detroit, Houston, Dallas, .... also offer some interesting investment options as the rental yield can be higher (compared to some of the coastal cities) but then you may have to consider issues such as decline of population, less diverse industries, more land available,....  

As such, determine your budget and risk/return profile - that should help you greatly in narrowing down to a few cities. Good luck!

It really depends on your risk/return ratio.  There are some markets (e.g. Detroit) that see tons of international investors. We see numerous inquiries for Detroit investment properties on our platform for the simple reason that investors can buy cheap and have a high rental return. However, you may want to make sure that your area is safe so your asset is protected and you have no loss in value.

Chicago is quite known to international investors (especially Chinese) and seems to have good numbers - decent rental income and decent appreciation over the last years. i will leave it up to the Chicago specialists to give exact numbers.  Again, overseas investors (from China) seem to love it. The starting price will be much higher though by maybe suburbs might be interesting for you.

Another city with a relatively lower price point is Orlando (in Florida). A lot of interest from overseas buyers for that city (in a lower budget)

@Sei-Jung Park  You are raising an important question.  I am not a lawyer but here a few considerations:

- An LLC will provide you with liability protection (in case something happens with your property, or inside your property, or in case your tenant decides to sue you)

If you buy in your own name, you will not have this layer of protection so more exposed to the risks mentioned.

- You may want to check with the bank if you plan to get financing. Getting a loan when you plan to buy the property as an LLC will be more complicated and potentially not possible.

hope this helps a bit!

We have seen many landlords who deal with international tenants without any US credit history by asking for a full 100% of all rent to be paid upfront plus security deposit. 

Interesting discussion - a few questions:

1) what kind of (gross) rental yield do you see on SFRs in Las Vegas? 

2) does anyone know how the condo market in Las Vegas is doing?

We do see Chinese submitting inquiries for Las Vegas indeed so would be good to have insights from the local experts on the ground. Thanks.

It does seem like interesting areas to invest in! This information here is helpful why foreign investors like Chicago.  

Also, some local Agents have been telling us that many things are going to improve as Trump has been calling out that city and seems to intend to make the city better. It would be interesting to hear from more locals on what their thoughts are on this?

Interesting indeed - we do see a strong interest from Chinese investors for Detroit.  Many of them are looking for those good returns but at the same time, they are aware that they have to be careful.  It seems that it is extremely important to know the areas on a block-by-block basis. Maybe the experts can share which areas in Detroit that they highly recommend these days...

This is less important than understanding local demand but for what it is worth, Seattle has been a favorite from what we can see here in China.  We continue to see inquiries from from both investors and families here in Asia.  Obviously, there are some challenges now with Foreign Exchange controls but the intent to buy condos and houses in that market is strong so more to come for Seattle.

Chinese are investing in the US for the following three major reasons:

1) Diversification: Chinese are eager to get their money out of their own country and into a more stable/mature real estate market.  China has limited investment options and both the domestic real estate market and domestic stock market have been chaotic.  US real estate is much more stable in comparison. And yes, relatively speaking, the US houses are less expensive in many cases compared to China.

2) Education: Chinese love to invest in countries that offer great education. The US education is well known so many Chinese families are sending their kids to the US for studies (every year more than 300,000 Chinese students arrive in the US)

3) Immigration: Chinese love to get another passport and the US is top on the list.  This immigration trend consists of thousands of Chinese families arriving in the US every year.