All Forum Posts by: John Ma

There are lots of opinions on here.

Locally, I would look into downtown Norfolk, Old Towne Portsmouth, and Downtown Newport News @Micheal Waldrup 

Virginia Beach is good too, but the cost is higher. I find the said cities I've mentioned to be a better value in terms of profit to maximize what you have.

Quiting your 9-5 is a nice goal and something I have considered to reach for, its not something that can realistically done with-in a few years.  From one Nuclear Engineer to another, I can understand the beaucracy and other nonsens that come with it.  My goal now isn't necessarily to not have a 9-5, but find a field I enjoy as an occupation.

Okay, that is pretty much what I expected to hear.  Its funny how the idea of automatic payments on the tennant side will turn them off, when they are SUPPOSED to be paying anyways. Really it makes it easier on them because they wont have to think about it, but it is what it is.

Hey guys, I was wondering if any land lords out there have had any experience with requiring or prefering tennants to post-date checks for the duration of a year or the lease.

I have thought about requiring this as I feel it makes it easier for the land lord as well as the tennant. My only concern is, since my property targets lower middle class, potential tennants may be turned off from this for fear of not having enough on their account in case of an emergency.

I was hoping to hear experience from seasoned land lords who have imposed this or has had experience with it.

I would do my own research. Ask around in that particular area, understand who the renters are (group of students near a university? military ppl near a base?), and make your own judgement I'd say.

Hey guys, I want to hear what others who have been in my shoes have experienced.

I currently have properties in a metropolitain that I find to be profitable and easy to invest. I currently live here and have a job here as well.

My short term plan is to move to a larger metro area (DC) within the year for lifestyle reasons. Unfortunately, I find that area to be difficult to invest in with my buy-and-hold stratagies that I've been using here and the range of captial that I'm playing with at the time- so my is to continue investing in this area as I know it will continue to to grow. Perhaps when my enterprise has grown large enough, i can dabble in a larger player such as the DC metro area, however at this point, I plan on being a long distance property owner. How common is this in our community?

I know it can be done as I hear about some investors who invest in out of state and have never even seen their property, or investors in business who have businesses all over a state.

Any advice, other than the typical having a solid lease, good property manager, ect?

@Jonathan Carden

@Alicia Britt

I plan on moving to DC/NoVA later this year. I am currently a residential buy and hold investor in the Hampton Roads area. I plan on continuing my ventures in the Hampton Roads, but also would like to learn the NoVA game eventually. Growing up there, I have an idea of the inflated prices the area carries. The methodologies I use here for Hampton Roads investing doesn't seem liek they would work in NoVA, so I would like to understand the market better to come up with a stratagy that would work for that area.

If you guys don't mind, I would like to network with you guys to get something rolling.

@Jonathan Carden and @Alicia Britt

I plan on moving to DC/NoVA later this year. I am currently a residential buy and hold investor in the Hampton Roads area. I plan on continuing my ventures in the Hampton Roads, but also would like to learn the NoVA game eventually. Growing up there, I have an idea of the inflated prices the area carries. The methodologies I use here for Hampton Roads investing doesn't seem liek they would work in NoVA, so I would like to understand the market better to come up with a stratagy that would work for that area.

If you guys don't mind, I would like to network with you guys to get something rolling.

Hey guys, I started updating my LinkedIn profile last night and it got me thinking how I view my investment endeavors. I want to see how other investors treat this.

First off, like many people here, I have a day job. I am an Engineer. So as you can imagine, my resume is gear towards my Engineering career and will be written so that it can help me get me to the next level in this coorperate rat-race.

I always thought it was a good idea to just add in a real simple entry for my real estate investments under a "Side Hobby" or "Extracurricular" label just to let whoever is reading know what types of stuff I am doing outside of work. As i started describing what I do as an investor, I realized that my entrepreneurial endeavors is starting to sound as serious as my engineering experience. In fact, from a management stand point, it does look more impressive than my engineering experience.

At that point, I decided to change my resume/ LinkedIn format. It is now in a way where my real estate investing is labeled as "Experience", right next to my Engineering experience as it is another job I have, and have two careers.

What do you guys think of this? On one had it may be advantageous to let possible recruiters know some serious stuff I'm involved in out side of work and how that can be translated into my day career for a bigger opportunity. However, on the other hand I can see hiring managers can be turned off by it as it can seem like I am trying quit my day job and pursue entrepreneurship.

What is everyone else's thoughts on this?

Hey @Tom Doan . Without having read every reply in here, I kind of have a general take on the direction this thread has taken.

I'm not going to convince you not to buy an expensive car, but I will tell you where I have been with a near similar plan while I was going through my undergrad.

I have been into cars for a long time. I postponed going to college because I was pursuing a life style that involved cars and motorsports. I built a solid car for drifting and attended events at tracks back in the mid 2000s.

When i started goign to college for mechanical and motorsports engineering, I was planning to use my degree to leverage my lifestyle when I got out of school. In fact, I had assumed I would use my starting $60k engineer salary to build a professional competition level drift car and work up to driving with the big boys. I graduated in 2010 and got that great engineering job right out of school and hit my career running.

I became a Nuclear Engineer and still am. I started working on my plan by starting a new drift car build from scratch. At the same time, I got interested in investing in real estate as it was a good time to buy. I bought my first house, along with progressing my drift car build, as well as a new truck to daily drive (different story). As you can imagine, that was literally all my money, while paying student loans. For the first two years, I spent a good chunk of my income into my car build. Although it was fun building the car, I realized with a normal day job, it is hard to find the time to actually go to the track, or even find extra funds to add to my car, maintain it, while trying to do real estate investing, so i put the whole car stuff on pause last year. By doing that, I was able to save up enough to purchase my second house, which I am currently in the process of gutting and renovating.

I currently make an additional $10k on top of my original salary from a couple years ago, yet I find myself pursuing my motorsport plan to be unrealistic at a $70k salary level. Also I must mention the area I live in is not an expensive metropolitain. I'd imagine my situation to be teh same if i lived in a larger area with a slightly higher salary at around $80-85k.

I'm not going to tell you to not buy a whatever car you want, but just consider my story, and perhaps prepare for a lack of funds for real estate investing if you really want that dream car of yours. I'm not going to tell you it can't be done, but with limited assets, I would do some very detailed financial planning.

I have the same views as Andrew. I enjoy the building process, creating the business, this perpetual machine and being able to look back and see what you've accomplished.

Although it was about the money initially when i bought my first house, but it has gone way beyond that now. There is a lot of gratification in the difference that we are making.

What is just merely just a product in our eyes, is a home for someone else. Buying a foreclosure in for a good price and performing minor to major rehabbing is saving a distressed neighborhood which has the potential to affect all the children in that neighborhood, ect ect. These are the little things that I enjoy thinking about.