All Forum Posts by: Bill Goodland

I would say that the pros and cons of that are the same as any investment property. What is the ROI on the property itself and also on your own time and effort? I personally like the idea of college rentals because if you find next years tenants way ahead of time, or can even have a legacy style house for an organization that will pass it down, you can essentially eliminate your vacancy and thus increasing your returns. If you do have a huge house that is being rented out by a greek life organization for example, I think a pro would be no vacancy and being able to charge by the room instead of the entire house, allowing you to charge more. Also, any student that can afford a luxury college rental can also more than likely get a parent cosigner with good credit.

The downside is clearly if you have a large organization such as a frat living in the house you have to worry about parties, or do you? If the place is as tenant proof as possible and you have strong leases in place that will penalize any damage who cares? Also, are you sure there is demand? If the property is too far away from campus, how do you know the place won't be vacant or have to severely discount the rent to get it filled. Lastly, don't fall in love with real estate. What are the numbers? If you are comfortable with the numbers I'd say go for it, but personally, I think I'd rather by an apartment building over a luxurious house. Best of luck.

I am by no means an expert on this, but given the fact that there may be some tension between the two of them during the divorce, if they are both on title for the house, I would make sure your documentation includes signatures from both parties. Last thing you want would be to assign the contract, get to a closing to find out that one party is suing for not agreeing to specific terms.

I think the strategy you are referring to is househacking which if you are new to BP, is one of the most commonly talked about ways to get started in REI. I think it’s an awesome way to start, but I would be weary of “no money down” strategies with a bank. Are you referring to low money down? Because FHA loans require as little as 3.5% down which I would recommend saving up, have a couple grand for down payment and reserves and pull the trigger. If you are comfortable living and investing in the market and renting to roommates than go for it.

I see you're from Jamaica, New York but am curious where this property is located? It's just that I am from NY as well and find it hard to believe you could find a property this cheap there. Either way, awesome job!

I would recommend not leaving that much equity locked up in the property. Don't get caught in the trap of not wanting to hurt your cash flow, when that equity could be better utilized to generate more cash flow in a safely leveraged additional investment with all the other associated benefits of owning more property(loan pay down, depreciation, chance for appreciation, etc.). If you are looking to strictly buy another place, I would probably take the cash out by just putting a loan on it, but if you're looking to pick up some distressed properties, fix them up and put them on a loan(BRRRR strategy), then I think using a HELOC on that existing property would be smart as you can draw and replace the funds essentially as much as you would like to snowball the portfolio.

I was pretty ambitious at your age too, and although I did decide to go to college you absolutely don't need it if you want to hustle.

Problem is, hustling comes with no guarantee, whereas for me, going to school was the best risk adjusted strategy for me getting a return on my time and effort; so my recommendation would be to treat school like your job and find ways to make extra money on the side to save up.

I started umpiring little league at 13, lifeguarding at 16 and working my way up to bigger and better jobs along the way and started investing in stocks when I turned 18(which was a good time to do so). If you are familiar with the cash flow quadrant, I believe that everyone that wants to be wealthy must at some point take the plunge to moving from the left to the right side of the quadrant, I just don't think it is smart to do it at such as young age before you have developed a significant amount of capital and knowledge. Stay motivated, listen to as many podcasts and highly recommended books as you can so you're prepared once you are 18 and if you can find ways to add value for a profit to other peoples business then go for it. Something as simple as helping an owner of an airbnb turnover their units after school and assisting in their management could go a long way. Anyway, best of luck.

As everyone will probably tell you, it depends on your goals. Do you plan to just invest on the side, build a nice stream of income and use your portfolio for your retirement? Or are you aggressively trying to hustle, replace your income, quit your job and go full time REI? I would guess you’re somewhere in the middle like most of us and would recommend taking the free money that your employer matches, and keep the rest liquid for REI. Another option is opening up a self directed ROTH IRA that has similar tax benefits, but also allows you to access your contributions(not gains) before retirement allowing you to be a bit more flexible with it while still maintaining the tax benefits.

If you’re using private money to buy and rehab, and ultimately refi your cash out, do you need seasoning from the bank to get an FHA loan, or do they require seasoning? I know you can get commercial without seasoning but it’ll have a higher rate. I have heard of the delayed financing exemption as long as it’s the first loan on the property, but not sure if a private money loan counts.

Given that you’re young, I would definitely recommend an FHA househack. I’m not entirely familiar of your area, but I’m sure there are less expensive markets within a decent drive. I know southern Florida is expensive near the beach but I would think a half hour inland would be less expensive. If you were in Silicon Valley where it’s 500k+ houses every direction you go I’d say sure, invest out of state, but I would expect there is cash flow not too far away. Keep saving and learning man, best of luck.

The 4 Hour workweek author was Tim Ferris who has never been on the podcast. I believe they talked about that concept on episode 217 with Perry Marshall, author of 80/20 marketing. It’s been discussed a lot throughout various podcasts though.