All Forum Posts by: Jason Schneider

Thanks for the response Mark. Not particularly.  

It’s time to move on some property development/investment and I need some help weighing out my options. I own a 5 unit apartment building (80/20 with a friend) that I currently live in. I’m the majority owner. It’s in ok shape. Very livable but will need some work over the next few years. The immediate need is parking. There are currently 4 parking spaces for 8 bedrooms. Living in a winter climate parking overnight on the street is off limits. Because of the topography of the lot, there is no additional on site parking available. I do have the option to buy an empty lot across the street and develop it though. I could also sell the house and find a different investment. There’s a lot of options and the following are the main scenarios I’m considering. I’d love to hear your thoughts and answer any questions to help me figure this out.

1. Buy the empty lot across the street. Build a mixed use duplex. Business on the first floor, residence upstairs. I’d put in 7 parking spaces and a laundry room for my current tenants. This project will run somewhere between $120k - $150k. It should being in around $2,400/mo.
2. Forget the lot and development and work on renovations on the current house. The parking isn’t required, it just means a higher vacancy rate in the apartments. The house needs some supports shored up, new furnace/water heater rebuild of two large porches, insulation, siding and eventually a new roof. I’m looking at $40-50k over the next 10 years.
3. Sell the current house and find something better. If I sell it, I could pay off my friend and walk away with about $65k to put into something else.

Current house situation:

Market Value: $236,000

Mortgage:$155,000 @ 5%, 20 year. 19.5 years remaining.

Liquid Assets: $37k

Work estimate over the next 10 years: $50k

Gross rents: $3,675/mo

Expenses (including mortgage): $2,600

Personal Info:

Annual Income: $40k

Annual Expenses: $15k

Assets: $27k (Calvert funds)

Liabilities: $0 (except for the house listed above)

Wow, thanks for all the great welcoming responses. In forum introduction threads I'm used to just seeing the "Hi. Welcome" I appreciate the real responses. 

@J. Martin, 

Glad to see a fellow mustachios on here and thanks of sharing the thread. So much can be gained by living on the cheap. I wish I had found mustachian principles 10 years sooner. As for the tiny homes/storage containers, absolutely. I've got two projects on my radar that deal with building 10-20 units in the retail range of $100-$160k. That would be a low to mid range house here. And, that is one way I'm planing on changing the world, or at least this town. We have houses at $175k and up, and all new development is $250k and up. Wage's aren't that hight here and a lot of people are getting priced out. I'm hoping to find that balance of reasonably priced housing downtown. We'll see how this pans out. 

@Don Konipol 

I could not agree more. I grew up in CA suburbia. I'm all about living in walking distance to everything. It makes life more fun for sure. I've also served as a local city commissioner and started to look at the expense local taxpayers have to fork out to keep such a spread out community and it just doesn't make sense when it can be done so much better. We don't need to keep building like we have in the last 60 years. 

@Michael Lee

Thanks for the words of encouragement. I'm excited to be on here and have folks to talk with and learn from. 

Hi All, 

Jason, from Marquette, Michigan. I'm 37 years old and the director of the Marquette Chamber of Commerce. A little over a year ago, after my father passed, I came to be an owner of a 5 unit apartment building. It took a lot of elbow grease and is now up and running pretty well. With this under my belt, I'm looking to take on some more projects. Especially with my background in local economic development and local government I have a few start from scratch development projects that I'm hoping to take on. 

I'm new to the site and just starting to learn my way around. I envision hours of reading through it over the next few weeks. I've been through some of the "start here" posts and am now starting to dig deeper. I'm particularly interested in talking with others about real-estate development projects, sustainability, small, walkable middle range housing on unusual pieces of empty land. Weird huh? 

I'm a mustachian at heart. and welcome any conversations, or pointings in the right direction. Hope to be chatting with many of you in the future. 

Cheers, 

Jason