All Forum Posts by: Spencer Cornelia

@Cynthia Oistad you said you were buying a SFH in Vegas this fall...what area and was it off market? The Vegas market is scorching hot right now and you basically have to go off market to even have a chance at cash flow. If you're only looking at this market, I can understand why it's troubling to find cash flowing SFH. I personally prefer multi family and am anticipating MF making up 100% of my investing portfolio.

@Jon Lee I'll bring it up next time I see you.  I'm not entirely sure I can do this for a couple reasons, but would love to hear your thoughts.

Thanks @Bill B. good to see another Vegas resident in here. The HOA is a little bit of a pain with wanting to move on. They have a owner occupied % rule where a certain amount of the community must be owner occupied. Sadly, the list is like 100 people long and it's taken me 1.5 years just to move up 20 spots. Not until I reach the first spot can I have the option to rent out my condo (and thus making it non owner occupied).

Hello BP!  In September 2016, I decided to buy a condo in Las Vegas, NV.  After watching a couple of BP podcast videos on YouTube, I believed that house hacking was exactly what I wanted to do with my first purchase.

I found an awesome 2 bed / 2 bath condo in a nice gated, golf-course community next to the Las Vegas strip for $120,000.

Here are the numbers:

Down Payment: $24,000 (20%)

Closing Costs: ~$3,000

Interest Rate: 4.25%

Insurance: $30/month

Property Tax: $50/month

HOA: $344/month

Furniture: ~$1000 total (including tenant's room)

Monthly, my total costs are ~$880.  My roommate pays $700 total (includes electric and highest speed internet) and I've yet to go a month without a roommate.

This has allowed me to increase my income an extra $8400/year which represents ~20% of my w2 income.  The extra cash has now allowed me opportunities to begin my investing career.

Additionally, the Vegas market has been ridiculously hot and the condo has appreciated ~$40k in under 2 years.

I am of the belief that good things happen after good decisions are made.  I certainly got fortunate with the appreciation, but I would not be in this position without about 100 'good' decisions that I made before buying this condo, living frugally for multiple years, and working hard to land in a career that pays reasonably well.

I'm very appreciative of this community and will have part 2 coming shortly.

I'm currently in this process now.  I was speaking with a property owner and asked if he was open to the idea of seller financing.  I presented the benefits and why he would consider.  I then gave him multiple options:

a) I'll buy 4plex for $260k at 5% interest rate

b) I'll buy 4plex for $270k at <5% interest rate

c) I'll buy 4plex for $250k at 6% interest rate

He liked option A the best so we verbally agreed to it.

After a few months of him dragging his feet, and interest rates rising, I called him back to offer to pay $260k at 6.5% interest rate, which he obviously liked.

In the mean time, I met with a lawyer who drafted up a contract to purchase the property.  He has background in real estate which is why I selected him.

I'm currently waiting on the seller to sign the document so my lawyer can begin the closing process.

@Omari Heflin you didn't specify how much capital you are working with.  $100k capital doesn't get you anything in the Bay Area, but could get you 20 units in the midwest.

I don't see any cons of increasing the amount of people who could be feeding you potential deals.

I'm currently looking for my first investment property and am connecting with everyone possible in order to find a deal that works within what I'm looking for. 

@Greg Neuman The first lawyer I met up with seemed perfect and mentioned both him and his partner have been dealing with Real Estate Law in Vegas for up to 20 years.  He will be able to do the closing and all the stuff I'm unfamiliar with (opening/closing escrow, dealing with title, etc.)

Here's text straight from the contract:
"Buyer to execute a promissory note secured by deed of trust for $240,000 at 5% per annum...."

@Derek Dombeck I decided to get a solid real estate lawyer to assist with all of this.  I'm going to add in the contract to not have pre-payment penalties.   I wasn't aware of all of the other things you mentioned.

I setup an LLC through the lawyer to purchase the property. Was against it at first, but decided it would be best (for numerous reasons).

Thanks for the help.

@Nolan M. I was wondering how the payments would work.  You knew what my next question would be haha. Any recommendations on a service?

@Grant Rothenburger I'm meeting with a lawyer today.  He mentioned he will be able to take care of all the taxes, escrow stuff as he has experience with real estate law.  Thanks for the advice.

I spoke with the seller last night and he's still good to move forward.  If this goes through, I struck gold on my first investment deal.  Rents are now $200 higher than calculated and the market is so hot the value of the property may be more than I'm paying (we agreed ~December 20th on the deal).