All Forum Posts by: Thomas L.

Hi Pauline! 

Thanks for sharing your experiences. Yes, public auctions may indeed have huge potential, but are a lot of work to physically attend. I mainly buy in the Antwerp area myself but I assume you can find deals everywhere :)
May I ask what the property and numbers in Malta look like? Plus how do you manage them from abroad?

 Absolutely! Let me know when you have one and we will crunch the number together!

Hi Jonas, no I found something better. But i'm always looking for new deals. I'm now working to find hard money lenders. Not easy to find in Belgium

I found an even better deal haha :) so i'm now trying to sign that one. Maybe i should start a wholesale business in Belgium, cause i often find these kind of deals to be honest.. Anyone interested?

Nuno - awesome. So you would buy this.
In what region are you looking? I might be able to help out.

Niels - good advise. I will have to do that to cover renovation costs

Hi! I have been listening to the podcast and reviewing properties for several months now, so it's time to get started. I live in Belgium, so the market is a little different, but the numbers seem to work out for me. 

So.. I found a 5-unit property within a half hour drive from where I live. All units are small studio apartments. So they have one room which is both the kitchen, bedroom and living room. They also all have their own bathroom, so 2 rooms in total.

They are all rented out for about €500 (= $585) a month. So €500 x5 = €2500 / month or €30.000/year.
The owner wants €250.000 (=$292k) for the building and is not willing to negotiate much about the price.
In my area, that's the price you pay for an average older house.

Here is the good thing: I can get a loan at my local bank at 1.18% interest (no typo) over a 25 year period! Which means I would pay €962/month to the bank. There are other costs too:

-  +-€500/m on utilities (water, electr, gas..)

- €60/m insurance

- €120/m in taxes

In total I would have €1642 in fixed expenses each month, with about €858 left to cover repairs and maintenance costs. Renovating the apartments might bring in an extra €50/m per apartment but not more. They are really small.. about 35m2 or 114 square feet. I think I can also find a way to lower the utility cost a little.

Anyway, the numbers seem to make sense to me, so why do i want your advise?

- low income tenants might ask a lot of my attention. In Belgium it's also really hard to evict someone.. on average it takes about 6 months, even if they don't pay rent.

- my only deal this year. To buy the €250k property, I will have to come up with about 15% closing/acquisition costs. That's a lot, but it's just the way it is out here. I have that money saved up, but because of the high costs I will only be able to buy one deal this year. This is not a flip, so I won't be able to pull it out soon.

Good to know: this is the only apartment building I have found that has such a high income vs purchase price..

What do you guys think? Should I do this?



 

Did any of my fellow Belgian/Dutch colleagues here on Biggerpockets find investors in Belgium or The Netherlands to partner up with when buying real estate?

Hi Guys, I'm from Belgium (flanders) but would also love to join :) could someone add me?

Hi @Robin Dassy, sounds great! I haven't figured out yet if the BRRRR strategy would work here. You can always find great fixer uppers but I would love to know if I could refinance it afterwards at a higher value and pull money out. Not sure if banks do that here in Belgium or in the Netherlands..
Let me know how your first deal in Texas works out :) 

Yes mostly online. 
Good luck with your US investments! Is it possible to just buy something there as a foreigner?