All Forum Posts by: Toby S.

Hoping to get some quick insight. We have a pair of tenants that would easily qualify for Section 8 housing assistance, and would make great tenants, but they currently reside with the wife's mother. Some events changed for my wife and I on short notice and we will soon have our rental unit available. My question is, if they have not yet started the process, does anyone know how long (or how quickly) it would take for this couple to apply for the Section 8 housing assistance and be able to move into our rental? And is the HUD-NJ office the place to contact to find out? Thanks for all the help everyone provides on this forum!

Steve,

I am not a seasoned investor, but I live here and have family in Ocean City.  I can tell you that it is an extremely clean and family-friendly town.  It's a dry town, so there are no bars, liquor stores, and no alcohol sales in the restaurants (of course bringing alcohol onto the island is allowed).  This may seem a surprise to some, but its one of the reasons that families flock here.  There are about 8 weeks where no rentals can be found and are completely booked (July 4th-Labor Day).  But most good units will rent out at least 12-15 weeks of the year.  Closer to the beach is always best here.  I believe most landlords do a seasonal business since that's where most money is made, but many also offer year-round leases.  I have no idea what a condo would rent for but I know a common rental here would be 1/2 of a duplex (3b 2bath), and can go anywhere from $1200-$2500 or more per week during peak season depending on the unit and proximity to the beach.  You mentioned other places including Wildwood which is a very good and very busy resort town as well.  But they also have plenty of bars & liquor stores which means more college-aged crowds, slightly more trash, and there is certainly more crime.  Not a bad place, but things to consider.  I don't know if this will help you finalize a decision, but wanted to let you know from a local perspective.  Let me know if I can answer any questions and I'll be happy to try.

Thank you so much @Ryan Blake and @Natalie Schanne.  I just received the J Scott book today.  I was considering it earlier but went ahead on your recommendations.  Also Natalie, your reminder about the ability to cancel a transaction during the review period also helps to put things in to some perspective.  I have attended 3 meetings with the SJREIA, one of which is the one I referred to at the start of this thread.  I take away some good information from each session, though it is difficult as much of the talk is quick and definitely geared toward those who have been at this for quite some time.  

But I want to thank both of you again for your thoughtful responses.  It reinforces my decision to joint the biggerpockets community!

I attended a real estate investors meeting for rehabbers last night.  The leader lead a presentation on how to determine an offer amount on distressed properties.  While the information seemed very useful for the many seasoned investors in the room, he mentioned several things that concerned me.  Namely, that when evaluating leads, he only takes properties that meet a certain criteria and essentially passes the "junk" along to newbies.  He later mentioned that when evaluating a property on his own, through his experience, he is able to estimate costs fairly accurately by doing a brief walk-through.  He then suggested that by the time a new investor might arrange to walk-through a property with a contractor, that he or another seasoned investor will have already bought it.  

This may all be reality, and I understand there's competition. But my question is how does a new investor without a builder/contractor background identify potential properties? Are people still finding good leads on the MLS? I am aware of other means such direct mail, etc. I would love to find out what others did to get started or what's working for other new investors. It's otherwise a bit discouraging that think that any moderately good deal will be gone before I can find or analyze it. I greatly appreciate any feedback. Thanks everyone!

Hello to everyone in the BP community!

A lot of introductions are made regularly on these forums so I'll be brief. My wife and I are relatively new to the REI community though we have one buy & hold investment. This was purchased without much background knowledge but it cash flows nicely thanks to a large down payment. That was in 2012. But in the last year, we were lucky enough to discover BP.com which really opened our eyes to smarter investing, loftier goals, and endless possibilities. Since then we have read several books on investing, viewed many webinars, and even more podcasts and forum posts. We have also attended several SJREIA meetings though these discussions often pertained to the more advanced investors. We live in the Atlantic County, NJ area about which there seems to be a little less chatter on these forums.

We're putting this out there to connect with anyone in our area or abroad who may also be in the early phases of investing, and of course as well with those with some more experience who would be up for discussion and/or collaboration.  

Our immediate goals include buy & hold strategies. But also in our high-tax environment we are also very interested in BRRRR strategies as well as flips. Longer term goals are to greatly expand upon the above goals, as well as out-of-state investing. Thanks all for listening and we look forward to ongoing discussions, and hope we are all soon congratulating each other on succeeding at endeavors that others deemed too risky to attempt!