All Forum Posts by: Xander Snyder

@Gia Hermosillo - I'd be curious to hear what it was about property management that initially drew you into that corner of RE land. Having been in it close to a decade now, what are your most and least favorite parts of it?

I've been investing in multi for quite some time in my local market. I'm now contemplating expanding into new markets (given some of the headaches of where I live). My question is about the process for onboarsing a property manager. I've repeatedly seen long distance investments fail due to poor property managers - from family members who tried it in the early 90s with ~100 units to fairly large operations with 1000+ unit portfolios to single family homes. I'm reading David Greenes BP book and know that it is possible, I've just rarely ever seen it work.

First, is it really even possible to find a property manager in a mid sized city (say 500,000 ppl or 1mm in metro) that would care about a duplex or quadplex? That's probably the size of property I'd want to start with before risking larger amounts of capital in a larger apartment building.

Second - whats the process for onboarding a remote property manager in the acquisitions process? Ive personally hired property managers but only for buildings near me so j was never worried about have to drive over and fix something myself in the transition. When do you actualky turn over operational control? Any other tips appreciated.

@Account Closed - good advice on passive investing if you don't want to be a full time investor. I'm still kinda starting out myself - debating on how exactly I want to get more involved in RE (my family's in RE, so I'm already involved to some degree). The thing is - I like my day job (I know, rare), and though I wish the pay were a little better, I'm not sure if I realistically have the time to go acquire a bunch of properties, even if they are managed professionally. So, for myself, thinking more about focusing on finding sponsors/operating partners to deal with. Anyways, well put.

Hey Susana - thanks for the response. I'm still in the design phase, so I don't have detail on time frame yet. I do have a contractor my family's worked with before that we generally like, who I'm planning to hire or at least get a quote from. That said, we haven't done as large a project with him before, and I'm still waiting for him to provide me a rough estimate of cost. I'll get more a more detailed estimate once I get permitted designs, and at that point I'd be happy to pass his name along to you (with the above caveats that we haven't worked on a larger construction project like this with him before). 

Hi everyone,

I'm brand new, just getting started with Bigger Pockets. Have attended one webinar, and bought Brandon Turner's book on rental property investing.

I have some background in real estate - my family has been in real estate in the LA area for 40 years, and I've invested in a number of RE deals managed by different general partners. I've also done a very small amount of angel investing. I have a background in finance, so I'm familiar with the analysis side of deals, but aside from the home I live in, I haven't bought any rental property outright for myself, and am certainly less familiar with a lot of the maintenance aspects - how to figure out what repairs will cost what, finding dependable contractors, and just knowing what needs fixing when you walk a new property. 

I'm in the process of converting my garage into an ADU unit to rent out & house hack, and am interested in learning more about out of state investing given the sky-high prices in LA. Perhaps understandably, I'm pretty tentative about completely outsourcing the process, given how dependent you become on the property manager & how often property managers offer...er...subpar performance. I am very interested to learn about how folks have managed out of state investing, especially if someone you've pulled it off without a property manager and how.

Looking forward to meeting folks and learning from your experience.

X

Hi all,

I'm new to Bigger Pockets, and this is in fact my first post. So hi everyone!

I own a SFR that I live in, with a big garage that's going unused. I'm in the process of converting it into an Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU), to rent it out as a studio apartment and get going on house hacking. I'm in the early stages, working with a designer to figure out the layout and getting quotes from contractors (so any other general thoughts on folks who have gone through a similar process in LA also very welcome).

My question is - I'm sure property taxes will increase once that becomes livable space. But how exactly does the city of Los Angeles assess that new livable space for tax purposes?

Thanks so much for your response! The idea of managing a place remotely without a property mgmt company is daunting. Encouraging to know others are making it work.

Hey Joe - thanks for this. How do you go about finding solid maintenance/on-site managers etc if you're out of state? How do you vet them, and know that they aren't overcharging/cheating you etc? Understand that properties of scale help, but you need to start with 1 building first right?

I'd come to a DTLA one.

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