Diversification through rental property?

[REWahoo]

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Originally Posted by Winemaker My wife and I jointly approve/disapprove of our tenants based on a 8 point checklist we have developed over the years.

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Originally Posted by Winemaker I did rent to 3 college girls once. ...[they] were the prettiest young things on the planet ... very easy on the eyes.

How many points was that worth on your checklist?

[Winemaker]

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Originally Posted by REWahoo How many points was that worth on your checklist?

Just 1.

I take an application from anyone who wants one. General appearance is one point; as you only have one chance to make an impression. If someone is a slob, or unkept in their appearance, how do you think they'll treat my property.

Point #2, I always walk the applicant(s) back to their vehicle so I can get a another good look at how they take care of their own personal property. Messy car, beer bottles, trash, bald tires etc.

Now I will had this declaimer; I was really hoping a lot that they would pass the checklist. After all I was still in my 40's and wasn't dead yet!! When DW said she knew the girls and their family, I was trying really hard to suppress the high fives, fist pumps and head bumps.

At the time, my daughter was 22, and her college friends were around, so it wasn't the first time I saw coeds.

[THOMPMD]

I occasionally come to this site as it seems to have what I consider excellent member/comments, lots "way over my head". I actually had to reset to get back in because I wanted to comment.

I am simply an hourly factory(machinist). Have some college and consider myself avg or slightly below in terms of knowledge.

I'm 52 with a frozen pension/29yrs of time and yes retiring next year the day I get 30yrs and I am eligible to draw my pension.

The reason I am able to retire is very simple. RENTAL PROPERTIES. We live in the Midwest in a small town/small market. Bought my first at 26 and we have a couple dozen, mostly paid for(divorce 5yrs ago). We can't buy for appreciation and in fact in 08/09 RE came back down to a point that we can buy properties for the same prices we paid 25yrs ago but the cool thing is the rents didn't drop so they are 3x what they were 25yrs so in the past 3-4yrs we have bought about 15 more units.

It's been very good to us but make no mistake it's not free as many have indicated. It's a 2nd job. We have only recently hired much out. I doubt I could personally ever buy a property out of state and have someone manage it, it's a trust issue for me.

I personally see the stock market and RE very similar meaning "you get out of it what you put into it" meaning you have to work at anything to be successful(not that I consider myself that way). I never took the time to educate myself in regards to Stocks and only take the 6% company match.

A friend at work bought his first property and after re-hab said " now all I have to do is "Sit Back....and watch the checks roll in". I see the same in the Stock Market...I put my money in and now just wait to be rich. Now the real work begins.

[jkern]

I too live in the SF Bay Area and I have three rental condo's in Roseville (about 125 miles away). I bought them in the 2011/2012 time frame and the initial ROI was about 8.5% after all expenses including taxes. Now, the ROI is around 10% of the initial value. In addition, they have appreciated by 125%.

Rental properties have been very very good to me but I had few parameters when I purchased them. First, a good location with a strong rental market. Second, I was looking for newer condo's (less than 5 years old) since I was not local and needed properties with very low maintenance (no property management company). My turnover rate has been exceptionally low and I have had ZERO vacancy days since purchase. Total time spent per year managing the properties is around 8 hours.

[laurence]

I have rented only to young college/recent grad women so far. They have all been very respectful of the place and keep it cleaner than my own home. I'm not opposed to renting to others but since I rent rooms individually the remaining two always want to pick another peer with a similar lifestyle and feel safer with another young woman. I always include them in the decisions as happy renters make a happy landlord.

[wolf]

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Originally Posted by jkern I too live in the SF Bay Area and I have three rental condo's in Roseville (about 125 miles away). I bought them in the 2011/2012 time frame and the initial ROI was about 8.5% after all expenses including taxes. Now, the ROI is around 10% of the initial value. In addition, they have appreciated by 125%. Rental properties have been very very good to me but I had few parameters when I purchased them. First, a good location with a strong rental market. Second, I was looking for newer condo's (less than 5 years old) since I was not local and needed properties with very low maintenance (no property management company). My turnover rate has been exceptionally low and I have had ZERO vacancy days since purchase. Total time spent per year managing the properties is around 8 hours.

Follow the same thought process. Have both, house and townhouse rentals.
Advantage of Condo. You do not have to worry about the upkeep of the outside grounds. Buildings and grounds always look nice. Again, location
is imperative! HOA fees cane be expensive, but IMO, worth the trade off in
less hands on maintenance. Roseville area is nice.

[pb4uski]

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Originally Posted by DrBrisket ....We have had a few issues with damage to the units but we require a parental guarantee for tenants without a job that has adequate income to pay the rent. The parental guarantee has been a help a few times with expenses related to tenant-caused damage, but not always. We had one tenant that tore the $^!* out of one of our units. Turned out mommy and daddy were both lawyers. When our attorney sent a demand letter to this tenant's parents, they cheerfully called and said to so ahead and try to collect as they knew they were legally obligated to pay. However, they further stated that they would do whatever legal maneuvers were required to ensure that would it would cost us more in legal fees than it was worth. What a lovely family!

OK, fine, we'll go after your kid, the primary obligor instead.... we may not collect but we'll tie him up in court and ruin his credit rating. Now you want to send me a check?

[marko]

While a bit too risky for me, I'm wondering about those ads I see on TV and radio about investing in real estate through some sort of investment company. I looked it up and essentially (IIRC) you send them money and they buy properties using your cash along with that from others. Then they pay out a dividend of sorts.

Anyone look more deeply into these?

[rayvt]

My general thoughts are that any investment that is advertised on TV is going to benefit them much more than it will benefit the suckers buyers.
That goes double for anything that has a has-been celebrity advertising it.

[CaliKid]

I love rental real estate. Have had no problem with out of town ownership. Plus, it's a tax deductible trip once a year. If you want to learn about this go to biggerpockets.com. There is a tremendous volume of info there about real estate investment of all types. The cash flow cities (pretty much most of the fly over states) are completely different than places like California. If you want cash flow in retirement, rather than appreciation, look there. Can easily meet the 1% rule (monthly rent = 1% of purchase price) but hard to meet 2% without going to lower economic level properties which most people agree has more risks. Bottom line, do your homework as there are a lot of people out there making great money (and yes some losing their butts too). Oh ya, and tax advantages so talk to your tax adviser.

[Bruceski44]

When considering out of town ownership using property management companies near the property (turn-key) you must do due diligence on the properties AND the company. Going in, you'll know things like purchase price, market rent, insurance and property taxes, mortgage costs (if any) and will have to make allowances for expenses (repairs, maintenance) and a vacancy allowance to have a cushion for the inevitable vacant period.

I looked carefully at a company in Memphis, but I could never get my analysis to match theirs. They claimed NOI and cash return numbers which were not supported by my estimates. I asked them to review the properties with me, in detail, to find out if I was doing something different or wrong, but they never agreed to a dive. I went to a seminar they put on near my home and inquired of a couple we met there who were already investors. They were pleased with their property's performance, but couldn't tell me anything about NOI or expenses and were too new to have gone through a vacant period after a lease expiration. It met their needs, but I think we're in a part of the cycle now, where more can go wrong than can go right if you make the wrong decision. Markets are saturating, demographics are changing, home ownership is becoming popular again, prices have recovered...

So I moved on and used other property types as I've described elsewhere on this forum. I love RE for diversity and cash flow, but you must be extra careful right now.

[Bruceski44]

I guess I repeated myself there from an earlier post in this same thread. I thought I had posted in a different thread on this topic, but was confused. At least there's more detail in this post than the earlier one, but I'm sorry if I killed the thread.