BiggerPockets

Hello Everyone, my name is Daniel. I'm a current college student about to graduate in Accounting. I've got plans to go to law school next year at Ole Miss.

I'm co-owner of a publishing company that I started and I want to invest my yearly capital disbursements into real estate. I'm pretty sure I want to get into condominiums in college towns due to the insane rental markets I have seen around my current university.

I'm here to learn and take action. Take it easy.

DPayne

Hi Daniel,

Welcome to Bigger Pockets! That's great to hear you're going to invest in real estate. Much like yourself, I own a few different businesses and use the funds for real estate investments which is great to lower taxes, get higher return of investment (compared to banks' 1% savings interest). Just wanted to send you a friendly tip to calculate your costs when buying a condo. They're generally easier to maintain, but monthly cash flow is usually not as easy or not as much because of the condo fees or any assessments that may come up. For example, I have some condos in which the building is upgrading the original heating system to a high efficiency heating system this year and it's basically going to cost me $1,200 for each unit I own. Other thing about renting to college students is to really screen them well, have their parents be co-signers and make sure you have a security deposit because it's almost guaranteed when they move out the place will not be as sparkling clean as the way it was when you first rent it out. Sometimes the damages that occur are even greater than the security deposit that you collect, so that's just another word of caution to really take the time to find quality tenants. Happy Investing!

Daniel-

Read up on on the 50% rule and 2% rule here in the forum. It'll open your eyes. Do a forum search for them.

Originally posted by Daniel Payne

Thanks for the tips everyone, I'm looking at some 2 bedroom condo's in town. The trends here have these being leased out to two different college students (on individual leases) with parents as co-signers if they are under 25 years old.

Due to the fact that I am a college student myself, I wont be renting to freshman or sophomores with the party-bug still fresh in their system.

I figure if i can get a 2br with individual leases I should have enough cashflow per month to cover mortgage (should be pretty low, i'm gonna throw a lot of cash down), condo fees, and set some aside for clean-up when they leave. I'm not looking really to line my pockets on a per month basis, but really just have someone else paying in equity for me. However a few extra hundreds a month surely wouldn't hurt anything.

please, PLEase, PLEASE! read up before jumping in. it's not as easy as: RENT-MORTGAGE PYMT = CASH FLOW

you are looking to get involved in a higher risk market and you WILL have high maintenance (most definitely with the condos and the students). you definitely need to be be ready for that.

as already suggested, read up on the 50%/2% rules.

also, keep in mind that with the condo fees, you will ALWAYS have a payment.

Hi Daniel,

Welcome to bigger pocket.Nice to meet you.

Hi Daniel,

This is a great site for learning the business. Good luck on all your future investments!

Chris