How do you master your market?

[Alex Sanchez]

I'm new to the REI game and I'm wondering what are the steps you need to take to master the market where your gonna invest? I always hear "know your market" or "learn your market" I do take a look at sales comps near the property but what other steps or things do I need know or do?

[Ryan E.]

Alex Sanchez I've pondered that as well! Some of the things I'm trying to do in my market is learn rental rates as well as prices of homes being listed. I get email alerts from Zillow and Trulia when there's a new rental listing as well as homes for sale in the areas where I'm interested in buying.

Another thing I think is very important is learning what homes sold for 10, 20, 30 years ago as well as what rental rates have been historically and where they are now (Side note is that I'm working on doing this and haven't found a really good way to find this data yet). If you can do that in your market you can figure out what level of appreciation homes have in your area as well as what he rental growth rate is...you then have a decent predictor of where prices and rents will keep going. Another crucial piece of this is knowing what's going on in your city/market as far as population growth, employment, industry etc. I read a really good blogpost, https://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2015/05/10/invest-out-of-state-how-to-analyze-a-city/ that talks about a city's Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR). Basically each city has to compile a huge report that talks about what's going on in that city financially which includes things that help you analyze your market for real estate investing purposes. Just google your city and "CAFR".

I think having access to the MLS would really help because from what I understand there are a lot of tools you can utilize like seeing average days on market, seeing comparable sales, and a lot more I'm sure.

I think what I've mentioned are all things that will help you "learn" your market but I know there's a lot more that can be done and a lot more detailed and exact info to really learn your market as well as more effective ways so I'm looking forward to reading more responses from the other pro's much smarter than me.