What are some underrated real estate niches?
Real Estate Agent · Chattanooga TN · Member since 2016 · 34 posts · 9 votes
What are some underrated real estate niches?
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Specialist · Victor, NY · Member since 2013 · 823 posts · 844 votes
7yGreat Post...hopeful that there will lots of input.
I'm a storage guy through and through! But I've always been intriqued by mobile home park investing too...owning just the park, not individual homes. Conceptually, when you are just renting the dirt and infrastructure, there is a lot of overlap in the "dynamics" that make storage so attractive. It does involve "habitation" though even if you don't own the mobile home itself and that is enough of a reminder for me to stay in my lane:)
I have carved out a little niche purchasing timeshares at foreclosure and then renting them out and/or selling them for a profit. And there are a couple of other guys that do it at scale. We make $1500-$5000 per deal and it only takes a couple hours of work. Its nothing crazy but we've managed to use the profits on those to buy two for personal use (see my note below on finding a way to profit off our consumerism;)
Investing in Timber Land is also fascinating to me. I don't know a whole lot about it but I love the idea. Maybe someone with experience with that will chime in.
Of course, STR (short term rentals like AirBNB are taking the "vacation" rental industry to whole new levels. No longer do you have to live by a beach or other tourist attraction to capitalize on STR.
And lastly, this one is a huge stretch as its not really real estate but we rented out a Motorhome for several years to offset our cost of ownership. I always try to fund my "consumption" and renting out the MH when we didnt use it allowed us to own it for 3 years, live in it for 30 plus days per year AND sell it for $1600 more than we "paid" for it. I put "paid" in quotes because we traded our last low income housing rental for it;)
8 Replies
- Specialist · Victor, NY · Member since 2013 · 823 posts · 844 votes7y
Great Post...hopeful that there will lots of input.
I'm a storage guy through and through! But I've always been intriqued by mobile home park investing too...owning just the park, not individual homes. Conceptually, when you are just renting the dirt and infrastructure, there is a lot of overlap in the "dynamics" that make storage so attractive. It does involve "habitation" though even if you don't own the mobile home itself and that is enough of a reminder for me to stay in my lane:)
I have carved out a little niche purchasing timeshares at foreclosure and then renting them out and/or selling them for a profit. And there are a couple of other guys that do it at scale. We make $1500-$5000 per deal and it only takes a couple hours of work. Its nothing crazy but we've managed to use the profits on those to buy two for personal use (see my note below on finding a way to profit off our consumerism;)
Investing in Timber Land is also fascinating to me. I don't know a whole lot about it but I love the idea. Maybe someone with experience with that will chime in.
Of course, STR (short term rentals like AirBNB are taking the "vacation" rental industry to whole new levels. No longer do you have to live by a beach or other tourist attraction to capitalize on STR.
And lastly, this one is a huge stretch as its not really real estate but we rented out a Motorhome for several years to offset our cost of ownership. I always try to fund my "consumption" and renting out the MH when we didnt use it allowed us to own it for 3 years, live in it for 30 plus days per year AND sell it for $1600 more than we "paid" for it. I put "paid" in quotes because we traded our last low income housing rental for it;)
- Real Estate Agent · Chattanooga TN · Member since 2016 · 34 posts · 9 votes7y
@Michael Wagner
Thanks for replying! I find mobile home parks intriguing as well. It also seems like it would be extremely stable and recession proof (just a guess).
I also have not thought about time shares either, thanks for the insight!
- Real Estate Agent · Chattanooga TN · Member since 2016 · 34 posts · 9 votes7y
@Michael Wagner
Also, have you ever thought about motor home parks? I know nothing about this, but it does seem like it would be overlooked.
- Rock Star Extraordinaire · Northeast, TN · Member since 2015 · 10k+ posts · 16k+ votes7y
At this point in the market I'd be surprised if there were any underrated/undiscovered niches left! There's been a couple that I've been tempted to try but I just don't know enough about the mechanics of them that I've been willing to jump in both feet, and dabbling to me seems a good way to lose your money. I think MH park investing could be really profitable, especially if you owned the space but not the trailer.
Skyline Properties - Real Estate Agent · Chattanooga TN · Member since 2016 · 34 posts · 9 votes7y
@JD Martin
Thanks for your input! This niche keeps coming to mind for me. I'm not exactly sure where to learn about this niche, but I'm definitely interested.
- Member since 2023 · 25 posts · 7 votes2y
Storage/Industrial or just looking into selling office buildings and marketing them as properties which can be turned into multifamily provides money!
- Investor · VA · Member since 2015 · 21k+ posts · 19k+ votes2y
@Ben Bymaster
Mortgage note investing
Not many do it so a lot less competition
7e investments53 Reviews - 2yJay HinrichsBusiness MemberReal Estate Consultant · Summerlin, NV · Member since 2014 · 45k+ posts · 66k+ votes
Quote from @Michael Wagner:
Great Post...hopeful that there will lots of input.
I'm a storage guy through and through! But I've always been intriqued by mobile home park investing too...owning just the park, not individual homes. Conceptually, when you are just renting the dirt and infrastructure, there is a lot of overlap in the "dynamics" that make storage so attractive. It does involve "habitation" though even if you don't own the mobile home itself and that is enough of a reminder for me to stay in my lane:)
I have carved out a little niche purchasing timeshares at foreclosure and then renting them out and/or selling them for a profit. And there are a couple of other guys that do it at scale. We make $1500-$5000 per deal and it only takes a couple hours of work. Its nothing crazy but we've managed to use the profits on those to buy two for personal use (see my note below on finding a way to profit off our consumerism;)
Investing in Timber Land is also fascinating to me. I don't know a whole lot about it but I love the idea. Maybe someone with experience with that will chime in.
Of course, STR (short term rentals like AirBNB are taking the "vacation" rental industry to whole new levels. No longer do you have to live by a beach or other tourist attraction to capitalize on STR.
And lastly, this one is a huge stretch as its not really real estate but we rented out a Motorhome for several years to offset our cost of ownership. I always try to fund my "consumption" and renting out the MH when we didnt use it allowed us to own it for 3 years, live in it for 30 plus days per year AND sell it for $1600 more than we "paid" for it. I put "paid" in quotes because we traded our last low income housing rental for it;)
I like the Crimeshare buy low sell high concept or renting if you can.. that has to be wide open inventory.
I personally spent most of the 90s in Timber.. Mainly buying Timber Deeds . But we also bought a 700 acre parcel for long term and held it almost 20 years logging it about every 3 then selling it. the front 100 acres I busted into 10 parcels that paid for 75% of the property.. We exited with a mid 7 low to mid 7 figure profit when we sold to Stimson lumber. I also bought quite a few 20 40 80 acre tracts and would bust them up as well.. it was pretty cool because in Oregon logging permits are a snap.. you dont need any county grading permits to bust in your logging roads so say I had a 20 acre that I was going to short plat into 4 5s we would put the road in the logical spot for each parcel future access and then put a few landings in the logical spot for the homesites all under logging permits saved THOUSANDS .. then sell off the lots.. It was a great gig..
Timber deeds are actual Deeds kind of like Oil and gas rights.. So if a land owner did not want to sell the land but wanted to sell some timber we would use the Deed so that if they wanted to 1031 their proceeds they could because unlike gypo loggers who wanted to log with a contract. We wanted to pay cash for the timber up front we got much better deals doing this and virtually no competition form the Gypos since they are not sophisticated in these more advanced techniques.
Dont get me wrong the loggers are great people just not real estate and business folks by and large.
And a few other methods we used.
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