My first post was 9 years ago but now im back!

[Pablo Ottenwalder Jr.]

Hey everyone,

So this is kind of a full-circle moment for me. I made my first post on here almost 9 years ago when I was just a guy listening to the podcast on repeat, dreaming about getting into real estate but not actually doing anything about it yet.

So I finally took action.

Since then I've wholesaled, flipped, and done buy-and-holds across Massachusetts, Connecticut, Florida, and Michigan. I've had some great wins and some painful lessons including a flip where I lost $37K 

But here's where I'm at now. After years of flipping, I've started to realize the model doesn't excite me the way it used to. The risk-to-reward on a lot of these flips just stopped making sense to me putting up serious capital and taking on all that exposure for a $20–30K profit. Meanwhile I'm watching guys close commercial deals for life-changing numbers with way less risk. It reframed everything.

So I'm going all-in on commercial. I recently made the move to South Florida and I'm specifically getting interested in retail properties down here. The Florida market is a different animal population growth, no state income tax, businesses relocating constantly and I think there's real long-term opportunity in retail if you know where to look.

That's where I'd love to tap into this community again.

A few things I'm trying to learn from people actually doing it:

• For those in retail/commercial in South Florida what submarkets are you most bullish on right now?
• How are you underwriting retail deals in this environment with where rates are at?
• Any advice for someone transitioning from residential flipping into commercial? What do you wish you knew earlier?

Appreciate this community it's wild to come back almost a decade later as a totally different investor than the kid who made that first post. Would love to connect with anyone in the South Florida commercial space.

Thank you!