Live-in newbie could use experienced advice

[Collwyn Cleveland]

Hi All,

I'm a newbie looking to purchase an apartment building not so much as an investment, but as a place of residence where I can potentially live rent free.

I see no reason to go small, so I was hoping to obtain a building of 8 units and up. I'll need to use investor money for this purchase, as I don't have sufficient funds of my own for a commercial purchase.

Could anyone advise me as to what may be the best way to approach a potential investor? I have no problem analyzing a property from top to bottom, inside and out, but would an investor be uncomfortable with my wanting to occupy a unit for myself? 

I'm going through the BP tutorials and such, but I'm open to any other advice that an experienced BP'er could offer in my efforts to obtain my first property.

Thank you!

[Wes Brand]

Look, I'll make it simple: You're not going to be on the deed for a more than 100(or even a duplex) unit deal in brooklyn with no experience, no local network, and no money. There's no amount of creativity that will get you there. If you want that, you need to put in the work to get the skills, network, and capital so you can afford it. There's no shortcut here.

If you do, somehow, find an investor who is willing to do that deal with you, run away from them. They're a bad investor and you don't want to learn what they have to teach. You're not talking about buying a 50k house with private money here, you're talking about something with an entry point of ~$2million, most likely far more than that.

Find me one poster here or anywhere who had their first deal as managing a purchased rental property in one of the most expensive markets in the world with no money into the game, oh, and they share ownership of the property, oh, and it's not a family owned house, no, it's 8+ units.

You have three options: Get the experience required by working with an investor on smaller aspects of the deal and give up trying to own until you've developed the skills and relationships required, move somewhere cheaper, or work on your non-real estate job skills to get paid more so you can afford a down payment and run it yourself. 

If you want to start wholesaling deals, sure. Find good ones and you'll have investors coming out of the woodwork to buy them. But that means you don't get to live for free (you might be able to substitute a wholesale fee for rent or something?) and it means you're not on the deed/it's not your property.