Austin duplex - who is buying?

Question

I have been looking to buy duplex / fourplex in the Austin market. I need some information on who is buying the duplexes. I assume the fourplex is usually bought by investors. For duplexes, are buyers "mostly" investors or individual/families (with live in one and rent the other unit )?

Raj

Alex G. · Answer

The only accurate way to answer this is to get  list of sold duplexes for the period you're interested in and look up owner's mailing addresses in TCAD. If you have access to MLS you can also go into the sold duplex listings and click on a "Tax" tub to see the owner mailing address info. But keep in mind, it takes a while (3-6 months) for TCAD to update the property record with the new owner's info.

Nick Sheveland · Answer

@Neil Narayan is right I feel. I would say it's mainly an investor game. I'm a newer investor and house hack a duplex in downtown Round Rock via fha. I plan on house hacking small mfr's for a long time but also get into small apartments in the next 3-5 years.

Aaron Gordy · Answer

Anecdotally speaking, the last few fourplexes that I sold over the last couple of months, were owner occupy but that was due to the fannie mae program that was allowing 5% down. Its phased out. Fourplexes for owner occupy will be harder to make work with fha given the self sufficiency rule. Duplexes have less onerous rules for financing.

Neil Narayan · Answer

Based on what I have seen with my clients, most Duplexes are being bought by young investors who are house hacking (as that concept is being preached a lot these days in the investor forums and books). But the location matters too e.g. a decent duplex in South Austin or East will cost $400-800k so it will be bought by a more seasoned investor.

Austin duplex - who is buying?

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