All Forum Posts by: Aaron Millis

J Scott,

First I want to say your book is awesome. It was the first real estate related book I ever read and it also guided me towards BP. I ended up gravitating more towards the rental side of RE but the information has still helped me a ton.

I saw in some thread from forever ago where you talked about buying homes with foundation issues. My only question is regarding that because I am interested in some homes in my market with foundation issues. My question is- In your experience did your properties having "Foundation Repairs" ever turn away would be buyers? I understand that a lot more goes into the equation but lets assume everything was done correctly ie: structural engineer inspected the property- repairs were done by a reputable company with a long term warranty etc.

I'm basically asking do people fear foundation problems so much that they turn away from your properties regardless of how well the work was done/or what experts inspected it? Thanks

Hi Anna,

For starters I had the same thoughts as Amanda G. Why do you say that the house will be used as shared housing for veterans? Is it not possible that you could get 4 non veterans as tenants? I'm not the fair housing landlord expert but I'd probably steer away from referring to it as "veteran housing"

Either way I can relate to your situation a little because I also own a house that is shared by multiple people. It's a 4 bedroom 4 bathroom house in a Auburn AL which is definitely a college town (though I do not refer to it as a student rental). I currently have 3 tenants that are all female and I live in the 4th room (house hacking). 

I'm not saying this is necessarily the right answer, but I did not really put anything in my lease as far as guidelines for sharing responsibilities of common areas. I think issues regarding this can be avoided mostly just by tenant screening. All 3 girls in my house are grad students at Auburn. They didn't know each other before moving in but they all have something in common and they are all grown adults. I basically just told them when they moved in that any drama that may arise from them sharing the house is between them and has nothing to do with me (as long as the house/people aren't being physically harmed).

If you do end up renting to veterans I think your best bet to ensure everyone gets along is to just make one lease for all 4 bedrooms. When you do that groups of people will apply, rather than random individuals. I was in the military ( making me a veteran now) and during my time in I shared all kinds of living conditions with strangers and friends. This obviously won't apply to everyone but most of us (military/vets) are pretty good at policing one another. If you get a house full of veterans that know each other and agree to live together I wouldn't think you'd have many issues like this! 

Hi BP,

It's always nice when you get to click "Real Estate Success Stories" as your Forum Category:)

I would just like to share with the community that I am now an owner of 2 properties, because I just closed my 2nd deal yesterday! This process was about 100 times more stressful/difficult than my first purchase. I purchased my first property about 20 months ago right off the MLS. I bought it for exactly what it was worth and closed in 30 days.. there was no fancy negotiation or value add play. I was simply buying it as a house hack and it worked out well for me, better than I could have anticipated. The property is in Auburn AL, and I was very fortunate because the value on that property has risen by about $45,000 in the last 20 months due to the market getting crazy hot here.

Though I did not have any control over the value add with my property, I did understand how powerful it was and how it gives me a lot more options as far as: selling/HELOC/cash out refi/etc.

So this time around I decided to do value add on purpose rather than hoping to get lucky again.

The property I have just purchased is in the south part of Montgomery AL near Vaughn Meadows. It was a foreclosure that looked like a train wreck in a lot of ways- which turned out to be because it was vandalized. To include to copper wires being stolen from basically everywhere imaginable, the entire ceiling in one of the bedrooms was caved in, and to top it off it looked like there could be foundation issues.

The property was on the market for about 6 months and I imagine its appearance scared off all other would be investors. But I decided to take a closer look.... After a few inspections, a lot of headache with my realtor, and a lot of headache with my lender, and a lottt of headache finding a contractor- I ended up going through with the deal. Maybe on a future post if anyone cares I will elaborate on my realtor/lender/contractor headache because it would be a lottttttttttt of typing haha.

SPECIFICS:

-list price: $75,000

-purchase price: $70,500

-loan type: conventional renovation loan - 5% down payment/have to live the property for a year

-Reno cost: $12,700

-Total price: $83,200

-Cash invested: $9760

Structural engineer inspection $450- Home inspection $350- Earnest money $2,000- down payment $4160 (5% of $83,200) closing costs $2800.

- Appraised value: $124,000!

When I started investing about 20 months ago the only RE knowledge I had was from BiggerPockets. And that is 99% the case today. Anyone reading this that is just starting out and wondering if this site is legit and if you can actually benefit from REI I'm here to tell you it is/ and you can. If you think you need to buy into some "investing course" or pay a coach or mentor you don't. The books, podcasts, and forums on here are GOLD and they cost you next to nothing.

When I started investing I had about 25K to my name saved up from the 4 years I was in the military(lower enlisted). 20 months later I have over $100,000 in equity between my 2 properties and one of them is cash flowing beautifully.

I left a lot out but I'm trying to keep this shorter than my last success post.. so this concludes my success story:)

@Kyler Cook

I’m about to close on my 2nd home and during this entire process I’ve felt how you just described you felt. My realtor was pretty much just there to let me into the property when I needed to. He almost lost me my deal because he misinformed me of something, and he also tried to lean me away from this property without any decent reason. The appraisal came in on the house I decided to buy anyway, and it was $41,000 higher than what I bought it for ($54000 higher - $13,000 rehab). I’ve decided to ensure I don’t run into this potential problem again.

I’m doing the online classes for my RE license.

Hey Riley,

I haven't bought a multi family property yet but just things I would think you would want to ask:

-If utilities are separately metered- Proof of current rent roll- ask about its vacancy/occupancy history-If there are tenants, verify that they are actual tenants not just bodies to make the property seem like its cash flowing. Just kinda common things like that I imagine would be a good place to start. Other than that just double and triple check all your numbers, good luck! 

Hi Yosselyn,

Welcome to BP (officially). Are you looking for a multi family to live in or purely as a rental? Are you looking for 2-4 units or 5+ commercial ones? I'm just curious what you have you mind set on. I'm also a veteran and I started investing almost 2 years ago and it's been awesome so far! I know I want to get into multi family eventually, but I'd like to use the VA loan to house hack a 4 plex or 3plex if I can find one that works. Also- I don't know if you separated the Marines with any sort of disability, but depending on your rating (if you have one) that can also help you out in the Real Estate investing world. For example you wouldn't have to pay a funding fee for the VA loan, and you might be able to avoid some or all of your property taxes on your residential property! At least I think that's pretty cool.

The book on Rental Property Investing by Brandon Turner (from this site has all you need to know from a basic simple standpoint. It's the only book I read then I went and house hacked and it's worked out better than I could have imagined. 

You can't control how old that you are but you can control how mature/professional you are. I'd say you are at an advantage being only 19 and already having discovered something that could potentially be life changing for you. I started at 24, I'm 26 now and I have already had a great amount of success via real estate, and I'm not a real estate expert. 99% of what I know about REI I learned right here on BiggerPockets in the form of books, podcasts, and forums. I guess my advice might not carry as much weight as others who have been investing for decades.. but I'm wayyyyy against spending money on "Coaches" or "Mentors". All you need is information and action. You're in the right place for information so all you need to do is figure out how to take action. The forums are amazing because you can ask 1 million+ people questions anytime you want. So why would you ever pay someone when people are willing to teach you for free?

As far as which route you should take, just go for the one that is the most appealing and seems the most possible for your situation. I was going to tell you not to get discouraged if things are hard or don't go well... but I'm the kind of person that doesn't believe stuff like that needs to be said to a grown man. If you know what you want is obtainable and you know how to get it no amount of setbacks should stop you from achieving it. If they do then you never really wanted it.

This is coming from someone that's done numerous random entrepreneurial things prior to discovering real estate investing and failing at a lot of them. To include getting robbed of $2000 cash when I had like $3000 to my name!  

It's a great book man. That book alone turned me on to rental property investing and it is worth its weight in gold to me. I have been investing a short while and my financial life has already changed dramatically because of reading that book/ along with listening to podcasts. 

I've only just begun reading it but, I'd say read "Think and Grow Rich". It seems like a great book so far and I like the overall message that I think it is trying to portray and am a big believer in it.

Take this as lightly as you want since I'm obviously very detached from this entire situation but... If you want to be financially independent, and you want to get to that point via real estate investing (assumption since this is a real estate platform) then why would you let anyone else tell you to do otherwise. I looked at your page and I see that you have read the same books I had before I started investing a short time ago. And you are a member of this awesome site that has 300+ podcasts, books, forums, and a crap ton of information in general. Why would you not go for FI?...

If it's a fear or uncertainty thing that's something you'll have to just get over or always wonder what could have been. The podcasts alone can prove to you that normal everyday people become financially independent via real estate all the time. I knew I could and would succeed as an entrepreneur and I don't need a test or a mentor to confirm or deny that for me. This is coming from someone that started investing 19 months ago, someone that is also recently retired from the military, someone that is also young like you, and someone that has made more money in 2018 via real estate than I did the last 4 years in the military. And I'm not RE expert either. I just absorbed all the information I could and acted on it. 

You live in the land of opportunity so why settle for less than you desire? I went the entrepreneur route and I'm happier than I've ever been. A lot of people told me I was foolish for leaving the military to do this, imagine if I had listened.