All Forum Posts by: Aaron Taylor

I think there would be value, however I think you really have to be selective.  All these podcasts now who say "masterminds are what accelerated me to the top" and then just happen to have one to sell you, well, it's kind of hard to take them seriously.  It feels like the podcast/mentor/training market is getting pretty frothy these days, it seems like some of these groups have shifted more from actually buying real estate to selling training/advertising.  Hard to know who to trust, I think you'd need to get feedback or a recommendation from someone who's actually been in the particular one you're looking at (like make a post here on it and see if anyone has done it). 

 I would start with listening to Smart Passive Income by Pat Flynn.  Then Niche Pursuits podcast as well.  Go to their websites, start reading and consuming information.  There are some other podcasts to listen to/udemy classes you should take depending on what route you want to go.

Do you need programming experience?  No.  They're just wordpress sites, or ran on Amazon, or ran off Shopify.  No programming needed.

You do need to be able to formulate a plan though, and be able to process information logically so you know what parts to focus on.  It's competitive, so I wouldn't exactly say this is passive at all.  You need time to do this, but that sounds like what you have right now.  If you start from scratch, it's about planting seeds and getting them growing over a year, and if you buy you need to be able to handle the site.

I recommend building a site from scratch to start.  Just your basic wordpress blog about something you like and can right constant content about.  Write 30 or 40 articles, then see what starts to pull in traffic from google.  Start a youtube channel, maybe a podcast, etc.  Create a brand around it.  Start learning SEO to rank your site higher.  

By this point, you'll have figured out enough to extend your capabilities to make more websites and probably even hire yourself out to local businesses who need help with a basic site.  You can snowball it pretty easily.

But the one thing you need to do this is time.  You can work a full time job and still do this, but you have to be willing to put in the time to start on it.  It isn't passive to start at all.  Once it's up and running, then yes it gets a lot more passive.  It can be way more lucrative than real estate in a short period of time, but then again almost all business can...real estate is the slow path to the wealth usually but is less risky than running business.  If you want to make money faster, doing a business venture (like websites, flipping houses, etc) is going to be the way to go.

To be honest, if I needed to become a millionaire in 5 years, I'd probably skip real estate and just do websites.  Like affiliate, e-commerce, Amazon FBA, etc.  You can flip those just like you do houses.  Doesn't require much capital, doesn't require connections, doesn't even require finding good deals, it just requires hard work and dedication to output content/products.  

Frankly you could probably do both of them at the same time, since web stuff is only time intensive in spurts, just like real estate.  Lot of doing a bunch of work then waiting.  You can work on the web stuff while trying to find a real estate deal, and when you find a real estate deal you can work on that and put the web stuff on hold temporarily.  You can buy websites that make $1k a month a for around $30k, you get good at that and you can turn that $1k a month into $3k and sell that website a year later for $90k.  Same concepts as real estate.

I think the answer is yes but I wouldn't expect it to pay off right away.  I've actually sent a couple things another investor's way recently because they didn't quite fit in the scope of work I was looking for (meaning I didn't have time to take them on).  You may find the same thing.  If you can find deals that don't fit your scope but may fit someone else's, then that might be a good starting point for a relationship.

I also try and pay it forward on people who might sell but aren't sure.  Like I talked with a guy and his 93 year old mom about a property they have owned for like 54 years, it was her's and they were thinking about selling.  I told them that while I would like to buy it, it would probably be a lot smarter to hold onto it for the rest of her life, that way the cost basis would raise up at that point and you'd pay no taxes.  They were unaware of that and thanked me for my honesty...so even though it cost me a deal, maybe that social networking will eventually come back around (not expecting it to though).  Either way it's nice to interact with people, and you never know what might come around.

Having done both, this is what I would say:

Both scratch (at least the high end Home Depot stuff does), and they're both going to be decently expensive to install compared to carpet.  If you have any sort of water issues, LVP is the worst to pull up.  Water will sit on hardwood (or soak in some), soak into carpet, but will seap underneath LVP so you have to pull it up (which is awful).

I've put some LVP in bathrooms, kitchens, etc.  It was a mistake, I should have done tile.  Not that I've had issues there yet, but tile would have been cheaper, more durable, and more easily repairable.

If I had to do some of them again, I would do (in this order):

Tile

Carpet

Hardwood

LVP

Tile is more durable/repairable and costs the same about (maybe cheaper), carpet can be dirt cheap and install is cheap/fast, hardwood can be refinished and lasts a long time.  LVP is more of grey area right now as far as long term results.

I actually used LVP on the advice of this forum.  In hindsight, it would have been far better for me to do more tile/carpet and use LVP sparingly.  Tile will outlast LVP and carpet's like 1/2 the cost installed, so it's hard for me to make a compelling LVP argument.  Like if the faucet in the kitchen breaks and leaks all over the floor, you'd be ok with tile or hardwood...LVP you're probably going to have to pull up unless the supposedly waterproof joints work.

I guess my advice is, LVP is great unless you have an issue with it (broken plank, water).  Then it's a nightmare, at least for the click joint stuff.

Honestly, I think it's worth doing both an active investment and a syndicate deal, just so you know what you like better.  Right now it's probably easier to find a syndicate deal to invest in than local real estate for most people, a lot of the 1 to 4 range properties are really heated and don't make a lot of sense anymore unfortunately.

We've invested in both and may go more syndicate here just because people are overpaying so much for KC area property...I can't see how it's going to pan out longer term, and if most syndicates hit 50% of their goals it's going to be better than most of the local stuff.  There have been some properties listed lately where I just laughed at the list price and how absurd it was, only to see it under contract the next day.  Are they out of state buyers using all cash?  I don't know, but for some of them that's the only thing that would make sense.  There was one property with foundation issues where they couldn't get $460k for it locally after making the rounds past all the local investors, they broadcast it on facebook for $560k and I think it sold in one day....cap rate of like 5%.

If you're building a recession proof plan, 30 year loans are a lot more recession proof than 15 because they give you a lot more cushion in the event of vacancies or rent drops.

By paying off the loan early you're essentially making a bet than you can't earn more than the interest rate (4% to 5%) on that extra money you're putting towards principal. 

By doing 15 years you're also limiting how quickly you can acquire rentals.

All things to think about anyways.  I liken it to traveling on the interstate.  If you take the interstate (akin to 30 years mortgages, lots of leverage) you're going to get to your destination a lot faster most of the time.  However, sometimes there are major accidents and the interstate gets backed up...so sometimes the alternate routes are better.  All up to personal preferences.
 

There's a certain amount of irony for someone getting moderated for posting a link by a moderator with four links in their signature.  :)

#1 Check to see if the population is growing or shrinking.  If it's shrinking, don't count on any appreciation at all.  Also it's definitely riskier if shrinking.  

#2 Check to see on Zillow, facebook groups/marketplace, etc to see if apartments are renting quickly.  That will give you a good feel for whether vacancy is an issue.

#3  Use the rents found above and then use Zillow's sold history to determine the typical cap rate for the area.

#4  check out the websites for local apartment complexes and see what they charge for rent.  You may even call to see if they have openings, can also give you a feel for vacancy.

I was just thinking this same thing today and then I ran across this thread.  The posting is starting to get a bit ridiculous at times, but where I really notice the difference is podcasts.  Most of the podcasts I've been listening to for the past couple years have started to go downhill, mainly through loads of circular self promotion.  Person A has a podcast and Person B comes on it, then A goes on B's, and then they both go on C's and he comes on their's, etc and they all say the same thing and the value just goes downhill quickly.  Even the biggerpockets podcasts (which I love most of the time) have fallen victim to this.

Everyone is chasing capital and throwing out their best sales pitch constantly, like it's a frenzy out there now.  Probably a bad sign, whenever there is overwhelming exuberance things tend to fall apart.

I do agree with the poster that the quality of posts in general seems to have fallen over the past year for some reason.  The constant self promotion stuff isn't making that any better.