All Forum Posts by: Ryan Arth

@Renzo Roffmann Shaker has high taxes, as you now know. Since the plan is no longer to live in it, the question becomes what to do now, given the change of plan. I get your thought about selling and investing somewhere with lower taxes, but I would consider the overall picture, not just the taxes. How much do you have tied up, what is it yielding, and what would a different investment of those funds yield? With the transaction costs to get out of the one in Shaker, how long would it take you to recoup the friction costs of switching, and then how long after that until you are ahead enough that it was worth making the change?

Realtor.com says that Shaker rose 11.8% on average over the past year, so you may have benefitted from investing in a higher appreciation, lower cashflow, area. 

In addition to what others have said, Lakewood is a city where the majority of the single family home stock is older. As long as you keep up with updates over time, you shouldn't fall behind the market in rents or value. If you are looking at this decision through the investment lens, what would you net on the investment that you put this money in to, after transaction costs and taxes? If you kept up with the property what would your returns be in five years? How do these compare?

If you want to let it go for non-financial reasons, that is a different story. I cleared most of our portfolio over a few years because they didn't fit where I am going. The financial aspect worked out fine, but that wasn't the primary driver. 

@Ido Roth If you search on BP using the spyglass you will find a lot of agents who are active in the investment space. Are you local, or investing from out of the area? 

Type the city name into the search function on here and see how many threads come up. Very popular, for what that is worth.

@Michael Storch If you are interested, there are a few area investor meetups. Depending on what side of the city you are on, we host one in Independence, which is tomorrow at 6pm (Tavern of Independence). Our friend Darian hosts one in Lakewood in two weeks on Thursday. There is another well attended one on W25th every month. Most are posted on meetup.com, some are on FB. 

Quote from @Brendan Taylor:

Best way to analyze areas is to make a trip and drive around the city. If you are serious, this will be 100% worth whatever time and money you spend to do this. 

I could sit and tell you all zip codes I am comfortable buying in but Akron like many cities almost changes from block to block. There are areas in almost all zip codes I would buy in. 

 For sure, driving the area is always the best. And it is usually difficult to recommend areas without context, as you never know what price point and property class someone is targeting. Or what their risk tolerance is. 

His question was about areas to avoid, which was a little more specific than many similar posts asking about neighborhoods. 

@Dan Hinz You may find some valuable information here.

https://www.neighborhoodscout.com/oh/akron/crime

@Emilio Ortiz I just looked and there aren't any local meetups while you are here. I figured that was the quickest way for you to meet many people involved in this market. 

It's a lot to take in in two days. Hopefully you did a lot of pre-work before you arrived. 

If you have any questions while you are here feel free to shoot me a message or call.

@Darnell Fenderson It's good to see that you are local. I might suggest attending one of the local meetups, to be able to talk to other investors that are at various points on their journey. 

If you sold the quad there are costs involved, and then you have to find somewhere else to live. If you were there over two years you won't have as much to pay as much in taxes. That FHA loan is assumable, so that might be attractive (depending on your rate).

You could consider leaving the FHA loan in place and just move into a live in flip. Or rent and buy another investment.

Capital can always be borrowed/raised as well, you just have to have a good enough of an opportunity to support the debt and compensate you for the risk. 

You answered your own question here. Every dollar into this project is borrowed at various interest rates. There is a very real chance that your rehabbed section 8 property will not appraise for enough to cash out refi all funds invested. You would likely use the proceeds to pay off the HML, leaving you with a new mortgage (which you paid to get) and a HELOC payment (and possibly a residual balance with the HML).