All Forum Posts by: Aubrey H.

We are in south central Iowa looking for a contractor or handy man. Where in Iowa are you from?

@Bob Green We close on the property around Nov. 1st. Right now on the block there is a very large duplex (each side about 2,300 sq feet) everything else is open land. For the property our loan will be 195k with an appraised value of 300k.

How often do you or your property manager stop by your rentals to check up on things? Or did the little odd jobs like change the filters or if paying utilities in a multi unit check for water leaks? When you do stop what all do you check?

We have a property that we are looking to do some work on -- we are looking at some drywall work, flooring, and a few other odd jobs. We can do it but, life has gotten in the was and we dont think we will get it done fast enough. We would like to get the property rent out. We are trying to decide if repairs can wait. Someone then approached us that they could do some of the repairs is trade for a discount on rent. Would you or have you traded the labor on the house for rent? Why or why not?

@Ryan Behnke I would say it depends on where you want your rental properties to take you (is it a side thing or your full time job?) We on average get $100 a door but with that being said we live in one unit and have family living for free in another unit so we are more then ok with our low return at this time. This is also more a retirement plan for us or we are looking more at the equity we are gaining (that others are paying).

I know other have said this but get a new agent!!! We looked at a house listed at 45k the other day and we put in an offer of 18k in which we settled at 22k and would be able to sell for closer to 60k when we are done. Are agent has never had a problem putting offers in like this!!!

We are looking at developing a city block into several MF units (per city codes). We are looking at way as to finance this new project. What have you found as the best financing for new construction of investment properties?

We wanted to get some insight on how to proceed with our business! We own 4 SF and 2 MF for a total of 8 units. Of those 8 we live In one unit and his parents live in one, So only 6 units have an income. On the 8 units we have a total cashflow of about $100 a month (but keep in mind we dont have a personal house payment and we have a house with no income). We both have full time jobs and without a house payment we can save money every month. At this point we would like to know what you all have done.... would you pay down your current debit or would you save that money for a down payment on another rental property?

@Steven Cherry This is how we have been buying all of our properties. We refinance a house to either pay cash or to get the down payment! To me it depends how much debt you want to carry. But we look at the cash flow, if the unit(s) still cash flow them we go for it! We let someone else pay down our mortgage(s) and still make a little on the side! Personally if the numbers work we go for it!

A little background. We have purchased a small city block that has one duplex on it. The rent income will cover the mortgage on the property so at this time we dont plan on putting the cost of the land in our new budget. We also plan on being our contractor so we understand we will be doing extra work/time and hopefully do some of the work on our own. We would like to develop this land (depending on what our city will let us do). So throwing a few ideas around for how to finance here are a few thing we have thought about. 1.) Get a traditional new construction loan. The problem we see here is being able to get this type of financing we are getting very close to the debt to income limits and dont have enough tax returns (experience) to work with some banks in the area. 2.) Get family and friends to invest or loan us the money as needed. We fear with this that we will have family that wants to be more then a silent partner and not sure we want to open that door. 3.) We have also thought about taking advantage of some of the credit card deals that have 0% for 6-48 months. After we get tenants in (for the income) or at the end of the promotion time we could refinance the new property to pay off the cards. The downfall here is that it would not help our dept to income if another deal presents itself in the near future. What would you do? Or do you have other ideas?