All Forum Posts by: Brian Levredge

Philip Meyer with Hurst & Meyer.  We use him for our property management company and he's handled real estate transactions for me as well.  

Depends on your constitution and tolerance for risk, etc.  We manage all over town and even the not so great areas have pockets that are ok, but it's block to block.  Generally, higher crime/lower rents are associated with East Chatt, Alton Park, East Lake, and parts of Brainerd.  

@Jeremiah Russell, I own a local PM company here in Chattanooga.  We have the work load as we are expanding and always looking for handy men or a project manager type that can run his own crew.  Feel free to PM me.  

Since you've already found out your answer on ownership, were you to take over a property with vehicles parked in the yard, etc., you can post 72 hour notices on front, back and both sides of the vehicles and take pictures of them.  Once 72 hours has passed you can have them towed and the owner would be responsible for paying the towing and storage fees.  Usually, there's a pretty good reason why they are sitting there and it's generally not worth the time to try and get title on them.  

Between Main & McCallie going east from Central Ave towards Dodds.  You could expand that up to 3rd on the north and down towards 23rd on the south, although those areas are surrounded by much more that's not so go, but still changing for the better.  

S Broad would be the other bet.  If they get the Wheland site redeveloped I think you'll see that whole area start to pop, including the parts of Alton Park that are closest to Broad.  

You should be able to work backwards on this fairly easily.  First thing would be to find two bed rental comps in the target (sub) market.  Once you have a general idea of sq ft overall you can have contractors give you a general ball park price on the price per ft.  Generally in Chattanooga you can build multi for 80-100/ft depending on size, finish, and lot condition.  You need to get about about $1.50/ft/month to make the deal work and put a couple bucks in your pocket every month.  

Depends on the lender.  As an out of market investor you might be looking at a larger down payment due to perceived risk from the lender.  As an in market investor I've rarely been over 20% on a commercial loan, but that's mainly because I work with lenders who can due subject to loans based on stabilized value after construction is done.  I also agree with the sentiments above where someone stated to hang onto your money.  30k won't get you far on buy and holds using commercial financing without getting pretty creative.  

For those thinking about buying in East Lake...you need to be careful.  First while most sub markets have appreciated (so has East Lake to an extent) the city is targeting gentrification in different parts of town.  While I know the mantra here is invest for cash flow, the truth is you make the majority of your money by buying right and selling down the line.  With that being said, as someone who owns and manages a fair amount of rentals all over town, including East Lake,  there are more that a few parts of East Lake that should be avoided.   

I've closed with Title Guaranty & Trust (downtown).  Use Leslie Spearman.  Not always easy to get a hold of but does great work and has saved my bacon.  As a caveat, I don't wholesale but I did buy an wholesale apartment building a year and half ago and they paid the assignment fee off the closing statement.  

Longhorn Investments would be a great place to start.  

@Dan Beaulieu is a member here.