All Forum Posts by: Brian Levredge

I think your biggest risk with STR in Chattanooga is them changing the zoning/allowance to do so after you've purchased. There is currently a movement to do this in the 37404 zip led by the Dist 4 (I think) Councilwoman citing a lack of affordable housing that STR's contribute to by taking them out of the LTR housing inventory. I personally don't agree with this logic, but that's what's happening now, and no idea if it will pass. But if it does pass and you purchased based on STR returns instead of LTR returns then you may be up the creek. My only suggestion would be to look at the same property from a LTR perspective and see if that's a ROI you can stomach if that's what it came to pass.

We do.  Feel free to PM me. 

PM me and I can give you a few leads. I don't think there are any commercial focused agents in Chattanooga that are on here.

Define investor friendly.  I work with a number of GC's here in town.  That said, lumber prices have doubled in the last several months due to a number of reasons, so even the guys that are cheaper are now costing a fair amount more.  Also, to save you time, if you aren't going to get $1.35/sq ft per month in rent you probably don't want to bother with it.  

Depends on zoning as well.  Ft O is mostly in Catoosa County but some of it lies in Walker County.  Walker County is broke and has been jacking up property taxes to get out of years and years of mismanagement.  That being said, each county has it's own general plan for growth that can be found online.  This will tell you min. lot size, set back requirements, street frontage, etc. that a lot must have in order for it to be built on.  I've done this in Hamilton County in the past.  I'll also say that if everything is R1 and there are no other small multi's in the neighborhood, you'll probably have an uphill climb getting it rezoned to to R2 due to neighbors most likely complaining.  Just food for thought. 

As someone who owns a PM company in Chattanooga, you could easily charge between $40-$50 per applicant.  You should run credit and background on all adults living in a property.  We utilize Propertyware for our management platform and background is run through them.  We pay a fee per applicant to PW for credit and background, plus we incur labor expense for reviewing the info.  We typically won't accept multiple applications on a property (first come first serve) so if we get multiple apps in our system we will refund those without running background once we've approved another application.  Hope that helps.  

I would add that many properties inside the OZ are already priced accordingly.  Really boils down to what you want, what your tolerance/philosophy is, etc.  If you'd be stepping outside of that box just do this for potential tax benefits then it's probably not worth doing.  

Though I live in Chattanooga now, I was living in Los Angeles (my whole life) prior to moving here in 2012 and had started investing in Chattanooga in 2009.  I've also been in construction for a loooonnnnggg time now and can speak directly to trying to do things from afar.  

@Jeffrey Holst, who also happens to be a partner of mine here in Chattanooga is correct.  If you're going to do this long distance, or any reasonable distance, you better have people on your team that you trust implicitly and who also know what they are doing.  I tried doing remote flips with my ex contractor.  It worked ok on some and less so on others.  It wasn't until I moved here and developed a lot more resources that my success really took off.  

So while it may be tempting to venture out from your home base because the numbers look a lot better there are plenty of risks and challenges that will more than offset those perceived discounts and value if not addressed up front.  I also would advise anyone thinking about investing tens of thousands (or more) of dollars and guaranteeing hundreds of thousands more in loans, etc. to spend time and money traveling to that market and really learn about it.  Google only tells you so much.  

@Erica Sexton Steele, I would suggest talking to any number of commercial lenders around Chattanooga, but be advised that cash-out refi's are being viewed in a less than positive light currently.  If you want to PM me I can give you a few names for the Chattanooga market.  Keep in mind they will look at you globally.  They want to see liquidity, operational history, etc.  But if you check those boxes they can help you come up with a plan. 

As long as you qualify from debt to income standpoint and have sufficient cash reserves to carry then should be ok.  Fyi..sometimes going hard money makes a lot more sense when you look at the side by side comparison of out of pocket costs (down, pts, interest, etc).  At least that was the case, pre-COVID.