All Forum Posts by: William Collins

First I would read Rich Dad Poor Dad, yep everybody reads it. Second I would recommend reading The Cash Flow Quadrant which will help you decide where and how you want to make your money. Third I would read The Richest Man in Babylon which I think you've learned the lessons I've already. Those are foundational books the next thing I would do is read through the Rental Property Investing by Brandon Turner, the 30-day Stay by Zeona McIntyre, and Short-term Rentals Long Term Wealth by Avery Carl. This will help you set your crystal criteria of how you want to go through and achieve your cash flow goal through what strategy. Then I would recommend realistically looking at what market you're going to invest in. Yes, I know that's lots of homework but this is a measure twice cut once type juncture in our market where the high-interest rates and high cost of entry at this point make it more valuable for you to understand what you're looking for and buy correctly.

Once you get a sense of this style of investing you're trying to pursue strategy wise there's lots of content available especially on YouTube, here on bigger pockets, and in podcasts.

Joshua, while I am not in Florida I definitely would recommend a couple of evidence that you could pursue. Have you looked into getting employment in the industry relative to being a property manager for out-of-town investors? Have you attended local meet-ups to try to find a mentor which I think your post is really looking for? I think this is a key that you really need to emphasize and have you looked into your local real estate investment clubs to become the presence there? Have you started to bird dog to find deals to present to investors to do the value add?

The other thing you can do is look at becoming a mobile notary in the meantime as it potentially could get you interfacing with investors who are looking for flexibility.

Magi,

money without a strategy doesn't really help you. I would recommend doing some learning on a couple of fronts before you invest that money and anything other than potentially some bigger pocket glasses (which I am not affiliated with). You need to define what your crystal clear criteria are. What are you going to do where are you going to do it and what is the outcome you're looking to have? I would immediately caution against any type of partnership. Until you have a better understanding of what you're trying to do you'd won't know which partner you could potentially be investing in that would align with your goals and not take advantage of your cash.

First, you need to set a goal of what you're trying to do with the money. Are you looking to invest in syndication and be part of the upside on a bigger lower hands-on investment? Do you like being a weekend warrior and want to do DIY renovations and do a value add live in flip. Do you want to have a vacation home in a different part of the world where you can earn money on the side in the time period that you don't use it? I there are so many ways that you could go moving forward.

Second the one nugget you said is that you're looking for cash flow. Cash flow is the Holy Grail for everyone you haven't mentioned what your current living situation is. If you are looking at house hacking a multifamily for instance a quadruplex You could save money on your housing expenses which reduces your after-tax expenses. It also potentially could cash flow depending on your market see my first point that you don't have a firm strategy or a market.

I'm not advocating for analysis paralysis, but I think we need a little bit more information from you to help guide you.

First I would read Rich Dad Poor Dad, yep everybody reads it. Second I would recommend reading The Cash Flow Quadrant which will help you decide where and how you want to make your money. Third I would read The Richest Man in Babylon which I think you've learned the lessons I've already. Those are foundational books the next thing I would do is read through the Rental Property Investing by Brandon Turner, the 30-day Stay by Zeona McIntyre, and Short-term Rentals Long Term Wealth by Avery Carl. This will help you set your crystal criteria of how you want to go through and achieve your cash flow goal through what strategy. Then I would recommend realistically looking at what market you're going to invest in. Yes, I know that's lots of homework but this is a measure twice cut once type juncture in our market where the high-interest rates and high cost of entry at this point make it more valuable for you to really understand what you're looking for and buy correctly.

Katie,

The question is what you think is the future of the Cape Coral FL area. Do you think it's going to bounce back and have the same rental potential that you had previously? I see that you're looking at the potential of doing a short term rental and that would not be good for you insurance wise from what you said, but did you consider medium term rental? Is there a draw in your area for corporate travel or visiting nurses or a college where I furnish rental could help you bridge through.

I know that the insurance market in general in Florida is going crazy especially with the risk of hurricanes. Is your house in a flooding path? I see that you were previously affected by hurricane Ian. In the end you're going to need to make the decision that will make you sleep best at night. From the tone of your post I don't think you're comfortable with Florida as a market relative to the insurance slash hurricane risk reward scenario.

@Geoff Chambers

Welcome to the board Geoff. Some quick questions that I had for you on your strategy. First, will you be using this duplex as your primary residence? Second, are you going to be trying to target either doing a short-term rental or medium-term rental as part of your acquisition? Third is the reason that you're looking at a duplex as opposed to something bigger such as a triplex or quadplex?

@Jeff Puciato

So there are a couple of missing details here Jeff that I would love to have to be able to give an educated opinion. What is the purpose of the next multi-unit buying. Are you intending to live inside multi? Do you have a reasonable clause for moving from one multi to another? (Technically you should have a reason to go from one FHA to another primary residence loan such as closer to work, change of living circumstance etcetera) what are your means for investing at this point in time? Also for your first and second properties what are your current interest rates?

@Amaan Hassanali 

Your decision to pursue a financially independent life is admirable but I think you need to refine your vivid vision for your clarity of what you want to do to succeed. Based on what I'm seeing with no field experience and the fact you're pursuing your grad degree in August in Connecticut here I would recommend making this also a grad year learning about what you're trying to do.

I would come to the state of Connecticut and immediately get involved in all the local real estate meetups and try to offer value to people in return for knowledge about the projects that they're undertaking. There are many meetups including Stephanie Cabral, Brandon Rush, CTREIA, etc All of which are low or no money.

The other goal to really look at is house hacking. Your desire to flip houses is trying to pursue a career as house flipping is an active pursuit. If you were looking at trying to build wealth and financial freedom preventing costs is equally as powerful if not more powerful than increasing income. Let's say that you're going to be in grad school for two to four years in one location. If you bought a house to hack you could save on all of your housing costs, potentially have cash flow coming in above your housing costs, be building equity in an asset, and add to a long-term portfolio which you can use the equity in to then assist with any other real estate ventures in the future.

What's the deal?

So the first thing I noticed in what you posted is relative to your mortgages you mentioned that you have a military retirement. Do you have a veterans qualified loan available? The other thing is you're relocating into an area that is about to hit high season. The area is ripe for doing house hacking and Airbnb take a look in the Groton and Mystic area as well as close to the beach in New London. There's less seasonality in the Mystic area or you can go even farther east close to the Rhode Island border due to the ocean beaches right over the border. The big thing is if you are in that area understanding the short-term rental legislation in some towns and how it would impact doing a house hack short-term combination

Knob and tube is super common here in the northeast, especially on older multi-families. Do you know how much knob and tube you have present in the house? You typically want to clean it up and replace it if left undisturbed it could stay in the house. With access from the basement and attic levels, I don't see how you would have a high cost for doing the replacements as the electrical runs would be easy to do. The other thing is with a small as house as you're saying you could cut The plaster slash drywall up to three to four feet off the ground in all rooms to be then able to rerun all cables really well. It also makes it easy to quickly put the walls up again by utilizing one sheet of drywall or wood trim. 

The other thing to realize is that the electrical contractors don't want to do the patch and repair work that comes afterward or the cutting work that comes before they wiring. You could cut down the quote by probably doing this pre-work and post-electrical work yourself or contracting it to another party