All Forum Posts by: Brian Adzadi

@Larneka Lavalais

I personally would not take on a property that has been flooded, especially if I am just starting out. I would take on a home that has foundation issues than this. I say that because if the property is built with cinderblocks or brick, I would take it on because its still solid and know that the water damage will only be on the HVAC, appliances and electrics. However, if the house is built with wood, just know that the flood has affected the structure of the house tremendously. It also going to be harboring mold real soon. You will soon be dealing with a money pit real. As a newbie, this would not what I want to tackle. The contractors in that area I am pretty sure are booked for many years. Then one you will find available will just steal your money. Beware.

@Cody Jensen

As our collegues are saying. It purely depends what part of pennsylvania you are looking at. Some areas see a population growth while others see a loss. I have chosen to live and invest in the Lehigh valley area. Mainly Allentown. Houses are cheaper, property taxes are cheaper and it's less tenant friendly than N.Y. or NJ. Lehigh valley has seen some growth. Both in population and job market. The downtown Allentown area is seeing new businesses transfer or set up there. There are multiple universities and colleges in lehigh valley. Depending on what kind of rentals you want to go into, either MF or SF. Either way you will get a good ROI. Lehigh valley would be good for you because its only about an 1 hour 30 minutes from you.

@Monte Dick

Personally for me, leveling the house and turning it into a duplex sounds like a sweet idea. I would consult a local REA to find out what its potential appraisal will be when you do that. However, I would get a good lawyer to set up an airtight contract with the GC. 

The idea of renting it out, I am not a fan of simply because you will not be able to cover the whole mortgage with the rent. The only time I would be ok with the rent covering only a partial amount of the mortgage is if I am house hacking. Just my 2 cents. 

@Carrie A.

I had used Mysmartmove.com from Transunion, it was endorsed on Biggerpockets and it was a pretty easy set up. They give you credit score, eviction, & criminal. The potential tenant don't even have to give you their SSN, all you need is their e-mail address. You give mysmartmove.com the tenant's email address and they send a link to the tenant and the tenant would fill out their information. Within 24 hours the background is sent to you, they suggest to you if you should accept or decline. I love that part so then it doesn't seem as if you are declining them but the 3rd party is. The only fault I found is that each potential tenant MUST have their OWN e-mail address. So if its a couple that uses the same e-mail address, the other spouse must now set up their own. Mysmartmove.com would think the e-mail address is the same person and would give you 2 or more information on the same exact person instead of different people. 

@Stephen Kunen

Thank you for promoting my hometown. However, does this mean you and I may be competing for the same rental properties? LOL.

May the best man win then.

@Kelly Conrad

LOL, the only time you need to use a lawyer is when writing out a lease agreement and setting up an eviction process, because the lawyer is going to use his legalese to set up a lengthy qualification statement which he/she feels will fit the confines of the law.

As long as your qualifications are not discriminatory, you should be good.

1) No Evictions

2) No Criminal record

3) Makes X amount more than rent

4) Proof of funds

5) Job number

6) Have Security and First Months rent on hand.

Is all you need.

I truly felt intimidated by those requirements you stated.

@Kelly Conrad

Man that's a lengthy qualification. Even if I met all those standards, I will be discouraged to rent it because I may think somewhere between the lines, I don't qualify. Is there a way to make it more compact and easier to read? Also, how many have actually requested showings, there is a difference between interested and actually going to see it?  I would also question how well the advertising is when you post it. Do the pictures look inviting that a tenant could see themselves living there.

The fact that you have so many ad venues with no bite means there must be a major issue with the place. As you said, the place is below market and you allow pets; people should be tripping over each other to live there on pets alone.

I would try this for a short time: do some little DIY work to spruce up the place even more, take bright pictures, shorten the verbiage (No eviction, No criminal history, make X amount more than rent, show last 2 months paystub, don't bother for credit score, just keep it simple stupid) and see what happens. I would also place ads on Facebook marketplace. For my rental I only used Facebook and Craigslist and within 3 weeks of closing on the house, we had a tenant in the property.

Hope others chime in to give you more or better advice.

@Cecile Gonzales

From a fellow nurse to another, I love your enthusiasm for real estate investing but you seem scatterbrained. Your mind is all over the place. What you need to do is ask yourself what do you want out of real estate investing? Do you eventually want to change careers and do this full-time? Do you want to supplement your income with money from real estate? Do you want to get fast and quick money such as wholesaling and fix n' flips or are you aiming for the long game like rental properties.

Remember, you don't have to have a real estate license to invest in real estate. The benefits of the license is to get access to the MLS. You can use nursing as a crutch to build up a portfolio, meaning the money you earn from nursing can be used to build capital and utilized to obtain new properties.

Once you determine your goal and your priorities you can use the Biggerpockets blogs, tools, webinars and forums to delve further into your inquisitions and find the answers you need to take that next step. If you have any questions, the forum is happy to guide you, but first, get your priorities in order.

@Justin D.

I would do exactly what @David Morgan said. Try hard to keep as much money in your pocket by putting a low down payment.

@Justin D.

Since you want a single family to a quadplex then the next question is Do you want more cash reserves, meaning you put the least amount of money for a down payment and have more money in your pocket? Here are your 2 scenarios at this point.

1) For a single family that will be used as a primary residence, put your 20% down and no PMI since you are putting 20% down.

2) For multi-family, you get an FHA loan, put 3.5-5% down, pay PMI but your tenant will be covering some of that cost. Plus you can deduct PMI on your taxes. Now you have good amount of money to rehab the property.