All Forum Posts by: Carol D.

@Deborah B.

Thanks! I think we will give that a try next w/e.

Shaun,

No, it is priced right but it is in a mixed area not in a neighborhood. It is downtown but not in a high traffic area. The area is a bit bizarre with very low end homes in the same area as very high priced historical homes. My home is in the middle. I believe I just need more exposure. My other homes are in neighborhoods so the sign in the yard seems to work very well... but that is not working here. Thanks for your help.

Matt & all - Thanks! I was thinking of doing an open house on a Saturday... is something like that effective for rentals? I've never tried it before but willing to give it a shot to get the house some more exposure.

All my houses rent immediately from putting a sign in the front yard... except one! The reason is - That house is out of it's market area, so people driving by are looking for lower priced rentals. I may need to go with a real estate agent, but if anyone has any ideas on how I could market it myself please let me know. I have it on Craig's List. I'm working on getting it on zillow. And I am going to run an add in the local paper (but that is not cost effective for more than 1 week). Thanks for any advice!

Interesting RE Article at Money today:

Chinese buyers flood U.S. housing market
(Copy & Paste the link for the whole article)
http://money.cnn.com/2013/07/08/real_estate/chinese-homebuyers/index.html?iid=HP_Highlight

Chinese buyers accounted for 18% of the $68.2 billion that foreigners spent on homes during the 12 months ended March 31, according to the National Association of Realtors.

I just did a property insurance in an LLC. When I told the insurance company that the property was in an LLC, they did not care. Not sure that is the case for every insurance company, but that was my experience.

Rick,
My experience has been that you have to hunt and hunt and be patient. I do not know the market in St. Louis but where I purchase is very similar. The 1st SFH that I bought was after the market crash and I heard all these good deals being had. I searched for 2 years and was ready to give up... I shared my goal with a friend who had done a lot of flips and he introduced me to a friend who introduced me to a friend who found me a great house that would meet the 1% rule... at the same time my RE Agent found a steal of deal... in fact the offer I made was a bit of joke - I never believed the bank would take it but they did. So after 2 years of hunting I ended up with 2 purchases back to back. Both rented immediately at 1%... I think I could have got more but I wanted to get them both producing immediately. It should not take you 2 years like it did me... it took me 2 years for 2 reasons - lack of experience and lack of time... I was only spending about 1 month/ year in the city where I wanted to buy properties. Don't give up... keep looking... keep making offers... and be very clear with your RE Agent as to what your goal is. Good Luck!
-CT

Rick,
IF you WANT the property... you should analyze the property and then make a good offer based on YOUR numbers not the market and not the what the owner is asking. In your example if you really want this property for other reasons than simply business... like you see yourself using one of the units in the future... or you need one of the units for an aging parent - etc... whatever reason you want this property then I would offer $160,000 (max) for it. From a purely business point you might want to offer less... maybe $130,000. Never be embarrassed to make an offer. I have been amazed at what people are willing to accept. A low offer is not an insult. You are simply telling the seller - I will buy at this price - then it is their decision to sell or not sell. You can even keep an eye on it and come back in a couple months and make the offer again if it was rejected the first time.
Good luck!
-CT

Bill - if you have a lot of retirement funds and you are wanting to allocate some to RE... that is good... but if you only have 100,000 invested for retirement you might want to invest it in stocks and use non-retirement funds for RE investing. Another option inside your IRA is REITs or REIT fund or REIT ETFs... just some ideas to consider.

Has anyone on here ever done a French Leaseback? (http://www.frenchleaseback.com)... If so, how is it working? i have studied a lot of them but I really can't find one where I like the numbers. I like the idea though if anyone has advice on where to find one that "works".