All Forum Posts by: Costin I.

@Mark C. Here is my free advice 2U, worth 2¢: You "want to get into real estate investing". And you just joined BP this May. You are a beginner in REI – so get started first, accumulate some equity, get some serious cashflow going, get some experience with managing real estate, figure out you want to do this long term…and then worry about how to layer an LLC cake. You are about 3-5 years early for this question.

Unless you already have some other serious reasons to start with asset protection, maybe you are filthy rich, or have partners, in which case free advice from a public forum might not be the best for you (and asking about Zen business for LLC creation tells me it's not the case).

Another 2¢ bonus for you:

1. - LLC as asset-holding entities are pass-through disregarded entities, with little to none tax benefits. They should just hold the assets and do nothing else.
2. - You want a separate shell LLC (one that doesn't hold any asset and is barely properly capitalized), to use for all public interfacing, contractors, tenants, payments, rents, rehabs, repairs, etc.

@Kenton Guidry - start by reading this thread, including my posts there: Any help for a newbie wanting to start off a real estate adventure

There are plenty of people who do flipping - figure out a problem you can solve for them and they will gladly accept you to shadow them. Don't just go to them with "I have time, I'll trade it for your knowledge, teach me" - you just created a problem for them and now they have to figure if/how they can use you.

Do you know your "Why"? Do you have defined your buy-box, your investment criteria? Your direction?

@Kenton Guidry - how much theInvestorEdge.com charge for their course? I looked on their website and couldn't find any cost amount, everything points to the ladder trap (free webinar, followed by free 3hrs class, followed by free weekend class with $$$$ VIP option, followed by $$$$$ enrollment, followed by more $$$$$ for "advanced training/tools/program").

And I looked at your profile - "passion for learning. I love spending hours researching projects" - sounds like you are good at self-education. You can find on BP ALL the information you are looking for, more than you can digest or any course will feed you. That, a few podcasts, a few select books, and a couple of subscriptions choke full of info material (less than 100$/month), maybe a couple mentorship programs (for less than 2K/year), and a lot of action on your part and you'll be a lot better than paying $$K for "gurus".

To rephrase, do you have more money than you know what to do with or an urgent need to get it to work for you, together with a lot of time on your hands ready to take massive action? That would be the only combo that might justify an expensive training program (and there are very few that are real and worth).

IMO, the benefit/cost ratio worth considering is 10 to 1. For example, if I have 100K burning a hole in my pocket and don't know how to put it to work in RE, then maybe a good and proven 10K mentorship might be worth. Or, if I have 5K and found a good program that guarantees making 10x (50K) by the end of it. Otherwise, start with $20 books that will give you more than 2K worth of education. Ten of them, $200 and you'll have 20K worth of knowledge to put in practice.

PM me if you want more info/assistance.

 

@Rakumarudu Nijam - which Austin Real Estate Investment Meetup? 

I used RLS back in 2018, when they were still ascending in their fame and riches, and not yet so expensive. Don't know a really good source now, stay away from Andersen, but first question is, do you really need asset protection? A lot of it is based on F.E.A.R.: False Evidence Appearing Real.
2nd question, have you done all the necessary precursors? 

@Alicia Marks

Asset Protection Decision Diagram - to help assess the need for asset protection, and what to implement : https://www.biggerpockets.com/files/user/CosIorg/file/asset-protection-decision-diagram

Asset Protection Onion Diagram - what, when and at what cost one should implement in terms of asset protection - https://www.biggerpockets.com/files/user/CosIorg/file/asset-protection-onion-diagram-v2

What is needed for a complete asset protection OR the domains that need to be intersected to find asset protection. - https://www.biggerpockets.com/files/user/CosIorg/file/asset-protection-spectrum-diagram

How a fully implemented asset protection layout might look. - https://www.biggerpockets.com/files/user/CosIorg/file/asset-protection-structures

Let me know if have questions or want to chat further - I can give you my investor perspective.

Duh...Someone else who just discovered ChatGPT. Welcome to the new form of informed spam.

@Andrew Sullivan you have multiple problems and ADD. 

You have the immediate problem of income - REI is not going to solve that. You might try wholesaling, but even that is not going to be fast - find a wholesaler, go work for him for free for a couple months, soak all the knowledge you can meanwhile and read all the material you can get from internet, BP, Amazon books on the subject. And you might get something going. Regardless, solve this one first. You are not thinking straight while under the pressure of this problem.

You have the intermediate problem of debt - you need to learn to save 50% or more of your income. And to pay your debt asap. It's a promise, you made it, so suck it up, and pay your debts, keep your promises. 

And you have the longer-term solution of REI. This is slow and steady, desert crossing quest, one step at a time, brick after brick. A marathon, not a sprint. You're not going to win one just cause you decided to start running today. Especially when you don't know in which direction to run.

The 3 main ingredients for REI are time, money and knowledge. Rarely a beginner has all 3. You are lucky if you have 2 and can compensate the 3rd. From the looks, you only have time. You'll have to spend a lot of it to make up for the rest.

Figure out what you want to do. Or better, figure out first what you do NOT want to do. Or even more important, figure out WHY you want to do it.  Then figure out what you are willing to give up (maybe more dramatic, sacrifice) for it. Nothing good comes easy. 

That post is exactly my situation, @Julio Gonzalez. But you also mention "Compare being able to write off the $370,000 today versus having to depreciate it over the life of the asset - 39 years - that’s quite a difference!" - is there a chance that what my CPA meant, writing off the old roof at current depreciated value? 

Is this a decision about one or the other - either write off the old roof OR depreciate the new roof? 

Or does partial disposition mean both - write off the old roof AND start new depreciation on the new roof?

@Andrew Abeyta - thanks Andrew.

@Account Closed - thanks for the effort, but that is (half of) a ChatGPT answer ☮

@Andrew C. - why do you think that is "super super low"? The houses are 2010+, the market value is somewhere 230K-250K, the appraised value includes 40K+ land, and new houses are built close by for the same 230-250K range....why would the replacement cost be 340K? 

["If the house burns down, we'll just take the insurance payout"...pyromaniac logic LOL...do you overinsure your properties on that hope? j/k]