All Forum Posts by: Eddy Dumire

Northern Stafford around 610 and Dumfries are your prime areas to target the Quantico market. Plenty of people who rent to military exclusively have no problem filling their properties with listings only on militarybyowner.com. It's worth stating that not all servicemen and women are worthwhile tenants though. You definitely need to screen diligently.

it's also worth saying that this is not a 2% market. I also don't think the 50% rule applies well here. Housing prices and rents are pretty high here but a toilet doesn’t really cost any more here than it does elsewhere so I think it overstates expenses.

@James Blalock I've been purchasing buy and hold properties in Fredericksburg and Stafford for a couple years now.  I just became an agent.  Please let me know if there's anything I can do to help you.

Eddy

@Elise Browning I live and invest in Stafford.  I also own in Fredericksburg.  I think Stafford and south are pretty much your best bets for cashflow anywhere near NOVA.  You may also be able to pull it off in Woodbridge or Dumfries if you get lucky.

@Jon Deavers @Adam Stanton  Did you find someone you're happy with?  I acquired 3 properties last year.  Two of them straight investment properties and one more I bought for a primary residence.  I then converted my prior primary residence and the conversion spanned two tax years so I'm getting a little buried in the tax paperwork.  I've always done my own taxes in the past and used turbotax.  I'd really like someone just to help me file within turbotax.

Sorry, didn't finish my thought there.  Virginia Partner's Bank was willing to work with me.  I think the other was Carter Bank and Trust but not positive of that.

Eddy

@Evan J.,

I had a tough time finding lenders willing to do HELOCs on investment properties and even fewer that would do them without a first in place. It didn't make sense to me why they WANTED a senior lien to them, but that was definitely the case. I ended up at TD Bank who did the deal, but it was a full doc. They were pretty horrible to work with. It took over 90 days to get the HELOC done. Ridiculous. I'm also doing business in Fredericksburg/Stafford. I contacted a few of the smaller banks about business lines and they were very receptive. I just haven't taken it any further yet. They were

Eddy

@Elise Browning you can pick two and rarely three of the following when looking for a contractor: affordable, trustworthy, reliable, knowledgeable.  I have different contractors depending on which 2 or 3 of those is most important at any given time. 

I also rarely dump everything onto a single GC.  I find that "knowledgeable" comes with specialization.  I have a drywall guy, an electrician, a carpet installer, a tile layer, etc.

Let me know which your current priorities are and I'll point you to someone.

Eddy

Are you asking that they only get paid "once" the house closes or "if" the house closes?  If it's the former, all the title companies I've worked with only get paid at closing.  If it's the latter, I think you'll have a tough time finding one willing to work under those circumstances.

The neighborhood you're looking at is a B/C area.  There has been some drug activity there, but it's not nearly as bad as further south in Dumfries or in the state street area of Woodbridge.  This area is on the edge of where you can potentially start making money in the NOVA market.  You'll notice that market rents for these townhouses are in the $1400-$1600 range.  The $1800-$1900 rentals another street over are much newer and this house is not comparable.  I don't think I agree at all with Nate's statement about hiring a contractor to fix the issues.  I often find that people simply won't pick up the phone and pay a contractor $10k to fix the issues that increase their house value by $30k. 

You've already been given good advice, but you can also go to Zillow and look at the rest of the neighborhood houses.  Click on all the surrounding listings and look closely at the pictures.  Make sure that your house competes with the others or be prepared to drop the price if it doesn't.

Can you give us more information about the property?  Renovations in Mayfield wouldn't look the same as they would in downtown.

If it's a class D neighborhood then you can renovate all you want and not get any more money.  If it's a class A neighborhood and you don't renovate to the neighborhood standard, you won't get market rent or your house will sit vacant.