All Forum Posts by: Ericka G.

Daniel F. Harb thanks for the tip. I keep hearing about index funds but don’t have a firm grasp on what they are. I will reach out to Charles Shwab for more info! What have your returns looked like in the past 4 years?

Jinyu Shao if it isn’t hurting you financially to just make a small monthly profit, I vote HOLD the property until you can sell at a profit. Manhattan always goes up eventually and rent always goes up, so your cash flow will keep increasing. As long as you sell within that 5 year window so that you can skip capital gains taxes (have to live there 2 of last 5 years) you should hold on until you make a profit from the sale and let your tenant pay down your mortgage and give you $150/mos in the meantime. Good luck with it!

Anthony Cotilletta live below your means and save all you can now and you will be financially free before you know it. Check out the site mrmoneymoustache.com for additional tips and stories of financial independence. At its core, you need to figure out how much you need to live on each month and then strive to make that amount from non-W2 sources.

Rachel Bjorklund I really want to DIY but it feels like a foreign language. I will do more research and try to figure it out, but every time I look at all the acronyms and options my eyes start to cross. I guess I liked the idea of giving someone else with expertise the goal and letting them make the $ grow. Real estate I get and am really good at - funds/stocks/bonds...not so much. I will look at the suggested websites, books, etc and see if that helps. The interest I get from the bank is offensive so the goal is to only have an emergency fund there and let the rest of the capital work harder elsewhere

Yes I’ve heard index funds are great I’m just not sure what they are or how to get into them. Hopefully wealthfront can help that that.

I will check out wealthfront and ask more questions about her fees. I will try to do it myself. We’ve had excellent luck with our rentals this far in terms of both cash flow and appreciation but I’m not seeing deals lately, so was thinking to put some money in the stock market in the meantime rather than having it sit in the bank

Thanks everyone for your input. I will put this on pause until I do more research. I should clarify that the person I met on the plane is a well known business owner/millionaire/entrepreneur in the Southeast so since he personally recommended her after hearing about my goals/needs that is why I felt she was a good option. I also then was at community wealth event and she was one of the panelists. But still, he is a stranger and so is she so I think I was placing too much trust in his reco. I value personal recommendations from “successful” people a LOT. Dan Rudolph do you mind sharing more about your experience with Edward Jones and why you wouldn’t recommend? Her fee would be 1% of anything I make. We don’t meet the min for your guy. Caleb Heimsoth I will check that the fiduciary angle and also look at attny and CPA options Gus Ross thanks, I will reach out Rachel Bjorklund yeah, it does sound crazy to consider trusting someone to manage so much money - I was putting too much trust into the recommendation of that one wealthy person I met Vincent Joseph we are not high net worth, just trying to get there ;) I will look into that book. Have tried DIY and find it overwhelming. So many options Glen Whipkins good idea - I will check out Dave Ramsey’s site Steve B. What doesn’t make sense? We’ve made some good moves, lived simply, and saved - now I don’t know what to do and don’t know anyone personally who can advise me so one of my goals for 2017 was to find someone who could help us take things to the next level. Perhaps my mistake was to assume we’d need someone else to help us do that Kerry Mertz will keep investing in real estate, just want to diversify and have some $ in stocks and other investments as well

I’ve recently been exploring wealth management strategies/options to make sure our assets grow and are protected. The problem is I don’t really know what we should be doing to take things to the next level. For those of you who work with financial advisors or have accumulated significant assets - any advice for someone trying to get started? We have 8 units and both work solid W2 jobs - our rental income more than covers our modest living expenses. We hope to be at 10 units by the end of 2018 and have a family net worth of $1M by 2020/21. Met an Edward Jones advisor who was recommended to me by a guy I met on a plane (wealthy business owner with similar life POV). The advisor seems solid and has recommended we keep a smaller amount liquid ($20-30k), then take the rest of our cash and do a combo of 60% stocks/funds, 40% laddered CDs in addition to our IRAs and 401ks, just to get company match. We’ll keep growing our real estate portfolio as well. Haven’t signed anything yet other than have her manage a small stock trade for me. My understanding is that Edward Jones is a reputable company but Is it crazy to trust hundreds of thousands of dollars to someone I met via the recommendation of a guy on a plane? How did you find your financial advisor? What was your strategy to get from middle class to wealthy? How best to diversify one’s investments if real estate is the core of your strategy? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

We have 4 units out of state and 4 units in our local area. We self-manage all of them and I can say it is WAY easier to self manage locally but it is also totally doable long distance - not that hard if you build a great team. We have an amazing handyman, realtor, and cleaning service who work on all of our units and will be there in a flash to help out. We generally have very good/low maintenance tenants so that makes being remote easier. If you have a good tenant stock, a good team and it is a smaller MF, you should be able to self manage. Make sure your numbers work with a PM too, though, because you may decide it’s not worth the trouble once you get into it. Also budget one trip per quarter to check on you property in person. Every market is a bit different and every person is a bit different. I have an aunt who has been a landlord forever and HATES dealing with tenants, she’s constantly talking about selling - she is someone who should prob have a PM. Try self managing first, build a team (if you find one good reliable person, ask him/her to reco others who do other types of work), but also interview some PMs to have in your back pocket if you change your mind. Good luck with it!

Do you have the ability to raise the rent? The gap is small enough that I'd try to close it in another way before selling if I were you and think of it as you tenant paying your debt while you wait for the market to rebound further. I think smaller Midwest markets are about 2-3 years behind the rest of the country in terms of rebounding from the downturn. It sounds like you're still enough under water where you'd have to bring money to the table to sell the place so that makes selling potentially more expensive than breaking even or losing $100/mos (my guess is you'll have to pay more than $1,200 out of pocket to close?) Unless this is causing a severe financial hardship, it may be better to hold on a bit longer til you can at least break even; keep raising rent in the meantime