All Forum Posts by: Ezra Nugroho

home prices are still increasing in the Bay Area, but the number of sales certainly sag down a bit in august, including Santa Clara county dipping 14%

http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_26514018/august-slowdown-hits-bay-area-housing-market

It will be interesting to see how next month is going to look like after such a strong run up here.

@Account Closed The better way to access your equity from your primary is to get a HELOC. Don't sell that home to go all out to out of state. A bad property manager would just make your life miserable. I am in a similar boat with you, and I do invest out of state. It's really not easy.

@Account Closed , good thinking about the light coat.

@Marilynn Woodcock Welcome to BP and to the South Bay community. First post, straight to the meet up thread! That's wonderful, it means that you are doing your homework and willing to learn. Keep at it, and you'd be successful. There are many experienced people in here who are very nice and willing to share their experiences.

Deep inside you wished that @Joshua Dorkin and @Brandon Turner would call you to be a guest in their podcast. But alas, they have a guest list is filled up for the next three years and the only real estate you own is Boardwalk in Monopoly, ha!

Okay, here is your turn to share your answer on the Famous Four questions. Maybe I will tally up the answers after a little while.

• What is your favorite real estate book ?
• What is your favorite business book ?
• What do you think sets apart successful real estate investors and the ones who come and disappear?
• What's your hobby ?

I feel that I am too green to say anything meaningful whenever discussions between cash-flow vs appreciation surface up. I guess, for what's it worth, I'd chime in a bit.

I lived in Indiana for 6 years, and then in Central Pennsylvania for 2 years, before I move to the Bay Area. I've rented from both professional and incidental successful landlords.

There is no denying that appreciation in Bay Area or other blue chip areas are wonderful, but I've also seen many property owners in Bay Area who've lost their shirts. 

Let's just talked about my primary residence, and a few hypothetical scenarios.

1. I bought it in 2008, and for the better part of 2009 - 2011, I was upside down. I am now holding a reasonable amount of equity in it.

2. If I were to buy it in 2007, I would be at 0 or still small negative equity. One year too eager would make me 3 years behind.

3. Of course if I were to buy in 2011 - 2012, I would have made a serious killing. Three year of patience would have made me 50% gain in equity doing nothing.

It's also been said that blue chip areas are so forgiving, that even if you buy wrong, you'd be bailed up if you can hang on through the storm. I do believe it, since I did get bailed out. But you do need to make sure you can hang on to it long enough.

Bay Area has seen soft economies too, the dot com crash was certainly obvious. But do you guys remember VC funding draught in 2005 ? My rent in Sunnyvale in 2005 was $735 a month! It was supposed to be $800 a month, but they had to give me a month free because there was no taker. The year after that Silicon Valley invented Web 2.0, my rent went up about 30%. If you were the property owner, and you had to refi when the cap rate was low, you'd certainly have a hard time. If you are buying for appreciation now, can you hang on to it in the next down time?

So I guess what I am saying is not really that cash-flow is necessarily the better play. But more of: Can we time the market? It does feel a bit frothy isn't it? 2 more years before we soften a bit? How long would the down cycle be?  

@Account Closed That's a great idea! I never even consider creating equity that way! I did think that your friend is strictly a mortgage originator. I didn't know that s/he would originate personal loans. I guess it's both what you know and who you know :)

Welcome to BP, @Account Closed !

I also work in a small startup, and invest out of state.

There is a local meet up coming up soon, but It's a bit far for you. I am sure you'd find it beneficial. Here is the thread: http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/521/topics/144...

The community here is quite robust, with many helpful and knowledgable people. 

As usual, I am probably going to be late, coming after my little kids settle down a bit.

Here are good podcasts on note investing just for further education:

1. http://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2013/05/09...
2. http://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2013/07/25...

And finally, I am going to bring marketing material from a turnkey out-of-state company. Probably not politically correct in this little group, ha! Disclosure: I am not related to this company, I don't invest with them, not even getting any free lunch from them. 

@Account Closed , wrt your mortgage connection offer, I am now in contact with some Central Pennsylvania CU. I wasn't actually thinking of leveraging much right now, but I figured it doesn't hurt to begin some relationship with them. They seem to be willing to accomodate a California newbie like me. 

@Tony T, welcome to BP. 

Do come to the meet up, it has been great the past few times. We have some very knowledgable people here.

NV seems logical, as it's just next door. TN? why TN, did you live there in the past?

I invest in Central Pennsylvania, which is also an odd choice for someone who live in the Bay. However, I lived there for a bit in the past, so I have some local knowledge.