All Forum Posts by: Jeffrey Albaum

Hey Keio! Are you able to have a contractor walk it and give you a quote? From there I'd add a margin of safety on top of whatever the quote is...I know it's rare for construction to go over budget....but it has happened (sarcasm!)!

Hey Darvin, I like to keep at least 9 months of PITI reserves and then assuming the property is cash flowing I'll let the cash flow accumulate to build up the maintenance and capex reserves, that way I don't need to save up that money prior to actually pulling trigger on a new property! As my capex account increases, and I get a sense of what the maintenance costs are, I might take a few months worth of PITI out of the account and start to save some of the cash flow for another purchase! Hope this helps!

Hey Chris! Excited to see you begin you real estate journey! As a few others have mentioned - I think your best bet is to find a great property manager. I actually prefer finding a property manager before finding an agent. An agent is incentivized to sell you a home, if they're good, they'll understand that the relationship is more important and won't try to sell you a bad investment. However, a property manager is going to be the one managing the place on a day to day basis, so if they aren't honest with you about how good/bad a property is, they'll just be shooting themselves in the foot. Once you find a great PM, they can recommend agents they like to work with in the area.

Property managers usually also have really good connections with local contractors, and while you might overpay, the work will get done sooner rather than later.

Hope this helps!

Hey everyone! Looking to start a meetup group in Austin to talk about real estate investing - super casual and laid back. Looking to meet fellow investors and talk shop at a fun coffee place!

@Kenneth Rose Hey Kenneth, welcome to Bigger Pockets! I'm out in California, so definitely can understand the reality of living in a super expensive market. I would totally recommend looking for deals out of state. There are tons of resources/podcasts/books etc. out there on the subject of owning property out of state and I'm a huge fan of it. It forces you to work "on your business" instead of "in your business" because you aren't able to just drive by to fix something small, you're forced to develop systems to help you run things. 

To start, the best thing would be to identify some markets that interest you. From there, go on Bigger Pockets and look for Property Managers. I know people say to talk to agents first, but I've found that property managers have less incentive to sell you something, and therefor are great people to talk to and than recommend agents from there. 

Hope this is helpful, if you ever want to chat more shoot me a message and best of luck to you!

@Luke O'Connell Congratulations on taking the first step! I'm also a 25 year old investor and will be moving to Austin in about a month. If you ever want to chat real estate, let me know!

@Diana Rosett it totally depends on what you're goals are! If you're looking for a relatively safe place to park cash it can make sense to purchase homes with all cash. Since you don't have a loan on these properties you're raw cash flow on a monthly basis will be higher, however you're return on your money (cash on cash return, or how hard your money is working for you) will be much lower. Hope this helps! I own some property in Ohio if you ever want to chat more!

@Corbett Brasington I love this idea....does the concept of an "Information Radiator" stem from a book you've read?

@Wymeshia Rob The best thing to do would be house hacking a multifamily, it accomplishes all your goals of owning property to live in but also owning rental properties. Reach out to an agent in your area to see how many multifamily's are available in your market and go from there.

Hope that helps!

@Destry B. Have you and your wife considered buying your first property sooner?