All Forum Posts by: Jim Truman

Thanks. Will have a more detailed conversation with an agent. 

Good morning,

My wife and I recently closed on our first out of state property, a townhouse in Bedford. I'm looking for recommendations on insurance. Also some advice on reasonable coverage amounts.

For now I just went with my current provider and used the numbers they suggested but the premium is bit higher than I, and my Realtor, expected. 

The townhouse is 1300 square feet, unfinished basement,2 bedroom, 1.5 bath, 1 car garage. The owner is responsible for maintaining the garage/garage door, and inside of the house. Purchase price was 86,500. 

What number would you use as the building replacement cost? I have no idea what it would cost to rebuild the interior in case of total loss. 

What's a reasonable liability amount?

Anything specific I should be looking for in a plan? I have lost rent coverage. 

Thanks

Thanks everyone. Top Tier called right back and we scheduled with them. 

Just for my future knowledge, should we bother finding our own or is the concern of using a Realtor's suggested inspector overblown?

Good morning BP,

We are about to close on our first property in Cleveland  our Realtor recommended a few inspectors but I've always been told we should find our own. Any recommendations from the group?

Thanks

Thanks @Bob Collett. Both pass POS. Taxes are relatively similar. I'm not familiar with rental registration and inspection requirements. I'll ask the Realtor/Property Manager. 

@Owen Dashner I am invested in REITs but with REITs you never quite get the benefit of loan pay down. So while the value of our shares do increase, it's not the same as having tenants pay our mortgage off and then we continue to earn income on the property in perpetuity.  

@Theresa Harris Good suggestion. I will see if I, or the Realtor, can get more info on the associations. I think his thoughts are similar to yours - the more expensive one will attract better tenants. It's also a newer building. We do have the money to purchase both, and have considered it, but we are really just starting to dip our toes in the water and get over our fears of owning property several hundred miles away. Although maybe buy 2 at once is a great way to just jump in head first! 

Good morning. Out of State investor here looking at a property in Euclid and Bedford. We're being told Bedford is a nicer area. The Euclid property is in an area of small/cheap townhomes. But I understand there is also some attractive new developments in Euclid. 

Mr. Wise's map actually rates Bedford as Class C and Euclid as Class B. I'm interested in your thoughts on these two areas.  

Thanks
 

Good morning. My wife and I are new investors. We've been studying for about a year and have identified the market where we'd like to invest and have also decided to focus on condos, at least for our first property or two. We have our reasons for this and this thread isn't about condos vs SFH. Also, since we live in a very expensive area, we are focused on out of state investing.

Our goals are long term passive income not so much current cash flow, although we'll certainly take cash-flow if possible.  

Please understand, we don't really like real estate, don't enjoy thinking about homes, and don't want our life to be consumed by worrying about properties. So for our initial property, we're looking for a relatively painless way to get our feet wet and get used to this whole idea. 

Our realtor/property manager has two condos right now that are both attractive. I'm very interested in the thoughts of the group. 

Condo #1: 2 Bedroom 1 Bath. Class C but seems to be up and coming (near some new corporate developments, and a up an coming updated waterfront  development.) Newly renovated. Price: $30,000. After all expenses I think we'd cash flow almost $300. Cash on Cash is around 10-11%. It's a cash deal. 

Condo #2: 2 Bedroom 2 Bath. Class B suburb. Newly renovated but still needs about 3k in improvements. Attached garage. Price:$90,000. After all expenses we'd cash flow possibly $100. Cash on Cash is closer to 4%. 

Our realtor is suggesting #2. It will probably attract nicer tenants and is in a nicer area. This makes sense. But we also can't get over how cheap and profitable #1 is. 

If I stretch both investments out over 30 years, they almost seem to be equal - cash flow over 30 years plus the value of the property. (Barring any appreciation which is impossible to know. The suburban one could tank while the cheap one's neighborhood explodes.) 

So I am interested in your thoughts. As brand new investors. Would you put 30k into #1 and have a cash flowing small condo or put it into financing #2 and have much less cash flow but a more valuable asset?  

Thanks so much!

@Account ClosedThanks for the input. Our realtor just brought two possible condos to us for consideration. I'm going to post a separate thread with the numbers to see what people think. I hope you provide your thoughts as well.  

Good evening,

My wife and I will be in Cleveland around the 14-16th of Feb and hoping to meet with some investor friendly Realtors and Property Managers, or just other investor, while we're there. She's from the area but we live out of state currently and are considering investing in the area Key to this is finding a Realtor who really understands the market and a property manager with whom we're comfortable leaving our investment. 

We're interested in single family homes, sub $150k, B neighborhoods, something kind of like Parma.

If anyone has recommendations I would love to chat.

Thanks