All Forum Posts by: Stone Jin

I'd get a cheapy fridge from lowes or Sears and pay for delivery and disposal. Unless you have it specifically called out in the lease that fridge is not warranted you will be responsible. Buying a used fridge site unseen is risky.

I'd try 1st bank in AZ, they are a portfolio lender and probably can be able to help you.

If you were to take out a HELOC or Refi on your house, you probably get 75-80% of your house's value, so if you were calculating equity as current market value of $300K and you owe 150K, you likely will only be able to get 75-90K out to use. If you already accounted for that then good for you.

Second, you are finding properties on MLS, there likely isn't 50K in equity in play. I'd be cautious about your numbers, unless the property is terrible terrible condition which would then require more than the 10-15K you are estimating. But assuming you found one, your numbers are pretty tight with commissions and concessions etc.

Lastly, I'd always caution doing business with a friend.  As the friendship will be in jeopardy if the deal goes sour.  

Happy hunting.

Stone

Tim, your criteria seems logical. I feel like the only one that Phoenix does not meet is #6. I think just have to be persistent and keep looking. We are closing on a house in AJ this week (fingers crossed) that should give cash on cash in the neighborhood of 11% leveraged. We found this house off of MLS, so there are still some floating around but are more rare. We also self manage all of our properties, if you want 10% with property management then you will have a hard time. You can look at multi family, I've seen a few that can give you those numbers with PM.

You should physically go visit the areas where you would like to invest.  I live in AZ and had planned on investing in Ohio (Originally from there), after visiting I quickly decided to change my mind and invest locally even if the returns are lower.  

Congrats on the purchase. One piece of advice is to not clean the unit yourself. You already charge a cleaning fee. Let professional maids do the cleaning.

You can try Delaney furniture auction Wednesday night at 730. We have gotten furniture for our vacation rentals from there. 35 Ave and Osborne in phoenix

If you have not dealt with investing previously in vacation rentals I'd just beware of the extra cost that will have in furnishing. I'd also be aware of the extra work in managing. Lastly if you hoa allows vrbo. We own and self manage 4 in Phoenix. The 4 almost take the same effort as the many unfurnished we have.

Hi Ly,  there is a meetup next coming Tuesday for local RE investors in the EV.  Last month it was held at Gangplank in downtown Chandler.  You should sign up and stop by for some free education, there is no sales pitch, no eduction selling.  Just a forum where everyone can ask questions.

There are some deals left on MLS, you just have to be looking with eyes wide open.

you can find it on meetup.com ahwatuckee investor group.  

Hope to see you there.

We own and self manage several short term rentals in the Phoenix area.  I can tell you from experience that the amount of work to manage short term rentals is significantly more than unfurnished rentals.  Our winter rates are about 2-2.5 times our summer rates and we stay booked through most of the year.  We have had situations where the person moving in and the person moving out are on the same day and our maids(we have 3 crews that we use) were unavailable, guess who had to go clean a unit.  Yes, the return is much higher, but the effort is also much higher.  Also you have to look at the market you are in, if you are in a tourist market then you'll get a lot of demand, however if you are in a small market it might get risky if the demand is not there.  

Also don't forget to add in the furnishing costs into your calculations.