All Forum Posts by: John Hinnant

Here's one on on-campus student housing - https://uncw.edu/housing/newho...

I'll pull together a few things, standby.

@Tyler Stone they never closed this past semester and seem to have survived well, unlike other schools. I looked at a SFR with an ADU last month less than a half mile from the campus. The seller told me he has never had a student in 15 years as a rental. I think they did much better than most, however they required single room occupancy for on-campus housing and do not have a football program. On the upside, our football program is undefeated, but we lack the large traffic draw that a football program brings. It means more kids in the lineup with the surf is good. The student housing projects were not really at typically 100% occupancy, but they also allowed students to do virtual learning voluntarily.

As an economic development asset, prior to the pandemic, UNCW was adding a net gain of 1000 new students a year. With that in mind, there have been several student housing projects both on and off campus. What we see more of is former students who choose to stay in Wilmington and those are your prospective tenants if that is the area you want to be in/around. Former students stick around and recent improvements in the job market have driven that trend. Many FinTech & BioTech companies are hiring UNCW grads and they start out making really good money - so the recent college graduate makes for a good tenant and they enjoy being near the university.

@Joe Kelly as I understand, Section 8 in Wilmington, NC is getting up to $1,150 per month for 2 bedroom homes. If I were you, I’d contact the section 8 folks now to schedule a walkthrough and know what you’ll need to do to qualify. I know an investor with several Section 8 rentals in the downtown area. I’m happy to make a connection for information purposes. If you still want to get rid of it, let me know. I’ll take a look at it

You can break it up, but you’ll need an experienced attorney

I’m new here too, I plan to attend the meet up in January at Waterline Brewery - look forward to networking there.

Another tip would be to use Zillow or Redfin and calculate the $/SqFt of sold properties vs active listings and look at the differences in sizes. Having MLS data would be most helpful, might be worth calling an agent or appraiser in the area and shooting them some Venmo money to pull data for you and email it in excel.

I like single tenant, absolute NNN medical office deals. Particularly if the tenant is providing medical services - 5.5-7.5% cap rates are pretty good for good term and high quality tenant. Medical services are resilient to economic swings and can provide sustainable passive income. Just stay away from administrative buildings under guise of medical office. Too many opportunities to off load admin duties and there is a lot of acquisition of medical practices and hospitals right now.

Also of note: sometimes you can find them in Opportunity Zones. Be cautious with Opportunity Zones; the incoming administration has promised to repeal the 2017 tax cut and jobs act - of which the Opportunity Zones is part of. One strategy might be to buy land in an opportunity zone and build a mini-storage facility. OZ or not, it’s a good business model.

Avoid 2 vs 3 bedroom comps. I typically export the neighborhood sales into excel and calculate the contributory value of incremental increases in square footage. It depends neighborhood by neighborhood, but if you can collect close to 100 (3 bedroom +) sales within a mile or two radius, you’ll have some statistical data you can rely on. Band the homes in square footage ranges 500-1000 SqFt increments. It’s a little complicated to explain on a forum, but it’s a technique I use in my appraisal business when working in a tea I haven’t been in over a year or two. I also do matched pairs for swimming pools. I’ve found 6% of sales price is a fair adjustment. A lot of folks just use $10,000, but that’s usually what you lose in the cost of building a pool. For example: a pool might cost $25,000 to build, but the contributory value might be $15,000. 

Avoid 2 vs 3 bedroom comps. I typically export the neighborhood sales into excel and calculate the contributory value of incremental increases in square footage. It depends neighborhood by neighborhood, but if you can collect close to 100 (3 bedroom +) sales within a mile or two radius, you’ll have some statistical data you can rely on. Band the homes in square footage ranges 500-1000 SqFt increments. It’s a little complicated to explain on a forum, but it’s a technique I use in my appraisal business when working in a tea I haven’t been in over a year or two.