All Forum Posts by: Juan V Lopez

Congrats, Patrick. Question – what do you want?

If you want to leverage that $3M into cashflow to retire you for the rest of your life – there's no reason you can't acquire a $10M apartment complex that makes you 2.5% returns yearly ($250,000 to you) after debt service.

But if you want to own $100M of real estate, then you would use that $3M to leverage it into smaller loans and work your way bigger and bigger. This would mean breaking down the $3M into smaller loans on smaller properties and "flipping" your way up.

Clarify what you (and your partner?) want and that will help you narrow your choices. Wish you the best, brother.

Invest now with buffer room for the correction we are going through. If you buy at the right price, you are able to withstand market downswings. If you wait until a "recession hits," the opportunities you see now will be getting scooped up by huge hedge funds who move with speed and tons of money.

Get started where you can. Wish you the best, bro.

Hey Steven, congrats on your flip brother. To offset high income (can capital gains on your flip), you need either: 1) Real estate rentals or 2) Business expenses.

Since we're already in the back half of 2022, any rental you buy now will only be depreciated for the remaining months you owned it in 2022. But don't let this dissuade you from acquiring a big rental.

Some suggestions:

1) Connect with a real estate-friendly tax professional. Doing this has saved me so much money in recent years. Literally hundreds of thousands of dollars. They know what you want to do and will do what they can to reduce your tax liability.

2) Cali is very difficult (damn-near impossible) to acquire cash-flowing properties. Go out of state to look at rentals. Personally, I live in Las Vegas and hold rentals in Chicago. More bang for your buck, larger brick buildings, steady tenants. Get clear on what you are able to afford (perhaps a $1 million property with $200K down) and use that criteria to start your search in markets you are comfortable with. Throughout the years, owning rentals is a fantastic depreciation against income.

3) Something I did in 2018 to offset a large tax bill was to acquire a business before the end of the year. I was able to depreciate all of the assets of the business in year 1. That's how depreciation for business works. Real estate depreciation is different.

Hope this helps, wish you the best bro.

Andrew, I say this to you respectfully as an investor and husband myself or a wife who has 0 interest in real estate investing – it's not her job to educate herself and get on board at the same level you are.

We men often get this wrong because we think that if our partner doesn't feel the same way we do, then there is something wrong with them that must be fixed before we can move forward.

2 key points for you that have helped me:

1) Your wife is merely communicating her preferences. She is not wrong and you are not wrong. You both have individual preferences based on past experiences. Your goal as a husband and provider should be to find middle ground in what both of you want.

2) She has no reason to believe your way will work anyway. When we're starting off as investors, we get so caught up in telling our partners' success stories about other people or things we've read or heard. Truthfully, they have no reason to believe us because we haven't done it ourselves. Some people can be convinced through words. Others need to see it through action and proof.

Trust me, my wife is as big of a nonbeliever as they come lol. But she completely trusts me now to be financially responsible and have our family's best interest in mind – even if she thinks the properties I buy look like sh*t.

My wife allows me to control our finances and invest in real estate with full autonomy. In return, she got a cabin in Big Bear this year that we are holding as a STR (and using ourselves) and she next wants a condo in Miami that we can also STR and use ourselves.

She gets what she wants after I proved to her that what I wanted was a way to get us there. Make both of you guys happy.

Find common ground. It's you guys vs your challenge. Not you vs your wife. Wish you guys the best, brother.

Hi Mary, good on you to take on feedback. Personally, the website would not drive me to make an offer.

• I need to scroll past the main photo to get to the price, amenities, etc. Try to get as much compelling information about the property "above the fold." "Above the fold" is an old newspaper term that refers to getting your best and most compelling news on the top half front page of the newspaper, so it entices people to pick up and read.

• The major information of the property is in small print (price, size, property type). This needs to be more prominent.

• Headline is non-informative. "Just Listed" is very generic. I'd go with something more attention-catching like the fact that it already comes with more than $100K in equity.

• If you're going to lead with photos at the top of the page, I would make it a carousel of photos of the property that people can scroll through.

The page itself is clean. But I always put myself in the eyes of someone reading through my stuff. What do they want to know most immediately? What will grab their attention? What will compel them to contact me? And then go from there.

Hope this helps, wish you the best.

Highlands Ranch is a beautiful area, I lived there in recent years.

Personally, I would talk to the tenant and boyfriend to make it explicit that if he is staying for more than 30 days, he will legally become a tenant, he will need to be added to the lease and therefore be legally responsible for the property just like the remainder of the tenants.

They'll likely say that "he'll be gone after the summer, so it shouldn't be an issue" – but this will give you confidence that they know where you stand. If it continues to be an issue in the future, you have made your expectations clear and can take legal recourse as the homeowner.

They sound like young people, so they're likely not doing this to be negligent. Just young and wanting to spend time together. Other than that, they sound responsible, so I would figure out a way to set your standard but continue to make it work with them.

Wish you the best, brother.

Beautiful property and congrats! Only piece of advice I have is to switch around your photos and update your listing every so often. AirBnB takes this new data and refreshes your listing, and shows it higher to visitors in your area. Wish you the best!

Hey Nate, there's no 1 single magic pill source for great deals that few other people know about.

Truthfully, your best source is yourself. You can find good deals on the MLS, wholesalers, wholesale companies, auction, driving for dollars, tax liens, a family friend, etc. Good investors are active and have knowledge in a variety of areas.

I don't think the question is necessarily where to find good deals, but the question we need to be clear on is: What does a good deal look like to me?

When you have clarity on that, you can move on one very quickly that meets your criteria. Speed when you find something that works is the biggest key to success.

Wish you the best, bro.

Rafael, happy you are getting in the game, brother! A few suggestions for you to consider:

1) Don't overhype your first property in your mind – this can create analysis paralysis. Your goal with your first property should be to buy a solid investment that you learn from. You take the knowledge and cash you gained from your first property into your 2nd, 3rd, etc.

2) BRRRR is a great method. Are you a contractor yourself? One of the biggest problems a lot of new people have with BRRRRs are the renovations take too long or are too costly. If you are qualified to do some of the work yourself, you have a leg up on everyone else.

3) You can finance a big purchase and rehab with a hard money loan. Essentially, hard money is a high-interest, short-term loan that is based on the sale or refinance of an investment property. Example: If a property costs $300,000 to acquire and $50,000 to renovate, your all-in costs would be $350,000. You can find some lenders who are willing to lend up to 90% of that acquisition cost ($315K loan, so you pay $35K at closing). You would be responsible for monthly interest payments and holding costs, but this would allow you to leverage a hard money loan to start your journey.

Absolutely do your own research and call around for different lenders' rates, but this is doable. DM me if I you need any clarification. Take care, my friend.

Hi Jeff, I'm a broker-salesperson here and I'd be happy to recommend some of the better areas around town for your friend. Wish you guys the best!