All Forum Posts by: Keenan Fitzpatrick

There's two groups that have monthly meetings. 

The Real Estate eXchange (REX) started about 10 years ago. You can find them on Meetup.com. This group talks about various real estate investing related topics and touches base every month on the real estate market and interest rates before going on to the months main topic and guest speaker. 

The Landlord Almanac is the second group. Their meetings are directly related to property management. 

Feel free to dm me if you have any questions. I've been in these groups for years and can lay it all out for ya. 

I agree with @Chris S.. Assuming your lot is R3 for commercial multi family, you'll need 6,000 sq/ft for a 4plex and 10,000 sq/ft for a 8 plex. The muni definitely doesn't make it that simple either. You'll have title 21 requirements, upgraded utilities, right of way access, parking vs lot coverage requirements, etc that will steer you towards the type building that will be allowed by the muni. You'll probably see that the return would be better by using that money to invest in multiple other properties instead of what would likely pencil out for that one property. 

Low interest rates help. Kevin is also a great agent and that was a great property. What I've seen is that the balance in our market has shifted a little to having even a little more buyers than sellers than what we had before. That's not what was expected to happen the last few months but we do even with a little tighter lending requirements. 

We'll see what happens when this Gucci unemployment runs out and this forbearance plays out.  Our market is having to bear less tourism (I went on a 26 Glacier cruise last week and there were 1 of 2 boats running and it had 70 of its 270 person capacity), oil and gas being low, fishing taking a hit and unemployment. 

@Marcus Auerbach there's also flightseeing tours all over and ziplining tours in Talkeetna. 

@Marcus Auerbach Fairbanks doesn't have much to offer. You could float the river. That's always fun and there's canoes for rent. Anchorage has glacier cruises out of Whittier, train ride to Talkeetna to see Denali and hang out in a cool little town, bike rental to ride the coastal trail, hike Flattop and lot's of good eating. Seward has fishing charters that are fun and you can catch lots of different types of fish. Just be prepared to pay a tip to the Captain, fish processing, packing and shipping. But you can get salmon, rockfish, and halibut and it's so good! Girdwood is a nice little place to check out and go to the top of Alyeska for a meal and it's only 35 min from Anchorage. 

@Marcus Auerbach If you're going to be in Anchorage, give me a holler!

@Rebecca Knox Captain Save-A-Home is the best thing I've heard this week. 

I've lived in northern and southern CALIFORNIA, HAWAII, IDAHO, NORTH DAKOTA, UTAH and ALASKA. I have spent quite a bit of time in Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Taiwan and the Dominican Republic. 

I will probably stay in ALASKA but IDAHO like it might have potential. I'm also interested to see what NORTH CAROLINA is all about. I've never heard anyone say anything bad about it. 

I've found some info here and there in podcasts and a little in a book or two but I'm looking more for a workbook maybe on how to evaluate them, set them up, find balance and weigh advantages and disadvantages. 

I have a potential partner and we're on the same page as far as finding a win-win. 

My role is as a licensee, wholesaler, and structuring creative financing. I'm bringing deal flow, leverage in creative financing options, and possibly some funding. Currently, I don't have much liquid to offer but will soon. My goal is to do more deals with less time involved. Last weekend I was painting the outside of my current 4plex flip/house hack at midnight... cuz it's AK and still light here at night. I don't want to carry that time commitment or mental weight that takes me away from more productive things. 

My partner is an experienced flipper and has a good amount of funding liquid. He wants deal flow, someone who knows how to structure creative financing (that's very hard to find in our market but I know how and, equally important, I know how to get them closed), and an equal monetary contribution. 

We both have the same goal as far as using flip profits to roll into multi-family purchases and pay down debt keep cashflow up and stay safe with lots of reserves. 

Neither of us want to do property management. Too much risk and time. We can do that for a short time though. 

Some questions we are both asking each other are:

If we do a flip together then we both make less than doing them independently. How do we make that a win? Is it our common goal of investing long term that makes it worthwhile? My time is leveraged but I can also use a general contractor and get my own funding. He has money and funding and would be doing/overseeing the work either way.

If his skills as a contractor and my real estate skills offset each other, does it make sense to contribute the same amount financially? 

What kind of business structures do we need to implement? 

Can we potentially get more financing together? 

I realize that there may not be black and white answers for these and it may depend entirely on us. Just trying to start the convo and let you know where we are at. 

I hope this is a good start to the discussion and I'd like to say thanks in advance for any help anyone offers, books or podcasts or websites they recommend or any advice at all. Thank you!

@Jamie Rose agreed. It happens. We just try to educate ourselves as much as possible to mitigate the risk. I think the biggest lesson for everyone to take away from current events is to not over leverage yourself. Keep reserves for yourself and your properties and don't do skinny deals. 

@Eric Andersen The best spot in the state for what you're looking for is Mt.View period. But I'm pretty sure you aren't imagining going to the least desirable neighborhood in the state based off one vector of evaluating a real estate investment. I've got two off market deals there right now that are 40% to over 100% ROI.

There's lots more to the question you're asking though. What type of deal structure, financing type, property type, funds available to invest, etc. 

I'd stay away from anywhere that isn't between Girdwood and Wasilla (that includes Anchorage). Homer and Kenai may be ok but I prefer to not hold property that is in fishing based communities. Too much annual fluctuation for me. It's not my wheelhouse. Like @Shaun Hatton I would probably most definitely maybe do it if I was local. It's 3-4 hours away for me right now. Homer is cool af tho.

Like @Ronald Laurion says, I would also be very cautious. Alaska got hit with stay at home orders just like everyone else. We also have a big tourism industry, big fishing industry and oil/gas that has also taken a hit. I disagree that home values will do anything close to what they did in the 80's. The state was almost entirely oil/gas dependent, interest rates were at all time highs vs today's all time lows and there was a mass exodus when the pipeline was finished. Home values dropped by over 70%. There is literally no economist, reports, article or any credible info that I'm aware of that would validate anywhere close to a 70% drop in property values. 

I think we could see a 5% drop in values, maybe a 10% drop in values. I don't think it would be anything more than that. People will visit Alaska next year and eat fish again and I think our presidency will do their best to get oil prices up again. It affects too much of our country. 

This is just my .02. Shoot me a dm if you like to chat more about what would be a good move for you. I'm actively investing and acquiring property. I think Warren Buffet said something about being greedy when others are fearful and risk only comes from not knowing what you are doing. I see this as an opportunity and have been developing strategies specifically for this. But what do Warren Buffet and some guy in Alaska know anyway. ;) I hope this helps. Let me know if you have any other questions.