All Forum Posts by: Seth Williams

To answer your last question, I would get an office or a PO Box. Additionally, I actually disagree with not being scripted. Unless you are in fact a highly trained sales person, likely, this very direct / simple approach will get shut down the vast majority of the time. As someone who spends a good amount of time daily prospecting for business ( calling fsbo / expired / book of clients ) you need to have an agenda and some ways to handle objections. If someone called me asking if I wanted to sell my property, 99% of the time im going to say no. If someone called as a property manager and they asked if it was OK to ask a few questions to help me be more profitable, id probably at least listen for a minute. Just my two cents. all the successful prospectors use this type of strategy. 

As far as mail, depending on what you are doing, I like to hit people with a lot of post cards so over 8 in 45 days. It shows you are serious, and ultimately drives the phone to ring / web traffic. 

Your only shot Is a small local bank giving you a better loan, but this is not likely - even owner occupant will be Challenging so talk to several local lenders as first step !  

Just budget for the repair / replacement before hand, if the #'s make sense on the building and you can absorb it, your good. Boilers break, so do other things. Make sure you keep the right amount in reserves. Potentially could even negotiate to have the seller replace before or after closing with an escrow hold back of sorts. Commercial properties are very flexible. We have done deals for clients before where we get a large kick back at closing to cover deferred maintenance. Essentially, everything is negotiable. So, get after it! One of my buildings has a 40 year old boiler, works great. 

Any lease should be able to offset your mortage thus not negatively effecting your DTI. Depending on how many units, id start with a local bank / credit unit who wont sell your loan, that way you can get a better rate and do 20% down if they have a program like that.

Commenting more to see what people say here, but, I would imagine you should stay close to population growth in the city / areas, as well as job growth and closely watch the real estate market as well as the contracting market. For instance if the cost to build is prohibitive, its not going to work - Its also a realllll long con. I would focus on something that you can help force the appreciation on. An agent I know in your area is selling some land tho. 

It’s completely legal and an often practice to owner occupy a four unit or less multi fam and put low money down.

@Dominique Palmer correct! You are dead on. I’ve yet to find someone who doesn’t do seasoning on the loans but I haven’t looked that  hard to be honest with you

Just reminder that the more lines you pull the more its going to effect your debt to income ratio, and therefore effect your potential future financing a deal, so make sure you talk it thru / think it thru if you plan on leveraging that. 

I would call a local small bank, the larger commercialized huge banks will likely have more stringent guidelines vs. a local community bank who is super willing to lend. I have a bank that I use locally here, Align Credit Union @Derek Da Silva is the Mortgage agent I use there. They do 20% all day. That being said, they are my local bank not yours. 

@Shannon Staff play nice and talk to the inspector before hand and ask him / her what are the most common reason places fail for. Make sure you are playing to them and mention you don't want them to have to come out multiple times, you are new at this etc. You will be fine! If the apartment is nice / safe you will be all set! I did this exact thing recently, and took the inspectors check list and walked it all before hand, and even had an electrician in to validate multiple things so I could get my $ on time.