All Forum Posts by: Michael Ehmann

Nice work!!! Love the specific call outs. I also love that you guys made a "low" offer, but it wasn't unreasonable because you had the research and analysis to back it up.

There will be some on the MLS too. Most probably won't work, but if you're having a really hard time finding some, you could look there. Even if it's a 1/100 chance that you find one that works, then you can expect to find one eventually if you look long enough...

One strategy to consider: if you buy a HUD home, I think you get access 1 week before any investors if you're doing it as your primary residence. I have a friend who is doing this in town.

@Account Closed, I'm a big believer in index funds, particularly ones that are "total stock market" or similar index funds. "Set it and forget it" with index funds is exactly what you should be doing. In the long run, I don't believe that most people can "stock pick" better than the total market. For me, constantly watching and moving investments is gambling...

Sort of real estate related: make sure you're maxing out your retirement accounts (or that you start one now). I'm a big believer in index funds. Set it and forget it. Cut down on the amount of taxes you're paying by maxing out your accounts, and you should still have plenty left over for other ventures.

@Lisha Taylor welcome! Are you living in Atlanta currently?

Echoing Caleb Heimsoth : run fast. So so fast.

It definitely doesn't take "years" to learn this stuff :) There are SO MANY great resources, many of which are free or very cheap: the BP Podcast, BP forums/blog, J Scott's book on flipping houses, etc. Really, you can put in a little time (5-10) hours per week and learn enough to jump in within the first few months. The more time you put in, the faster you can get started. I'd also advise to try and get your hands dirty with a real deal (yours or someone else you're helping): it's easy to keep "learning" forever. Education is great, but after a little while experience is the best education.

Where are y'all moving from? 

A lot of people move in North Atlanta move there for the school districts. If you're trying to rent to families, this can be a huge value-add. From what I know, Cobb County has a wide variety in quality of schools though, so you need to choose carefully if that's a factor in your decision. Schools like Walton, Lassiter, and Kennesaw Mountain are great, but there are also many sub-par ones, too. If you're looking to be close to Marietta, parts of Smyrna are pretty popular right now. 

We are under contract and in the due diligence period for a small multifamily unit in Atlanta. This would be a buy-and-hold play for us. None of us will be living in the property, so I don't think a 203k loan will be an option. 

The property has lots of differed maintenance (more than we expected) and HVAC units and water heaters that are all near end-of-life (all were installed at the same time). We understand the importance of budgeting for CAPEX and have conservative estimates in our budget.

One of our biggest fears is getting into this property and having to throw down another $20-30K in CAPEX within the first 12-18 months. We will have some reserves to start and could make it work if a ton of things hit us within the first 12-18 months. We're just really trying to minimize the amount of additional capital required out of our own pockets.

A few options we're considering as alternatives to paying in cash ourselves:

• Having the seller fix some issues before purchase (we're in the process of post-inspection renegotiations). We're not asking for everything to be fixed and don't expect it to be perfect. But we think the things we're asking for are reasonable. 
• Credit cards: we'd like to avoid this at all costs because of high interest rates.
• Hard money
• Private money

Are there any other loan types or financing options we should consider to deal with upfront CAPEX in the first 1-2 years until we have a larger CAPEX fund built up?

Thanks!