All Forum Posts by: Rick Novotny

There are a lot of great cities to invest in that will make more sense than the big ones like L.A. and New York.

Take a look at places in Ohio, Tennessee, Kansas City, ect.

One issue you might run into is the inventory. Every market seems to be short on inventory right now so you have to be extremely fast with offers. Kansas City, for example, is down 63% in inventory from last year.

All of my rental properties between 4% and 5%. Some of these loans are 5 years old as I began investing in 2016. I do live in one of my duplexes, which is close to 3% due to being owner occupied.

Hi Jr,

Real estate syndication is a group of investors that pool their money together to buy, typically, very large deals.

Most of the time syndicators are going to require you to be an accredited investor, meaning you have a net worth of over $1M or have a very high income. 

In the U.S., the term accredited investor is used by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under Regulation D to refer to investors who are financially sophisticated and have a reduced need for the protection provided by regulatory disclosure filings. Accredited investors include natural high net worth individuals (HNWI), banks, insurance companies, brokers, and trusts.

There should be plenty of blogs and videos out there with more detail. I'm not a syndicator so I don't have all of the information, but I am happy to help answer any questions you might have!

Hey Dustin,

Find an investor friendly agent in the market you're looking to invest in. They will be more than happy to spend a few minutes setting up an MLS search for you. While you're learning the ropes, you won't need to search for off-market deals or anything crazy creative.

You could reach out to a property manager in the area you are looking to invest in to help you with repair estimates. If the agent you're working with is an investor themselves, that helps.

Just keep it methodical and analytical as you move forward, never let your emotions get involved when investing. Honestly, the rehab costs are kind of a moot point if you're going to keep the property forever. It matters more for short term projections, but who cares if you're going to keep it for 30+ years? Take that with a grain of salt, because the repair costs DO matter but depends on the type of investing. If you're syndicating like Taylor above, it definitely matters.

As the rents and value of the property continue to rise, your returns start to skyrocket. For example, my first deal was only like 7% cash on cash return. That was in 2016. I had no idea what I was doing. The returns on that property have turned into more like 18% cash on cash over the years.

I don't know who that is, so I might be wrong but be careful with those kinds of programs. A lot of those gurus will promise the world and underdeliver.

Since you have experience as an investor, why not just start to scale it up? You already know how to do it. You can use stepping stones. For example, purchase a 12 unit then a 20 unit, ect. After a couple of those it will all be the same, it won't matter the size of the deal.

If you're interested in the Kansas City market, I can help get you started here. Either way, I can help you find an excellent agent in any market in the country. Let me know!

Look at all these active KC agents/investors in this thread. Maybe I should start another meetup here!

Hi @Forrest Hayashi

Same disclosure as above - I am not a lawyer. 

I ran into this same situation when I started. I bought 3 duplexes in my personal name but ran everything through my LLC. It was difficult to get lenders to lend to an LLC with no income, so I definitely understand. I did everything as if the LLC owned it (even taxes) and then eventually moved the deeds over to my LLC through a real estate attorney. I'm not sure if this is the right or wrong way to do it, but this is what worked for me so I thought I would share.

Hi @Victor Alberto Vidana

I agree with Cody on this one. Finding a lender and an agent would be the next steps. If you don't know a good lender in the area, find an excellent agent in the area and he/she will have plenty of contacts in the industry.

If you want help finding an agent I would be happy to connect you with an investor friendly agent in your local area. Feel free to reach out!

Hi @Ethan Eddy

I'm not a lender, so it would be best to get a lender's expert advice here. But yes, the first time buyer programs are typically for owner occupants. Lenders see investors as riskier than owner occupants ( I know, it's weird ) so we get slightly higher interest rates and such. One thing you can do is buy a duplex when you're ready to move and live in one side as an owner occupant.

I hope you the best in your investment journey! Feel free to reach out if you have any questions.

I have 4 mortgages with Flagstar. One is for my personal portfolio and 3 of them are for my LLC. However, the ones in the LLC were moved over after the mortgages were in place, so the loans are in my personal name. My autopayments from my business account have not been stopped and my bill pay checks are going through too. So basically I'm double paying my mortgages for those three properties right now. I'm super confused with what's going on and the support is no help saying the autopayments 'should cancel soon', but we're way past the date they said now. Should I just cancel my bill pay checks that are being sent from my business account and let the autopayments take it's course? Obviously I don't want to miss a payment and ruin my 800 credit score.