All Forum Posts by: Robert Ellis

A lot of eyes are on the midwest these days so I thought I’d put an offer out there for all the BP folks around the country who have their eye on Cleveland, Ohio.

I've personally placed a major bet on Cleveland as an upcoming city for long term buy-and-holds and I have plenty of reasons why. I've got a duplex running a 44% ROI and another ~24%'er on the way. It's a duplex closing on Sep 5. I live in the Seattle/Tacoma area so I'm doing the whole out of state thing.

Anyway, I see a lot of interest in Cleveland, Akron, Toledo, Columbus, Cincinnati, etc. (sorry for keyword spam!), here in the forums, but the Midwest can be a risky place to invest. Not everyone has the capacity to fly out to every city they want to invest in, but some questions can only be answered by being on the ground.

So, if that’s you, maybe I can help! I’m flying to Cleveland from Sep 5-10th to get keys, fix the new place up, look at some properties, grow the team, and generally get the place rent ready. The ugly details are where the real learning happens so if you want to know about the deal, agents, contractors, taxes, regulations, contracts, financials, etc., while I go through the process, I’m happy to share my experience. I’ll be sure to document the process and post it on BP. I’ll also be bringing my best friend out from Alaska. He’s never set foot in Ohio or even bought a property but is looking at investing in Cleveland. Maybe you can relate?

Anyway, the BP community has helped me a ton, so here’s my chance to build up some good karma. If you want to know what it’s like to be a new out of state investor buying a property in the midwest, I invite you along for the ride :)

A year ago I was totally new to investing, but I’m slowly getting it figured out. Leave a comment or send a PM if you have any questions on what it’s like to do a deal out in the Cleve. If you like what you see and might want to talk partnerships, I’m all ears. Also, if you don’t have any local contacts out there and there is something we can do to help while we’re in town, don’t be shy!

Mostly 3 beds 1 bath. Occupied.  Serious inquiries only please PM me. Thanks!

Gross :Rent- $     208,140

Taxes& IN-            $38,316

Net Cash Flow-  $169,812

Due to popular demand, I've moved our location to Black Point, the sister restaurant to the Hyde across the street: 

570 N High St, Columbus, OH 43215 

Any issues please call me on 614-843-1374 

Looking forward to meeting you all!

Hi @Lori C.!  I'm just now coming across your post!  My husband and I are also in need of a 203k contractor in the Columbus, OH area.  Were you able to find a reliable contractor?  Hoping to learn from your experiences.

Thanks in advance!

Jenny

To start, this began back in 2012, but took me a while to get some traction and realize real estate was the way I wanted to go.

Let me provide the brief version:

First property I purchased was a short sale in Clintonville in Columbus, Ohio. I still adamantly believe "short sale" is a misnomer, as the process took me 11 months to close. It ended up being a blessing, however, as the previous owner allowed me to live in the property until we closed - rent free!

I also had a housemate move in with me and paid me rent. Not a bad 11 months at all! Closed in October 2013 at $152,000

Over the next few years, I made some additions and repairs (new bedroom, bathroom, and extra kitchen in the basement), and now got two housemates - completely covered my mortgage payments.

2015 rolls around and I start studying real estate a little bit more. Had some cash saved up from working a full-time job in logistics and a part-time job teaching tennis, and bought a fixer-upper for $29,000 with a tenant in place at $700 (sounds like the $30,000 pig, right?)

Long story short, evicted the tenant, put on a new roof, painted the walls, replaced carpeting, added a 1/2 bath, got a new amazing tenant in place (they have since finished the basement, added security alarms, painted walls, added cabinetry... all on their own dime) paying $850 a month.

Fast-forward again to last year. Take a HELOC out on my primary residence - it had appraised for $235,000. Refinanced the investment property. Purchase a new primary residence and investment property with $0 down total (used the HELOC for both down payments). Got married!

Currently renting out the old primary residence at $1800/month with a cashflow (after mortgage, insurance, taxes, vacancy, maintenance, cap ex, etc.) of over $500/month; with the other two investments each pulling in between $250-350 a month.

I also decided to make tennis my "full-time" job and pursue real estate more heavily as my career. Currently in the process of closing on a 4-unit, and working on coming to an agreement on a fixer-upper, student rental that I plan to BRRRR with a coworker of my wife.

I know my "short" story ran a little long; but that's the nuts and bolts of it. Can tell you, the last two purchases and everything since would not have happened without the help of Josh Dorkin, Brandon Turner, and BiggerPockets. A huge "thanks" to everything you all are doing here.

Franklin county reassessment and reappraisals have hit transitional areas like Merion Village and Olde Towne East pretty hard. Anyone who has BRRR will see that their values have increased significantly.

Are there any good tools to estimate the reassessed property taxes?

My understanding of Ohio law (which is suspect at best) is that school levy millage must be reduced when the overall tax base increases. Therefore property taxes do not scale 1:1 with property values. It will just get redistributed based on updated values. This makes it impossible to estimate.

Any good tools out there that could help?

New to BP and just starting to look at investing.  Planning to attend Nathan's event...even though it's opening day for OSU football!

Steven, if there is an email invite circulating for your event in September please forward to me as well.

I have started and am running a new service in my company for helping property owners and landlords take advantage of the short-term rental phenomena! I am a broker, and investor myself, and a year ago I decided this Airbnb thing is no-joke, and I started a new company called Housepitality. So now I manage 6+ houses full time on Airbnb, and am adding more as we speak. These houses are achieving a 94%+ occupancy rate, and we are bringing in 3X - 4X the rates of what long-term rentals would achieve. Some of these are houses we own, some we are managing for other clients. We have a team of cleaning crews, and managers, and we are looking to expand!

We are looking for investors who wan to own an "Airbnb" or a short term rental property. We will help you find the property that will make the most money, and help you with set-up and management of the unit. We can offer as little as consulting, or as much as full 

If you have a property in Columbus OH, and are interested in seeing what we can do for you just send me a message.