All Forum Posts by: Ryan Evans

Maybe you could work a deal with a developer where your contribution is the value of the land, and that determines your split. It will probably be the smaller piece of the pie, but if you factor in the competition and everything else then there has to be some number that makes sense. All that said while assuming it's in a place where development makes sense. 

I had a lot of similarly negative opinions when I was starting out. Often by people with no or very few properties and were twice my age. I didn't have a job and just did occasional consulting and traveled the world for fun. But I bought 10 units in the last 3 years and I'm only 28. None of them have been traditional financing and I only used my money in a couple of them. 

You've got to have some credibility before people will take you too seriously, but if you can find deals and put the pieces together then it's a very viable strategy. It's very difficult, but nobody ever said this was easy. 

I'm quite shocked how many people have great income and the ability to finance, but only can manage to buy one or two deals a year. It's so easy to buy properties with financing, but people like us have to do it the hard way. 

For larger deals you'll almost certainly need an experienced operator on the team to back the loan, but if you find a deal and bring it to a sydicator then you're off to a good start. 

You just need to talk to more lenders. Find one that lends more heavily on the value and rents than your financials. If you're going for cash flow, which I assume from the states you mentioned, then that shouldn't be a problem. Even US bank commercial does this so they're not that hard to find once you know what kind of lender you're looking for. 

I'd strongly recommend backing out. Investing in Cleveland is not for the faint of heart, and if a local didn't outbid you then you either hit the jackpot or it's probably not worth a cent. Comps don't mean much in many neighborhoods, and if you're asking questions like what to look out for, then you're already in over your head because the list is long. Very long. And as Tim said, you already did your due diligence. Not trying to be negative here, but you should strongly reconsider what you're doing before you lose your $12k+. 

Good luck with the move and getting up and running with your first investment! I moved out here last year to build my portfolio faster and it's been quite an interesting year full of ups and downs. If you can finance a nice side-by-side duplex then that might be a good start to get your feet wet as a landlord. 

There are already a million threads on this very issue so I'd recommend you do some digging through the forums to find some recommended PMs. Finding good PMs and contractors is the biggest struggle of almost all out of state investors here. 

I'm assuming it was a low price point duplex as that's why everyone invests in Cleveland. A couple of months might sound unreasonable for filling a vacancy on a property like that through a PM. But that's just the reality in most cases unless you're in the hot suburbs. 

Until you own quite a few units, you, unfortunately, don't have much leverage on a PM who is only making maybe $150/month on your property.

Don't be surprised when Clayton sends in a bogus court order to keep the video offline even longer. He is a fraudster at the end of the day.

I think there is a big need for it. I did this for plenty of investors in Cleveland, basically as a consultant, since I’ve got a background in consulting, light construction and am an investor myself. I don’t pretend to be any kind of expert, but if someone wants to pay me an hourly or flat rate to drive out to a property and give my opinion with nothing else to gain then I’d do it. I’m licensed now so it’s a different story, but I still find myself talking investors out of deals on a weekly basis because they get sent “deals” and they need someone to go look at it. Half the time I’ll see $30k+ in rehab before I get out of the car and the deal is dead already, but You’d never know from afar. So there’s definitely a lot of value in doing what you’re talking about! 

That does sound like a either a lot of coincidences happened around the same time or something is going on behind the scenes. That said, there are a million out of state investors looking st Cleveland and they’re mostly after the same types of properties. I’m always sending out offers for my clients on properties sitting on the market a long time and sometimes they get snatched up right in front of me. You’d be amazed at how much action is happening here. And people are starting to overpay because of it. 

You might have an iffy realtor repping an investor group that’s buying in bulk and using you to find deals. But @Tom Ott makes some good points. All of us have access to the same info and any decent local realtor should be more informed on the market than a new investor from out of state. And you should verify who’s buying them once they close to see if that tells you anything! 

I don’t think that’s an unreasonable timeframe. From what you’re describing it doesn’t sounds like a ton of time needed to go into it to be rent ready, but keep in mind that most turnovers are never as simple as they seem. Handymen are in short supply and things just take time, especially if you’re not a high volume client. Some people investing out here would consider you lucky that your pm even calls you back within a week!