All Forum Posts by: Ryan Mahoney

@Clint G. - Congrats on the purchase.  Without knowing your property it is difficult exactly what needs to be done.  Documenting the condition of the home is very important.  Have a move in condition check sheet for your tenants.  www.biggerpockets.com/llforms has some good stuff.  

I would first make sure anything that involves safety is fully fixed and tenant ready.  This includes all electrical, anything sharp, heavy, or which could cause any type of injury.  

Secondly, I would make sure anything that could cause damage to your property if left unfixed is taken care of.  Plumbing comes to mind here.  

Next, I would fix/finish anything that will be more difficult to fix/finish once tenants are moved in.  Painting, flooring, etc.  

I would also make a list to hand to tenants of you plan to repair and when once they move in.  Otherwise you open yourself up to them expecting you to perhaps fix everything under the sun for weeks and months and risking some conflicts.  Make everything very clear upfront so everyone is on the same page.  

I would try to leave exterior, landscaping, and yard work and the final steps.  It is way easier to go back and do those things later.  

Good luck.

@Luke Amsbaugh - I would just run your numbers figuring that appreciation would be negative (depreciation) and take your home to $0 value when calculating your exit.  I would also figure higher cap-ex and repair costs.  Probably higher vacancy rates as well.  If after doing all that the numbers still look good it may be a good investment.  As always have strong criteria regarding who you rent to.

@Justin Tahilramani - innovative strategy.  I love it.

@Hector Peralta - I watched John Oliver's piece on mobile home park investors the other day.  It is interesting to see the other side.  From our point of view as investors mobile home parks can be a great investment with a stable tenant base.  From renters point of view investors can unfairly raise rents on fixed and low income people who are trapped.  As with anything we hope as investors we provide a high quality, safe, and affordable place for people to live while allowing us to make a fair profit.  

I agree with @Jaysen Medhurst.  Always run your numbers assuming you are renting both sides out.  When you do that is this an investment you would want to keep for many years?  That said, if you really like the idea of living there and house-hacking will save you some money then that is different story.  Our personal residence does not necessarily need to meet good investment criteria.  

If you are looking for solid cashflow perhaps look into house-hacking a 4-plex.  You could get conventional financing, live there for a year or two and then move somewhere else.   Whatever you look at you should be shooting for $100-$200 cash flow per door after all expenses.  Use the bigger pockets calculators to run your numbers and be conservative.  No one is ever upset if they are able to get more rent than they expected or expenses are less than they budgeted for.  It can be a disaster if the numbers work the other way however.   Another option would be to look for a duplex that needs a little work.  You can buy at a good price and force appreciation with some repairs.  Fix the rental unit and exterior first to get good rents and then fix the unit you are living in last.  

Good luck.  Don't be afraid to keep looking.  

I invest in Hastings, Nebraska and I use Pinnacle Bank.  They cover both the Lincoln and Omaha areas.  Very easy to work with.  I actually just brought in the PDF from the Bigger Pockets calculator showing cash flow and Cash on Cash return and they made the process very easy.  Asked me to bring them future deals I want to finance.  

I have been using Cozy with 4 tenants for almost a year now.  No issues.  I have one tenant who sometimes likes to pay with a personal check and it has been easy to enter offline payments into the system.  I found that exporting the data for tax purposes was very convenient as well. 

It is a little scary to hear that someone can dispute past payments and get their money returned with no recourse for the landlord.  Luckily I have not had that problem.    

Awesome.  Great success story.  Out of curiosity what part of Lincoln was this in?  

@David Ahrens I had Walt Fick inspect a duplex I bought in Hastings back in June. He did a nice job. Thorough inspection and very reasonably priced. http://www.kyhinspections.biz/

@Josh Nix I need a Monday where I am not working so I can make it to Lincoln in time to attend one of these.

@Christopher Moore I would say it all depends on where at what you are looking to invest at and in. As you know Lincoln and Omaha have some very expensive areas and some very cheap areas. Small town Nebraksa generally has low priced real estate. With the large number of college kids in certain markets (such as mine) you can collect very good rents on B-C properties if you are willing to put deal with that clientele. Be sure to familiarize yourself with tenet laws in Nebraska and get a good lease that is state specific. Being a Pro member gives you access to this but you should always run anything by an attorney to be safe. I purchased what I was say was a class C duplex in a B- neighborhood. Purchase price was $104K. I put about $3500 into it in repairs plus a lot of my own work and really made it one of the nicest rentals in the neighborhood. Got a lot of compliments from other landlords and long time residents of the neighborhood. Long story short I want to make sure people know I take pride in being a landlord and want to provide the neighborhood and my tenets a quality service. I am able to collect rents that are higher than others in the neighborhood. So far it has worked well for me. Find what works well for you and go for it. It’s a lot of work, and I have had some mistakes along the way but I love the challenge and I am paying down a mortgage with other people’s money.

@Christopher Moore Hi Chris. I invest in Hastings, NE. Just bought my first multi family last summer. Fairly new to all of this myself. Let me know if I can help with anything.