All Forum Posts by: Saad D.

Hi @Simon W.Thanks for replying. At Baselane, we're going to build the custom chart of accounts and Balance sheet.

Just for my own understanding, I'd like some clarification on your statements.

1. I don't really understand what you said about edit charts of accounts. If most investors, and by most I mean 95% are not accountants, then why do they need to edit chart of accounts? I'm genuinely asking to understand the use case for my self for an individual investor.

Re. balance, as someone who is a former CPA and has prepared financial statements for multi-billion $ funds, I understand the important of a balance sheet. Based on the user research we've seen most use cash flow as a proxy for performance. Many, if not most, want to have this data, but a very high % don't calculate monthly performance. They usually tally it up at the end of the year. Has that been your experience with RE investors?

My question back to you about Balance sheet is what % of RE investors that are not accountants understand what a balance sheet is and how do they actually use it? (Do they know how to use it)? Would love some actual reference to data if you have it (not anecdotal). 

Thanks

@Simon W.Great questions. 

Baselane offers cash flow at the unit, proper or portfolio level. Yes, you can consolidate it into 1 report.

Balance sheet- this will be built next year. It's not as highly requested as one may think for multiple reasons (we're building based on feature demand). 

Edit chart of accounts - not at the moment. We offer over 120 categories that are real estate related and periodically add more based on customer requests. 

How do you use edit chart of accounts feature and for what use case?

Yea. I can see why that's simple @Gregory Schwartz. I think most people default to this. Only issue is you have minimal insight on monthly performance unless you download the bank statement and then build custom charts in excel or google sheets. 

That's why Baselane has 120 real estate only categories so you don't have to code any classes or anything like that. You don't have to be an accountant to do bookkeeping - just click or auto categorize based on the rules you set up.

@Rene Hosman Yes. Two things:
1. Baselane uses Plaid to connect your existing bank and credit card accounts and you can import up to 2 years worth of data (depending on the age and type of account). 
To connect an external account and auto-import the data follow instructions here:
https://support.baselane.com/hc/en-us/articles/2548356963957...

Note: Baselane is working on providing CSV upload option and it should be launching in about 1 week. =). Great timing!

2. I think you can start now. Once you import the data, you can bulk edit and categorize transactions (e.g. if you have the same mortgage payment every month, you can search for the merchant name for all the mortgage payments, and bulk categorize all those transactions in a few clicks).

https://support.baselane.com/hc/en-us/articles/2548350790581...

I feel very strongly about this topic. To be transparent, I work at Baselane. In fact I joined the company to help build a product that can help everyday investors organize rental finances like the pros do. 

I have been use Baselane for the last three years and I like being able to login and at any moment get a very clear picture of my rental earnings for the month. 

Curious to learn from others. 

Hi all, Baselane is hosting a CEO fireside chat titled 'The Inflation Equation: Impact on Real Estate and How to Navigate it'

If you're attending BPCON24 in Cancun, join us on Monday 1:15pm EST. 

If you can't make it to BPCON24, we will livestream the conversation. 

Click here to RSVP!

Thanks!

Saad

Thanks for the reply. 

@Scott Trench what platform is that in the screenshot where you track rent yield?

I'm definitely looking to get into bigger deal sizes if the Cash on Cash and rent yield makes sense. The last two deals I did were in the $350-450k range which is more worth it in my opinion. 

Like others mentioned sub $150-180k doesn't seem worth it, especially in blue states. 

Thanks. I just started using Turno - haven't hired anyone yet. Let's see how it goes. 

We started using TTL Locks for room rentals and entrance doors. 

Hi All,

I was wondering are you still using the 1% rule when doing quick and dirty new deal analysis? Is anyone out there still able to achieve the 1% rule and in which markets?

Recently I noticed I get to 0.7 or 0.8% at best (i.e. 100k purchase price, $700-800 rent per month). 

Excited to learn from you all!

@Alyssa Wrightthanks for sharing. That's helpful. Does that mean you're doing fully self serve showings? What city or cities do you do that in? 

Once your unit is rented, where do you end up spending most of your time as an investor/owner?