All Forum Posts by: Steve B.

All made good points. Depending on how much school you have left, I'd buy a multi-family in Albany, live in one unit or bedroom and rent out all the other bedrooms to other students. Returns are excellent if you pick the right tenants. 

if you need a co-signer, I would find out why by trying to get pre-approved for a FHA loan. Then do what you need to do to get credit established so you don't need a cosigner. Get a summer job, preferably in residential construction. Pay is decent and you'll learn a lot about homes. Or go ahead and get your real estate license and find a good broker to work for. Whatever you do, save as much as you can and apply it towards your 3% down for FHA.

Parents can be helpful but can often hold you back. In the end sometimes you just have to jump in and do it, and if you make a mistake consider it as part of your education. And whatever you do don't give money to fortunebuilders or any of those other guru hacks

My question is why is the landlord so desperate to sell? I see Schenectady as only going up with the casino coming, but really depends on the neighborhood. Just curious on the back story of the property, I'm still trying to figure out Schenectay myself for rental properties, and like to know why other people are leaving the market.

You need to start networking with other real estate investors in your area. Find a local REI club and introduce yourself to people and state your goals. I highly recommend doing a flip first with an experienced person, maybe you have some skills that the other person doesn't have. Start reading everything you can about flipping homes so you know what you are talking about with other investors. Believe it or not there are ways to flip a home with little cash, but usually not entirely by yourself. good luck!

I probably won't be able to make the meeting this month as I have to watch my kids and can't find a babysitter. I will definitely be at the April one though, I'll add you later when I'm on the desktop site, the BP mobile app isn't really very functional, like adding people!

Welcome to BP! I share your enthusiasm for this site, it's an awesome place. The podcasts are great, I've learned quite a bit just from listening to them. I'm just up the road from you in Schenectady and also looking to build a large rental property portfolio. Have you singled out any specific towns or neighborhoods that you want to buy in? I'm looking to buy a few multi-families first as they seem to cash flow a lot better than the single family homes do in this area. I'm looking in Schenectady or Scotia right now, but the insane property taxes there are holding me back.

Christian Cuevas Welcome to biggerpockets! I'm in Schenectady, and while I'm more of a buy and hold guy, I still want to practice some of the wholesaling techniques to buy my own properties below retail. Haven't come across any real active wholesalers in the area but I'm sure they are around. Best way to find a mentor is to offer something of value to them, like James said. Maybe you know contracting, marketing, or whatever it is that someone else may not know as much about. Highly recommend going to the local AIN meetings at the Century House in Latham. Next one is Monday night, great place to network with other local RE investors. Get the $10 buffet they offer, food is excellent.

Black River and Calcium are great towns as they are literally right outside the main gate and for the most part not run down at all. I know good homes sell there far quicker than the more outlying towns just for that reason, I'm sure rentals are the same. 

Calcium has those 2 old housing areas, but from what I hear they are not very popular because the homes were built very cheap, the management is not very good, and the rent is high. Also consider the town of Philadelphia as they have their own municipal power company instead of National Greed, makes heat dramatically cheaper for tenants, and Indian River Middle and High School is right outside town. 

Just note that your main competition in the single family market around there is the housing on base. Thousands of brand new very nice homes have been constructed over the last few years and lately there really isn't a wait list to move in. You can always call the housing office and ask. Most of your lower enlisted (majority of ft drum) prefer on-base housing because of the convenience and free utilities. With my house I targeted the higher enlisted/officers that did not want to give up their whole BAH to live on base. There is also still a huge demand for 4-5 bedroom homes if you can find one for a deal, they are not common in the area or on base. You would be surprised how many military families have 3-4 kids!

Also avoid all the big-time property managers around there and just manage it yourself. You will save yourself a lot of aggravation, trust me! I personally would't buy any property up there until the government decides what if any downsizing will occur at Ft Drum. I doubt it will be drastic but you never know, a huge cut in Soldiers will have a dramatic affect on real estate in the area just as it did when the base expanded 10 years ago. 

Michael S. Welcome to biggerpockets! What towns are you looking at buying in around ft drum? I used to live in Watertown and kept a SF rental for the past 7 years before deciding to sell it this year. The market isn't as tight as it used to be up there but I believe there are still ways to make money, particularly in the lower rent range that most multi-families would rent for.

I hoping to get some help here on filing a form 4684 on my tax return for a casualty loss to a rental property. Basically what this is if I understand it correctly is when there is a major insurance claim on a property, the IRS allows you to write off the entire expense of fixing a property after a loss in the tax year that it happened instead of depreciating it over time. I paid roughly $5,000 out of pocket after the insurance claim to complete the renovation to my rental property. Anyone ever do one of these forms, and if so how do you fill it out correctly so that it is acceptable for the IRS?

Another update. Listing went live roughly 2 weeks ago and received 2 offers! First offer fell through, the buyer wanted the house for nothing and would't budge on price. Second offer came in yesterday and we are under contract! First goal of the year complete, as long as the deal closes. 

Learned a lot in this as it is my first time selling a house. Lots of factors against me with this one. Number 1 being that Watertown - Ft Drum is a huge buyers market right now. Average DOM is 160 days! The only way to combat that was to set the price below the competition. I won't lie I wish I could have got more for the house but so does everyone else. 

Second factor is the weather. Average lows have been below zero every night with highs lucky to be in the teens. Couple nights ago was -35, no joke. Every single day!! Not to mention there is roughly 4 feet of snow on the ground up there. Brutal winter, even for Northern NY standards. However, there are always people buying houses, no matter the time of year. I paid a neighbor to keep the driveway cleared of snow at all times and kept the heat at 67 degrees. That way people can get in the house easily and will linger inside during showings since its nice and warm.

Lastly and probably most important is do your homework when selecting your listing agent. Not all real estate agents are the same, most honestly are not very good. I spent many hours looking at listings online, picking what I thought were the very best ones, with professional pictures and great descriptions. I then checked agents online presence, googled their listings, see how many websites its on. Bottom line everyone is looking at houses online, if an agent can't market themselves on the internet, don't bother working with them. I then did a phone interview with 3 agents. Not surprisingly through this process I needed up with one of the top producers in the area. Obviously I made the right decision!

For anyone interested in buying rental property in the Watertown/Ft Drum area, I would highly discourage it. Vacancies are at all time highs right now, lots of people offering free months rent, etc. The 2% vacancy days are long gone. The area is over built now with brand new apartments and town homes, with more still going up. Ft Drum is losing people as well with the Army draw down of forces, how many remains to be seen. Not to mention a zero wait list for thousands of brand new housing on base, which is some of the best houses I've seen on a military base. I made my money over the years and glad to be getting out now while I can. On to the next investment!