All Forum Posts by: Steve Kenney

Hey Hiren,

I self-manage a small portfolio of 12 units and have been using RentRedi for the past 18 months. It has worked great and only costs $100 a year. Whenever I have questions the support from RentRedi has been awesome as well.

Feel free to shoot me a DM if you have any further questions about it!

Hi Carey,

I live in Maine, so the cost of heating is always at the forefront of my mind. In your situation what I would recommend is to firstly, get an experienced heating technician to come out service the boiler. Let them know you are having higher than expected heating costs. The boiler may be malfunctioning so they can help with this. Getting the boiler serviced each year is always good to do. 

Secondly, you could have an energy audit done on your home. In Maine there are companies that specialize in this area. You may have parts of your home that aren't well insulated or are drafty, and that would certainly cause your heating bill to rise. Once the audit is done they will give you suggestions on how to make the home more efficient.

Lastly, there are some grants available to help reduce energy costs. In Maine we have several different options, so I'd recommend looking into what you have in your area and taking advantage of them.

Hey Jay!

I think it's amazing that at your age you are interested in real estate! I wish I had that insight when I was 16. 

My suggestions for getting started would be to:

1. Learn as much as you can (listen to podcasts, read books, read the forums here and ask questions)

2. Attend local real estate meetups (this will allow you to build your network and learn from other agents/investors

3. Find a mentor (find someone that is successful in what you want to do, build a relationship with them and ask them for guidance)

4. Call local real estate brokers and ask for a job (there are other things you can do for a brokerage than being a real estate agent)

Good luck and I hope that helps!

Hi James, 

This is a good question. If you are using a government-backed loan, such as an FHA, you cannot purchase a property under an LLC. The property must be in your name. If purchasing a property under an LLC you need to use a commercial loan.

If you want to purchase a multifamily using a government loan you must occupy it for at least one year before moving into another property. This is a great way to start out and will give you a taste of being an investor/landlord. I suggest getting your first property under your belt, getting it stable, getting your systems in place, then focusing on the second property. 

Once you have the first property stable you can do a cash out refinance to pull out equity and use on the next deal.

Good luck! 

Hi Anata,

I would suggest trying to pull out some of the equity from the house to use as a down payment towards other properties. Are you only focusing on single family homes right now? If so, doing a midterm rental (traveling professionals) or a short term rental (airBNB) will allow you to maximize cashflow. Typically, a long term rental on a single family won't cashflow all that much compared to a three or four unit building, for example. 

If you want to grow the number of doors you have and get the largest return on your equity, investing in a multifamily is the route I'd suggest. Obviously this comes with more work - taking care of maintenance issues and managing more tenants, but it also comes with more cashflow. If you combine the equity you have now and borrow from a bank, you could build out a nice size portfolio. 

As far as analyzing deals, when I first started I would look at every multifamily property that got listed in my area. If it was something I was interested in I would run it through my analysis spreadsheet and if the numbers met my criteria, I would setup a showing. That's how you have to do it. Just analyze deals, go look at them, and then when you find one you like put an offer in. It can be a tiresome and frustrating process but if you stick with it eventually you'll find something!

Good luck and let me know if there is anything I can do to help.

Hey Matthew,

If your friends have money and want to invest with you, one option would be to use a promissory note, where they lend you money for the down payment but the property remains in your name. You can offer them an 11% return and pay them interest only payments for 24-30 months. You can then refinance the property and pay them back. This is a great way to go because they are getting a good return on the money they lend you and you are able to scale without coming up with a large down payment. If you do a deal using this method and it's successful, then maybe you could consider doing a joint venture with them on another deal.

Good luck!

Firstly, I think it's awesome that you have five properties already! If you've bought these by yourself without the use of partners, that is amazing!

Like others have said, try not to get too fixated on the number of units someone has and how fast they've been acquired. There's usually always more to the story and it is hard to gain all those facts by listening to a one hour podcasts. A lot of those guys use partnerships or syndicate to buy deals, so if you are a solo investor you really can't compare your results to there's. 

Ask yourself why you want to grow so fast, is it an ego thing? Just make sure if you want to grow, you are doing it in a way that makes sense financially. 

I don't know your background, but buying three properties a month seems very ambitious. 

A couple ideas for you:

Pull out equity:

I think the fastest way for you to scale would be to pull out equity from one of the five properties you already have and invest that into a multifamily property. If you are buying single family homes now, you'll scale much faster if you invest in multifamilies, so that's what I would focus on.

Promissory notes:

Another option would be to borrow money from a friend/family and use that to put toward a down payment on a deal. This method typically leverages a promissory note, the person lends you money to put toward the down payment, common interest rates for this method are around 10 or 11%, you make interest only payments over 24-30 months and then pay them back in full afterwards. 

Hey Joshua,

As others have suggested a great way to begin real estate investing is to purchase a property between 2-4 units and owner occupy one unit for at least a year. If you occupy it the loan terms are much better, only needing to put 3.5% down for an FHA loan. Ideally if you could find a 4 unit in a decent area, that would be preferred. You'll be living in one of the units and collecting rent from the other three, so it would be a great way to learn the business, get some cash coming in and cover your expenses.

As far as getting started, don't overcomplicate it. I started by listening to podcasts in the car (BiggerPockets podcast and real estate rookie are great) to get some baseline knowledge. I then searched for real estate meetups in my area and found a mentor from that. I'd highly recommend finding a real estate agent in your area that is investor-focused and they can help you run numbers on deals and provide some mentorship. 

Good luck!

Investment Info:

Large multi-family (5+ units) buy & hold investment.

Purchase price: $345,000
Cash invested: $69,000

This is a six unit apartment building in downtown Lewiston. It has three two bedroom units and three three bedroom units. It's an older building that has great bones, but needs some TLC, so it's been keeping me busy. Once I have it fully stabilized it will be a great cashflowing asset.

Hey Bethany I may be out of town that week, but if not I’ll be there. Thanks for putting this together!