Quote from: etotheipi on September 24, 2012, 03:55:54 PM

Quote from: amencon on September 24, 2012, 02:56:45 PM

I own some rental property and actually have been actively looking to acquire more very recently. Your spreadsheet looks pretty thorough (the one I made for myself was a bit less detailed so I might steal this one in the future, thanks!).

According to my own experiences for ~100k properties you will want at least $1500 in rent revenue to cash flow well. Properties around 150k should gross 2000+ at least.

For me what counts is that the property will still cash flow even after HOA, warranty and property management fees since the idea is to grab many of these to generate passive income without sucking up too much of your time. You can oversee a lot of properties that all make you money easily if they are all managed by a professional, however managing even a single property on your own can potentially suck up a lot of your time and be a big headache not to mention liability.

In my area while there may be some single family homes that would fit the above criteria they wouldn't cash flow much. The real winners are 4plex multi-family units for this (and more units if you can qualify for a commercial loan). I would strongly recommend you look at affordable 4plex properties in the area and run the numbers on them.

About 1.5 years ago I bought a 4plex for under 100k and am renting each unit out for around 600. Those types of deals have dried up quick in my area but it looks like I can get a similar property now for 130-150k ish which would still be decently profitable.

Good luck man.

One of the primary motivations behind this was that the property would be next door. This dramatically cuts down on "unknowns", since I've already lived in the same HOA for 2+ years. I know all the fees, what the construction is like, what problems are consistent across many units, how much it costs to replace appliances, etc. I recognize there is potential headache associated with property management, but I'm minimizing the amount of headache by being right there and knowing so much about it already.

Also, I know some other people who flip/rent properties, and have good contractors they use for these things. I really can't imagine needing to pay 8% for professional management of this single property. Plus, I'm part time at my real job, which gives me lots of flexibility to deal with issues. The other benefit is that I am near a lot of really high-quality work places -- it's not unlikely I can find someone at my work (5,000+ employees) to rent, which gives me a good chance of smooth sailing...

But once I got 2-3 or three properties, I think it makes sense for management.

Also, I do recognize the whole liability thing, and obviously I want to avoid it. I just wonder if there's not going to be a bigger headache dealing with intra-state corporate laws and incorporation, to avoid something that is about as likely as winning the lottery. Yes, super-nasty things have happened to landlords. But I can spend my whole life worrying about that, and then get killed by a drunk driver tomorrow. But maybe I'm underestimating the likelihood of something like that happening...

Part of the appeal for us was that I thought this could be done, not only in the same complex as we're already in, but without hiring lawyers, accountants, or doing endless paperwork for incorporating and complicating the hell out of my taxes. The more stuff we throw on top, the less interested we are in pursuing this. But, maybe it's fantasy to believe that we can pull this off (safely!) without all that mess.

Your plan makes sense to me and I doubt it will be much trouble. Opening a business acct and forming an LLC on legalzoom should be a snap if you were nervous about liability plus there are plenty of good boilerplate rental agreements and contracts you can use for your tenants.

In my opinion it is good to protect yourself as much as possible, however many people seem so paranoid of worst case scenarios they miss out on potentially good opportunities.

Hope it works out and doesn't steal too much time away from the good works your doing on Armory of course.