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Okay, originally it was Charlotte or Indy. Well, I went to see Charlotte. Hated it. So I'm sticking with the Midwest. But I'm expanding my search a bit. I have yet to see Cinci or Pittsburgh but will be doing so this week.
Which of these would be the best to get into rental property? Looking for any and all input on any of these places (from a purely economic standpoint).
My understanding is Columbus, then Indy, with the other two (Cinci / Pittsburgh) trailing behind a bit.
Indianapolis is not a good place to make money in multi-family RE. There is way too much supply and it keeps growing. Rents are low with little growth potential, vacancies are typcially in 8% range. My guess is Pittsburgh or Columbus is the best of the four listed.
Cincinnati has lots of culture, its very beautiful with all those hills and parks in the city, the downtown is probably the most active and vibrant out of the cities second to Pittsburgh. Cincinnati has put lots of money into its downtown and is currently building a streetcar system, also a casino has opened downtown, parks are being opened filled with kids and adults, everyone is eager to live downtown now, waiting lists for every condo and not to mention over the Rhine which has became a young liberal progressive area full of hipsters. The downtown is getting so vibrant and full of people that there considering adding a second grocery store in the heart of downtown! Cincinnati does have a bad traffic problem worst than any city on here, drive at 3pm on a weekday on maybe the 1-71 or 1-75 and I guarantee you you will have stop and go traffic. Also rent properties are extremely low because there are so many people wanting to move here now that its a little hard to find a place to rent.
If you hated Charlotte I don't see you particularly liking Columbus or Indy all that much (both are really nothing special). Columbus and Indy are similar in a lot of ways. Both are more suburban feeling than Cinci and Pittsburgh which look and feel more urban. However, like someone mentioned Columbus is more progressive and growing and the job market is decent. It wouldn't be hard finding a rental in either Columbus or Indy. I'm personally more familiar with Columbus. It really is an underrated city that deserves more props than it gets. The only thing I don't like about Columbus is that everything and I mean EVERYTHING revolves around Ohio State University which gets a little annoying after a while. Also there's no pro sports teams but they're a short drive away if you have an itching to go to a game. There are some great neighborhoods as well like Short North, Clintonville, Bexley (a city surrounded by Columbus), and downtown is nice too. The suburbs are anywhere USA and nothing special at all. The shopping kind of sucks though there are only two good malls worth going to. Other than that Columbus is 100% Midwest and just ehhh ok.
Cincinnati has lots of culture, its very beautiful with all those hills and parks in the city, the downtown is probably the most active and vibrant out of the cities second to Pittsburgh. Cincinnati has put lots of money into its downtown and is currently building a streetcar system, also a casino has opened downtown, parks are being opened filled with kids and adults, everyone is eager to live downtown now, waiting lists for every condo and not to mention over the Rhine which has became a young liberal progressive area full of hipsters. The downtown is getting so vibrant and full of people that there considering adding a second grocery store in the heart of downtown! Cincinnati does have a bad traffic problem worst than any city on here, drive at 3pm on a weekday on maybe the 1-71 or 1-75 and I guarantee you you will have stop and go traffic. Also rent properties are extremely low because there are so many people wanting to move here now that its a little hard to find a place to rent.
Are you trying to say increasing? Low rent would mean no one is taking the bait.
Quote:
Indianapolis is not a good place to make money in multi-family RE. There is way too much supply and it keeps growing. Rents are low with little growth potential, vacancies are typcially in 8% range. My guess is Pittsburgh or Columbus is the best of the four listed.
Indianapolis doesn't have a surplus of MFDU. It has a surplus of SFDU. NOT the same. YoY price increase for rental prices in Indy Metro 2011-2012 was 11% (Source: Trulia) which would make it 5th highest nationally in YoY increase. Rental prices in Cincy and PBG will naturally be higher due to the land constraints they posses in which case, PBG average rent price 12 month period is approx. $1200 average (All rooms). Cincy is just a tick over $930 average (All rooms). Columbus and Indy have more land to begin with which automatically drops the rent prices so $795 for CBus and $792 for Indy (both All rooms) rent average.
If the op has never done this, there's more to it than just buying up a property, fixing it up and throwing an ad on craigslist. Buying in an established neighborhood or one that has already gone through gentrification will yield lower results unless op put some major renovations (bells and whistles) to warrant the nice uptick over other properties in the area. Doesn't matter what city its in. Op, you have to study each city, find out where the potential neighborhoods are that will offer greatest return whether it be at the earliest stages of gentrification or even a newer neighborhood that just came out of foreclosure and the bank can't unload without dropping the price drastically. Just depends on what you are looking for. A foreclosure that sells for 65k, 3 bedrooms, 2 bath, 1700 sq ft or so home would be around $1300 rent in Indianapolis depending on the township and/or county. Lets say you took out a loan for the 65k, minus landlord insurance (about 650-1200 a year depending on insurance company) with current rates you could clear between 6-700 profit a month from that one property.
Same token, you can find a dog of a house and the bank will literally take anything you throw at them. Had a property once where the bank off the record basically said what ever price you want you can have it. I didn't because it was a severely jacked up property.
Are you trying to say increasing? Low rent would mean no one is taking the bait.
Indianapolis doesn't have a surplus of MFDU. It has a surplus of SFDU. NOT the same. YoY price increase for rental prices in Indy Metro 2011-2012 was 11% (Source: Trulia) which would make it 5th highest nationally in YoY increase. Rental prices in Cincy and PBG will naturally be higher due to the land constraints they posses in which case, PBG average rent price 12 month period is approx. $1200 average (All rooms). Cincy is just a tick over $930 average (All rooms). Columbus and Indy have more land to begin with which automatically drops the rent prices so $795 for CBus and $792 for Indy (both All rooms) rent average.
If the op has never done this, there's more to it than just buying up a property, fixing it up and throwing an ad on craigslist. Buying in an established neighborhood or one that has already gone through gentrification will yield lower results unless op put some major renovations (bells and whistles) to warrant the nice uptick over other properties in the area. Doesn't matter what city its in. Op, you have to study each city, find out where the potential neighborhoods are that will offer greatest return whether it be at the earliest stages of gentrification or even a newer neighborhood that just came out of foreclosure and the bank can't unload without dropping the price drastically. Just depends on what you are looking for. A foreclosure that sells for 65k, 3 bedrooms, 2 bath, 1700 sq ft or so home would be around $1300 rent in Indianapolis depending on the township and/or county. Lets say you took out a loan for the 65k, minus landlord insurance (about 650-1200 a year depending on insurance company) with current rates you could clear between 6-700 profit a month from that one property.
Same token, you can find a dog of a house and the bank will literally take anything you throw at them. Had a property once where the bank off the record basically said what ever price you want you can have it. I didn't because it was a severely jacked up property.
I mean to say rent properties are extremely high in terms of how many people want them.
If you hated Charlotte I don't see you particularly liking Columbus or Indy all that much (both are really nothing special).
It's subjective, but there was something about Charlotte that I just did not like. And there is something about Indy I do like.
Quote:
Originally Posted by msamhunter
Are you trying to say increasing? Low rent would mean no one is taking the bait.
Indianapolis doesn't have a surplus of MFDU. It has a surplus of SFDU. NOT the same. YoY price increase for rental prices in Indy Metro 2011-2012 was 11% (Source: Trulia) which would make it 5th highest nationally in YoY increase. Rental prices in Cincy and PBG will naturally be higher due to the land constraints they posses in which case, PBG average rent price 12 month period is approx. $1200 average (All rooms). Cincy is just a tick over $930 average (All rooms). Columbus and Indy have more land to begin with which automatically drops the rent prices so $795 for CBus and $792 for Indy (both All rooms) rent average.
But do the prices of houses roughly correspond with these rents?
From what I've seen, there's really not much of a price gap between these cities as far as house prices. Although some of them seem to have newer stock available at a roughly equal price, which presumably would be a better deal.
Quote:
Originally Posted by msamhunter
If the op has never done this, there's more to it than just buying up a property, fixing it up and throwing an ad on craigslist. Buying in an established neighborhood or one that has already gone through gentrification will yield lower results unless op put some major renovations (bells and whistles) to warrant the nice uptick over other properties in the area. Doesn't matter what city its in. Op, you have to study each city, find out where the potential neighborhoods are that will offer greatest return whether it be at the earliest stages of gentrification or even a newer neighborhood that just came out of foreclosure and the bank can't unload without dropping the price drastically. Just depends on what you are looking for.
Well just to put this out there, I'm not shooting for appreciation here. First and foremost, I'm shooting for a long term investment in a stable area. Profit is great of course, but what I'm saying is that I'd sacrifice a bit of cash flow for less long term risk right now. And I'm trying to start cheap.
My question was more general though, I have looked into some neighborhoods however before doing more research I'd like to settle on a city at least. My research now is focused on gathering general information on which of these cities would suit me best politically (being landlord friendly, low tax, etc) and economically (stability / diversity of local economy).
One thing I don't like about Charlotte is its dependence on the financial sector. One thing I like about Columbus is OSU. Colleges tend to bring a ton of money in and be very stable. You don't see a lot of universities going belly up. Indy doesn't have that, but seems to have a fairly diversified economy. PBG and Cincy, I have yet to do any thorough research, but I don't know what they have going for them economically, besides one anecdote I read about tech companies popping up in PBG.
Quote:
Originally Posted by msamhunter
A foreclosure that sells for 65k, 3 bedrooms, 2 bath, 1700 sq ft or so home would be around $1300 rent in Indianapolis depending on the township and/or county. Lets say you took out a loan for the 65k, minus landlord insurance (about 650-1200 a year depending on insurance company) with current rates you could clear between 6-700 profit a month from that one property.
Well wow, that is not bad at all. 1300 seems very high though based on the figures I've seen?
It's subjective, but there was something about Charlotte that I just did not like. And there is something about Indy I do like.
But do the prices of houses roughly correspond with these rents?
From what I've seen, there's really not much of a price gap between these cities as far as house prices. Although some of them seem to have newer stock available at a roughly equal price, which presumably would be a better deal.
Well just to put this out there, I'm not shooting for appreciation here. First and foremost, I'm shooting for a long term investment in a stable area. Profit is great of course, but what I'm saying is that I'd sacrifice a bit of cash flow for less long term risk right now. And I'm trying to start cheap.
My question was more general though, I have looked into some neighborhoods however before doing more research I'd like to settle on a city at least. My research now is focused on gathering general information on which of these cities would suit me best politically (being landlord friendly, low tax, etc) and economically (stability / diversity of local economy).
One thing I don't like about Charlotte is its dependence on the financial sector. One thing I like about Columbus is OSU. Colleges tend to bring a ton of money in and be very stable. You don't see a lot of universities going belly up. Indy doesn't have that, but seems to have a fairly diversified economy. PBG and Cincy, I have yet to do any thorough research, but I don't know what they have going for them economically, besides one anecdote I read about tech companies popping up in PBG.
Well wow, that is not bad at all. 1300 seems very high though based on the figures I've seen?
Thank you very much for your input.
Buying a home, outside of chicago, midwest prices are in the same price range. You always want the best roi. Something breaks in that house you fix it so you want your rental price to reflect that and some home repairs are not cheap like a new water heater or foundation issues that can arise.
1300 is reasonable for renting a house. It of course depends on sq footage, etc. My neighbor rented hers as she is in the military and deployed elsewhere and was just over 1300 for 2200 sq ft.
Taxes are another issue. Indiana is 1% bound by state constitution. Ohio and pa may be different. What you don't get though is homestead as this sounds like this would be a separate property. You would need homeowners insurance and if you take a mortgage to do it, you will also need landlord insurance which is more expensive than homeowners. If you pay out of pocket, do what you want. One good place to start is a site like zillow, plug in an area and see what you can get. Their prices aren't exact but it's pretty good as you will see what other properties sold for in the area.
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