BiscottiGelato

Just saying even at 200k annually, not possible to have multiple RE asset lying around collecting dust... or I meant, rent...

I don't make 200k annually tho. So i'm poorer than the poor.

BiscottiGelato

How much is your tiny rental? Which area? How big?
librazhy 發表於 2012-11-16 13:01

Currently looking for rental.

BiscottiGelato

A customer was in town from Houston. A few of us, including a sales guy who moved from Vancouver to Houston, and a FAE also from Houston went out to dinner to court him of course. So we were talking about Real Estate and how cheap it is in Houston.

A very new place, single house. Smallish just over 2000 sq.ft. Looking at under 200k USD. Once you put down minimum amount of down payment (20% to not incurr insurance in that part of the states) for mortgage. I'm told you hit the ground with positive cashflow immediately. Anyone who buys in Vancouver to generate rental income is a fool.... Just what I'm told.~

BiscottiGelato

都係㗎，美國好多地方真係超超超平。

我都有朋友嘅父母前幾年喺Miami買咗啲望海vacation apartment ...
大C姐 發表於 2012-11-26 22:07

Hmm.. the difference is that Miami RE is cheap cuz economy isn't so great there.

Houston is flooded with oil money. People definitely have much higher average income than say, Vancouver. Yet RE prices are low, but rental rate can be high.

BiscottiGelato

But buy in to Vancouver at this price level for rental income.... and still expect capital appreciation? What kind of investment time horizon are we talking about?

While one worries about appreciation for Houston even tho rental income is almost guaranteed and overall affordability and average pay cheque for both renters and buyers are much more reasonable?

The only reason why Houston is 'cheap' but prices still don't appreciate is because it is not cheap. The only place that has skewed valuation are places where Asian touches, until the bubble bursts and it starts all over again. Which means it's not call 'investments' into property, it's called riding the bubble until you are rich, or see yourself living underneath a bridge.....

香港人第一桶金都係喺賣樓賺返嚟... There's a saying called "past performance is not an indicator of future performance". I am not preaching that Houston is a great investment opportunity. There are much better ones in the states. Houston barely suffered a housing downturn due to strong oil and gas sector, along with tech and aerospace. I am just saying comparatively, preaching Vancouver as a good place for RE investment to generate rental income is pure insanity....

BiscottiGelato

I know some not very close co-workers, just one or 2, at work doing these stuff. They do one whole building of apartment at a time. A dozen floors or so? Basically that's their main job. The 100ish K salary is just supplemental income, and obviously they don't even care about promotion or whatever. They just do minimum to not get fired. 9-5 on the dot. I think I heard they are doing Phoenix. Mostly started around 2008/9 or something. Difference is I think they have friend in Phoenix that can monitor this full time, but just need investment influx which is much better in Vancouver than Phoenix. So the Vancouver side manages finding investment and doing the accounting and all that.

Don't quote me on this tho, just 3rd hand information here.

But I do agree that trust, effort and competence needs to be high on these type of project. But at least it seems that the returns justify it some what.~

BiscottiGelato

Interesting. Was Wiki'ing Phoenix. and there's a paragraph that says
"Despite the housing collapse, Phoenix is seeing an improvement in its rental housing. “Commercial-property owners are counting on apartment buildings to lead the Phoenix area's real-estate market toward recovery, based on a recent rebound for units rented and buildings sold.”[51]"

Anyways, the world is so big. And even just NA has so many stable investment and RE markets. Just limiting one self to 'invest' in the currently highly risky Vancouver RE market is definitely narrow vision. I'd even argue that sitting on cash might be a better bet than plunging into the RE market at this height.

All depends on investment horizon of course.