The busy season in leasing, move ins and move outs is nearly at our door step.  Like most management companies and real estate investors, we have a majority of our lease expirations stacked in the spring to summer months.  The reason for this is quite simple, in our region this is the season people think about moving.  The reasons your resident might want to move can be one of many.  Either they are wanting to purchase a home, consolidate households (people moving from a 1 bedroom to sharing a 2 bedroom apartment with someone else), deconsolidate households (think of three roommates wanting to get their own studio or one bedroom), poor living conditions or poor maintenance performance from their housing provider.
Most reasons your residents choose to move out are controllable.  That's why it's best to have a comprehensive retention strategy in place to keep your residents longer.  By the way, a move out costs a property owner on average $2500 per unit, between vacancy loss, make ready costs, and leasing fees!
For information on our retention strategy, visit our blog post here.
But some move outs are just unavoidable.  The typical property owner will post their apartment home as available 30-60 days prior to the current residents move out date.  And then perform their make ready of the unit after the current resident moves out.  This type of make ready work can consist of cleaning, painting, and other minor repairs which can cost most property owners from as little as two weeks to one month of vacancy loss.  If you multiply this over several units, the costs from vacancy loss alone can be staggering.  For instance, if you apply this scenario to our portfolio of 102 units, assume we have a 50% turn over per year or 51 units, with an average market rent of $800 per month.  If we incur 2 weeks to 1 month of vacancy loss, this can translate to a yearly vacancy and collection loss of $20k to $40k per year!  That's essentially someone's salary!  Having a vacancy management strategy in place is mission critical to the sustainability of your business!  Here are some tactical stuff that we use to manage minimal vacancy loss as a management company:

1. Post upcoming available apartments at least 60 days in advance.  We require current residents to give us at least 60 days notice of their intent to vacate.  Some residents will require more cajoling than others.  Be on top of it!  Most of your best resident prospects look far in advance of their date of housing need.  Your best resident prospects will probably not be looking one week before their move in date!  So be proactive to capture your best applicants!
2. Perform comprehensive maintenance inspections at least 45 days prior to a residents lease expiration.  These maintenance inspection consist of checking all plumbing, electrical, and HVAC systems, assessing cleanliness of the apartment, and assessing any cosmetic repairs that are going to be needed when the resident moves out.  Our maintenance and construction lead, Brandon Stonegraber manages this inspection process and will coordinate with the existing resident to get a jump on labor intensive repairs and preventative maintenance so that the apartment will be able to be made ready much quicker.  This procedure has saved us tens of thousands of dollars in vacancy loss alone, not to mention tens of thousands of dollars on services that would normally be contracted out to perform in a timely manner.  This way we can keep more services in house and reduce our make ready expenses.  This also gives us a jump on scheduling in advance with our vendors for make ready tasks that cannot be handled in house.  The best vendor partners you rely on (cleaners, painters, etc.) are usually booked out and very busy, allowing you to get on their schedule before others.
3. In your lease, make sure that you stipulate your tenant must turn in their keys and possession of the apartment home by 12:00 noon on the last day of their lease.  This is why hotels and AirBNB operators have strict check out times.  Furthermore, make sure that your incoming residents lease starts on noon the first day of their lease.  This allows 24 hours for your team and vendors to perform all of the remaining make ready tasks that need to happen in time for your incoming resident.
4. Communicate with your existing resident exactly what the expectations are for their move out in writing shortly before their departure.  These expectations can include cleaning standards, move out time, return of keys, and parking passes, etc.  Just because it may be in their lease does not mean they will refer back to it.  Face it, they are moving and have a lot more on their mind than what your expectations are as a housing provider.

In addition to helping reduce vacancy loss, these tactics will be helpful to having a more pleasant move in experience for your incoming tenant.  Remember, if your new residents have a bad move in experience, they will hold it against you, and you can take the likelihood of them renewing their lease next year and kiss it good bye!  We hope that these tips help you in making your rental business more profitable and your residents much happier!

Taxes are one of the largest single expenses that Americans face on a yearly basis. The IRS wrote a rule book intended for you to take advantage of their rules in order to reduce your taxes.

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a video (on social media) about how one of our investment partners earned tax free (more accurately tax deferred) cash flow on a deal they partnered with us on. Not only that, but they grew their net worth without growing their tax liability. Not only that, but their investment also earned paper losses which sheltered income from their job, helping them save $5,000 on their Federal income tax bill alone!
How is this possible? Watch my really cool fast paced video explanation above! Or you can read it here:
We typically purchase properties with an 8.5% percent rate of return before annual debt service (ADS); this is also known as an 8.5% cap rate (capitalization rate).  So on a million dollar multifamily property, it would throw off $85,000 in net operating income (NOI); we would have a 27.5 year depreciation schedule on that property or $36,000 in annual depreciation expense.  Now depreciation is a "paper" expense, not an actual one.  The IRS allows you to use it to offset current income.  Since we typically don't have $1,000,000 laying around, we rely on our banking relationships to help us buy the property.  Banks will lend you up to 70% to 80% of a property's appraised value.  So lets assume we secure a loan that is 80% loan to value (LTV) on a 20 year amortization at 4.5% interest.  The annual debt service on this loan would be $60,734, giving us a before tax cash flow (BTCF) of $24,266 or a cash on cash rate of return of 12% (Before Tax Cash Flow Divided by Down Payment.)  Unfortunately the IRS does not allow for deduction of principal pay down.  For simplicity sake let's just assume that the interest portion of the ADS is $35k.  So if we take our $85,000 NOI and subtract the $35,000 interest payment, we would have a taxable profit of $50,000.  If we didn't have depreciation as a tool provided to us by the IRS, our annual tax on that profit would be $15,000, assuming you have a blended tax rate of 30%.  But because WE DO have depreciation as a tool, we would subtract the $36,000 depreciation expense from that profit, effectively reducing the taxable income to $14,000, which reduces our tax to $4,200 on that investment income; a $10,000 annual tax saving!

Why is reducing your taxes important?

Yes, sure it's cool to have more money in your pocket to buy stupid things you don't need, but the real power is in the time value of money. If you save on taxes now and reinvest those savings over time, it has an INCREDIBLE power to grow your wealth exponentially!  Now the $10k tax savings illustrated in this video doesn't seem to be a lot of money, but consider it's reinvestment potential over time.  If you save $10k a year in taxes, reinvest that sum with a 15% annual rate of return (which is generally what we earn on our deals), over a 30 year period, you would wind up with over $7 million dollars!  Plus the more property that you buy, improve and leverage over time the more depreciation and paper losses you generate which can help you shelter income tax liability on your earned (W-2 or 1099) income.

Since we buy and develop value add commercial investment property, we generate paper losses which also helps all of us shelter earned income from our jobs too. See we typically purchase underperforming, under improved property which we fix up and do capital improvements on. Thanks to bonus depreciation, we can accelerate the depreciation on these capital improvements faster than the 27.5 - 29 year the IRS allows us normally.
You need a tax strategy. That's what your accountant is for, talk to them!

This subject might be a little off topic from the usual real estate subject matter, however, I thought it important to share my own personal development in the wake of loss.
February 26th, would have been my Dad's 69th birthday.  For those of you who don't know, my Dad Mike Drouin died unexpectedly from a heart attack in August of 2012.  He was a hero and leader to our family and community.  Unfortunately, Dad isn't the only death that has happened to a close family member.  My Mom, Debra Drouin passed away from an extended battle with cancer in 2003.  My grandfather, Roger Drouin (pictured here on the right) got hit and killed by a narcoleptic man driving a work van while walking in his own neighborhood.
Death has taught me some very invaluable life lessons:
1.)  Live with no regrets.  Your dreams cannot wait for a convenient time.  You need to start working towards them TODAY AND EVERYDAY.  You need to live with a sense of urgency.  When my mother knew she didn't have long to live, she decided to live out her lifelong desire to travel Europe.  And she did so with my grandmother Ruth.  She was incredibly weak and had to use a cane to get around.  It was a struggle for her.  For those of you who have traveled to Europe, it's not exactly a friendly place for people with mobility issues.  If it wasn't for her sense of urgency, she might have never gone.  You shouldn't have to wait until your twilight to do what you actually DESIRE to do.
2.)  Never go to bed angry at someone.  You are bound to get into arguments and squabbles with people you love.  If you walk away from someone, imagine if they died or you died.  Did you have the opportunity to reconcile with them, or apologize, or tell them you loved them?  At my fathers funeral, someone close to him was there who was terribly sad, sobbing uncontrollably.  I knew why.  The last time they saw each other was on very bad terms.  They had an argument about something incredibly stupid and  left each other in bitter anger.  So remember, when you say goodbye to anyone, make sure you do it graciously.  Tell them you love them because you might never get a chance to do so again.
I hope this insight finds you well when dealing with loss of a loved one!

As real estate professionals, we have been getting asked this question A LOT lately, by home owners and real estate investors alike.  You've probably heard that historically low interest rates and low inventory have been driving the real estate market higher, not just in Rochester NY, but across the entire country!  So this begs the question, "when will we hit the top of the market?"
Well.. in short... not any time soon.  Here's why:

"NO INVENTORY!"

The law of supply and demand apply to all markets and their subsequent pricing.  Demand has remained strong in Monroe county, not due to an incredible influx of population or a booming local economy but due to creation of new house holds.  It's essentially "butts moving seats."  Millennials move out of roommate situations and purchase their own homes to get their own space.  When that demographic group purchases a home, the family that is selling their home to the first time buyer usually buys another home, which creates demand up the entire real estate food chain.  Typically what alleviates this market inefficiency in most markets is supply will be stimulated through rising prices.  This is true to most markets, but real estate has an incredibly long lead-lag time.  The risk associated with developing new housing, the meteoric rise in the cost in materials, restrictive local zoning laws (which also artificially stem new housing development) have rendered the construction of new housing extremely cost prohibitive.  And even with the rise in pricing of existing single family housing we've seen recently, home prices are still trading at a considerable discount to replacement cost.
Incidentally, supply of existing single family homes is actually down quite considerably from last year.  In January 2020, there were 950 homes put up for sale in Monroe County.  In January 2021, 622 homes!  Supply down almost 35% according to data from InfoSparks, a real estate data platform that aggregates housing market data.

Housing Is Still Very Affordable

Because of the lack of supply, you can see how market pricing has been affected in the chart below.  The median price has increased from $155k to $173k, an 11.6% increase in just one year.  The main reason we believe that prices will continue to increase is, even at these elevated prices, housing is still remarkably affordable in our market when you compare it to national housing affordability metrics.

The Factor Of Area Median Income

According to Census.gov, the 2019 Monroe County Area Median Income (AMI) is $60,075 per household.  Even with median home values at $173k, housing is still a bargain!  On average American households spend between 30%-40% of their income on their housing costs.  Keeping no more than 30% of income allocated to housing costs will ensure a home buyer doesn't become "house poor" or housing cost burdened.  30% of AMI is about $1500 a month in Principal Interest and Real Estate Taxes before a household would start to become financially burdened.  If the average Monroe County resident bought a $173k house, put 5% down and locked in at today's 30 year interest rate of 2.962%, their monthly mortgage payment would be $688 month.  At an average tax rate of $36.25 per $1000, the real estate taxes would be $522 a month (this could vary by town, but we used the average for demonstration purposes).  Total monthly payment?  $1201 a month or 24% of AMI.  In order for monthly housing costs to be in line with 30% of AMI, or $1501 per month, housing in Monroe county would need to appreciate 24% to be in line with what average financially conservative Americans spend on housing!

Rising Interest Environment Not Likely

Obviously, rising interest rates could have a hand in tempering a rise in housing prices, but with the Federal Reserve Bank's (The Fed) continuing quantitative easing (QE), a rising interest rate environment does not seem to be likely any time soon.  Keeping unemployment low is one mandate of the Fed but it's not the only mandate.  So, what about inflation leading to rising interest rates?  Significant inflation does not seem to be on the horizon either.  With the world reeling from the affects of COVID-19, global financial markets have kept their flight to safety in buying bonds denominated in the worlds reserve currency, the US dollar.  Furthermore, our friends in China help keep interest rates and inflation low by maintaining themselves as a huge buyer of our debt too.

The Bottom Line

If you are considering buying a home or investment property, don't wait on the sidelines trying to time the market, because you may end up paying more for it later.
A special word of caution for real estate investors.  Do not buy on speculation of future appreciation.  Only buy based upon good current fundamentals: a good location and cash flow based upon REAL NUMBERS, projection of actual rents based upon market rents of comparable product and factoring in adequate expenses for vacancy, collection loss, property management fees, realistic repairs and maintenance, and capital expenditures.  I have been seeing a lot of irrational exuberance among real estate investors not using realistic financial projections.  So be patient, but strike quickly when opportunity knocks!

BRRRR!  BRRRR?  Yes it's cold outside, but BRRRR is a widely used strategy used in the world of investment real estate.  It stands for Buy, Rehab, Rent, Refinance, Repeat!  It is a strategy that allows developers to grow their portfolios exponentially over time and recycle the same investment capital over and over again.  This is how you can build a real estate empire essentially without access to cash being a bottleneck to your growth.
OK, now story time:
About 3 years ago, I got contacted by a real estate broker about a commercial property he was going to be listing in an area where we own property. When I asked him the price, my jaw dropped. The price was $1 million dollars! All those zeroes and commas! I have to tell you I ,was intimidated. We knew the property was worth a million but I offered $947,000 because, well, we were more used to 6 figures.

The seller immediately countered at $1,000,000. So I contacted my lender and asked if they could do 80% LTV and a 25 year amortization to make the numbers work better. (We had a required on cash on cash rate of return of 11%, and the only way to conservatively get there was by having the lender do a policy exception. They usually only do 75% LTV, 20 year amort or 80% ltv, 25 year amort.) Due to our relationship, they said "yes" and made a policy exception.

So I was going to need $200k for down payment, and $100k for closing costs, operating capital and some capital for some property improvements.  $300k, which I didn't have...  After getting the property under contract, I quickly got to performing due diligence and putting together my pitch deck to start raising the capital, another thing I never did before.  I was used to presenting opportunities to lenders so I took the same approach to presenting to potential equity investors.  Believe me, I was sweating.  Especially after I put $50k in earnest money down.

Yada yada yada, so last week, we just closed the cash out refinance and I took home a darling check for $310,000, which was pretty cool to see in my bank account for 2 seconds before I wrote a check for $300k to pay my investors back!  Now that I have your attention, if you want to review the very long winded manner in which we pulled this off, continue to read below.  If you are happy with the yada yada yada version, you can stop here, mask up and give me a virtual (covid friendly) high five!

Raising the $300k was a lot easier than I anticipated.  Why? 

1.)  The asset was in a great location.
2.)  The projected numbers were very conservative; income conservatively low, expenses conservatively high; so the investors knew that I wasn't B.S.ing them with pie in the sky financial projections.
3.)  The asset was 100% occupied and had history of strong occupancy.

The business plan was simple: raise rents to market value as leases expired (they were drastically under market based upon our market survey and the fact that it seemed to always be at 100% historical occupancy), and normalize expenses.  The expenses were abnormally high.  Utilities were God awful high and the management company had a maintenance employee stationed there for half the day, every day.  AND they were paying for their snow removal company to salt and shovel the sidewalks to the tune of $10k a year.  These were just a few items of financial waste discovered.

During our due diligence:

1.)  We found that 20 hours a week was not necessary for a maintenance employee on a 20,000 square foot building.  The management company swore that he was needed there... and the tenants loved him... and he would be sorely missed if he wasn't there everyday.  Through right sizing and only having maintenance there on an as needed basis and for proactive trips, we were able to save $20k per year!

2.)  In analyzing the utility bills with my energy consultant (shoutout to Enlightened Energy!), we found that the electric usage was just as high during the winter as it was during the summer.  This didn't make sense.  It was normal to be high during the summer with the usage of air conditioning with the expectation that the usage would taper off in the winter.  The building was heated by steam during the winter.  When we dug into it further, we found that the air handlers for the A/C units were not shut down at the end of each cooling season.  Tenants had thermostats in their office suites that they had set at 68 degrees.  The building wide thermostat for the steam heat was set at 70 degrees!  So imagine that, the A/C and the building steam were fighting with each other the whole winter!  Furthermore, we found out that the management company maintenance person had the pressure for the boiler dialed up so high that the whole steam system was packed with a head of steam (at all times!), so that the individual tenants had on demand steam.  By the way, this is not way steam heat systems work.  This was not only wasteful from an energy perspective, but it was also putting undue stress on the newer $50k boiler that was installed by the previous owner!  Through a small investment in an energy consultant and having them integrate real time energy management, we were able to save about 30%, or $10k per year.

3.)  I put the snow removal out to bid and we found a company to do it all inclusive, unlimited trips, and snow shoveling for $5k per year.  $5k in savings.

4.)  By increasing rents up to market as leases expired, we were able to push the annual revenue to $225k from $198k.

After executing this plan we were able to squeeze an additional $60k per year in NOI (Net Operating Income)! In order to capitalize on the low interest rates and positive lending environment, we jumped on getting the asset refinanced. The property reappraised at $1.4 million so we were able to refinance and pay our investors back. Now we have an appreciating asset that cashflows over $40k per year!  Now we're looking for our next $1,000,000 BRRRR deal in Rochester, NY so if you know anyone who owns commercial property in a great location please think of us!  Or if you'd like to invest with us, get on our distribution list here to learn about our next opportunity!

Successful investors correctly and consistently find the upside in investment opportunities  and that's what makes them successful, right?  We always hear about how the savviest investors like Warren Buffett got into the right opportunity at the right time, and that's why he's a billionaire.  You usually see the highlight reel, because that's what's sexy.  What you never really hear about are the investments that he didn't make.  Because that's not important, right?
Wrong.  Contrary to popular belief, the ability to understand risk is the single most important ability in investing and building wealth.  Billionaire investor Warren Buffet, coined the following rules of investing:

It is far more important to understand the downside of an investment over the upside.  For instance, consider Investment A that has a potential upside of 300%.  And another Investment B that has an upside of 10%.  You might be drawn to the A because of the upside.  But what if I told you that A had a downside of 1000%, meaning you could lose more than your original investment and B had a downside of 5%.  Every investment involves risk.  You cannot make money without taking risk, so it is imperative for you to understand the risks involved with any financial investment decision before making one.

In other words, if you needed cash today you wouldn't be able to convert a real estate investment into cash very quickly at all, at least not for what the property is worth.  It takes several months to sell a property and convert it to cash.  This is one of the principal reasons why financial advisors shy their clients away from holding real estate assets.  At the very most if you ask you advisor about owning some investment real estate, they will sell you shares in a real estate investment trust (REIT).  That way, if you need cash today, you can sell those shares today.  Yes, owning shares in a REIT gets you exposure to real estate... kind of.  But it lacks a lot of the benefits of having direct ownership of real estate: control, tax benefits, higher cash flow (REITs on average produce 3.7% dividend yield according to Commercial Property Executive.), the list goes on an on, but I digress.

Now, let's run this scenario.  Call your financial advisor today and let them know you want to sell all of your stocks because you need the money.  I will bet you they are going to ask "why" and will most likely put up a fight with you.  They might say something like this: "These stocks are a long term investment.  You don't want to sell them right now.  This is a 10+ year hold."  10 year hold, eh?  Weren't they just telling you to avoid real estate because of the liquidity risk?  Which begs the question.  If stocks (like real estate) are meant to be held for a long time, why aren't you being compensated for this liquidity risk?
I am fine holding my investments for a long time.  I just expect to be compensated for carrying that long term commitment and so should you!  This is one of the primary reasons why I like this type of risk in real estate: because it's a manageable risk.  If you allocate your assets properly and have plenty of cash and other marketable securities like stocks, you shouldn't ever have to sell your real estate in panic to meet short term obligations, aaaaaand you get paid for it.  Bonus!  Or at least should be paid for it.  Make sure that when you invest in real estate, that you expect to earn more than average stock market returns.
The second reason I actually like the illiquidity of real estate is that it forces you to be disciplined in long term holding and to best be positioned to capture the maximum upside.
A brief story:  I used to manage my own portfolio of individual stocks.  I would research individual companies and buy ones that had strong fundamentals.  I started buying Apple stock back in 2008 for $3.20 a share.  I accumulated and added to that position for several years because I believed in the long term fundamentals of the company.  I had conviction.  However, the stock started skyrocketing during 2010 (it hit $13.60 a share), so I sold a little of my position.  It would go up another 20% and I'd sell some.  I kept doing this until 2015, until I was completely out of Apple.  It was $27.63 a share.  To my horror, I watched over the years, absolutely hating myself.  Every time I bought a new iPhone, I would check the share price.  If I just held on, or even forgot about my investment in the company, my $5,000 investment would have been worth $213,000!  Mind you, this is not the only stock investment I have done this with.  I just do not think I would ever have the discipline to hold onto a liquid asset like a stock and watch it go up 1000% and not be inclined to sell it.
So What does this story have to do with real estate?

The point of the story is, if I would have had less liquidity, or if it was harder to sell my position in Apple or any other companies that I've owned, I would probably be a million dollars richer right now.  With real estate, it takes a long time to even come to the decision to consider selling.  Appreciation in Rochester, NY is pretty damn steady and nothing crazy happens with wild fluctuations in value.  At the very most, if one of my properties has appreciated a bunch, I don't sell it; I refinance it, pull cash out and buy another investment property or two!
Bottom Line: don't fear liquidity risk, embrace it and make it work for you!

At the beginning of every new year, I get inundated with requests from friends and colleagues to "pick my brain" about becoming a real estate investor.  Of course, I want to share all of the how to's of building wealth in real estate.  I WANT to give back and help promote the use of this most effective tool in becoming more financially independent!
I start off with any "brain picking" session by asking the person: "Why do you want to be a real estate investor?"  I have to say that the most frequently heard answers to this question are as follows:

1. I want to earn extra money.
2. I am struggling financially and real estate seems like a good option to solve that.

I never mean to cause any offense in my response to these reasons, but I usually reply "your reason isn't good enough."  Let me explain:
A typical investment property in a good location in Rochester, NY is usually going to run you anywhere between $100k to $200k.  Thanks to our strong banking system, a lender will usually allow you to borrow between 75%-80% of the appraised value of your property!  So to buy a decent property you will need to put down anywhere between $20,000 and $50,000 of cash.  Lets assume you want to buy a $100k property for the purposes of this scenario...

​Upon David Martin and my professional journey, we have come to realize that the reason the participation of these projects remain in the hands of the very few is due to HIGH barriers of entry. It takes a lot of money and experience. For us it has taken decades of experience and to forge the relationships with the people who make our projects happen: our investment partners. Who happen to all be high net worth individuals. People who can spare anywhere from one hundred thousand to half a million dollars to partner with us on our projects.  To see some examples of some of our recent completed projects click here.

We realize that this system is extremely exclusive.

Our company OakGrove Companies seeks to be more inclusive with all parts of our company, but have not been inclusive on the curation of our investment partner base. The reasons for this are simple. Having a hundred small investment partners on a project instead of one large investor is very cost prohibitive. The cost of compliance, financial reporting, and just the simple logistics of having to communicate with a hundred partners as opposed to one.
Crowdfunding technology and securities law reform over the past 10 years has been a game changer and will allow us to be way more inclusive to our partner base. So that being said, our New Years resolution in 2021 is to widen our audience of potential partners! So if you are interested in receiving information on our upcoming development opportunities, please request to subscribe to OakGrove Capital's upcoming investment offerings here!

Cheers and Happy 2021!