Do you own your place?

[ABDada]

Oh yeah, nightmares are part of owning any business.

One thing I've always done is shift the maintenance burden the longer I own property -- remove carpet and laminate flooring and replace with (cheap) stone tile; get rid of the large hot water tank and install an instant-on tank, replace fuse boxes with circuit breakers and slowly change out 15A circuits and wiring to 20A ones, etc.

I also do offer incentives to good tenants. My first condo I purchased ever has had the same tenant for something like 7 years.

Landlording is NOT for everyone, certainly. If you're young and can fix things, it CAN be a great way to create supplemental income that can be eventually used to expand your empire -- and eventually just hire a maintenance guy.

 

[ElJefe]

That's the real downside to owning - you have to do all the maintenance. The upside to maintenance work, besides increasing the value of the property, is of course you learn a lot of practical stuff.

I threw myself into ownership which has had way more in start-up costs than I estimated at first, but I'm slowly crawling out of that hole. I've been really stretched for a year now, but I rent out a room and that has done wonders.

First off, I rent out at the beginning of the college year (I live in a big college town), so I can charge a high rate as everyone is looking around 1 September. The rent covers about 54% of my after-tax costs (that includes a buffer). Another thing about property is that in big towns that are basically always run by progressives, there's a plethora of rules and regulations that generally favor tenants. This can offer advantages if you know how to circumvent the disadvantages while maximizing the benefit from the tenant-friendly regulations. It's specific to where you live, but as an example, where I live I rent out my place to students who will pay a market-rate that is above the regulated rate, while I have the option of finding a place to rent at the regulated rate.

I'm not quite in the mood to make that jump yet since I have many other projects, but as ABDada suggest, I'm going to continue sub-letting a room at least until the mortgage is paid off. That's over $9,000 a year that the tax-authorities don't know about (hopefully never). Over 5 years that's about $41,400 in real terms @ 3% inflation, or put more simply: $45,000 less debt. And it's always easy to find new tenants if one of them pisses you off.

 

[SelfPaid]

I am still Young and haven't found the places where I want to create my

Homebase so I Rent for myself but consider owning Property for Investment and Casflow reasons starting With my First One next Year.

I think that people have misconceptions about maintanance and ongoing costs. If you do it with the right people it's a no brainer in my opinion: You Need a Good Property Manager, accountant, lawyer, and a few other people who can help you Set everything up and Provide the right legal structure that you don't have you're Name on the Propertys.

Choosing Property it is about what you're looking for:
Some People just want Capital Gains, I Look for Casflow anything with arround 15% Return per anum. And at arround 50.000 Dollar cost. Per Property. I will Need much more Capital to create the Same Income I have True my Trading and to other Source but it's Worth it to me to use some of my Profits to Own Real Assets that Hase always been my Dream and the Most important thing when it Comes to Finances. For me it's about opm and Property is a Great Way to leverage that.

Renting is always a Smart Idea since you are more flexible and can use you're Cash for other Investments and since all my work is Cash related I Need to be liquid

The only Time I will think about buying is when I know I am going to live in this Country, City for a few years and than I would Personaly Look at the High End Market and Pay Cash. In Order do that I will Look at Having between 4 and 5 Times amount of Capital Invested before I Buy so my Risk is realy low of me Having to sell it.

I Don't Need to Impress any customers or Business Partners so I can live how I feel like living without the Need for a Ferrari mansion ect this thinks are great and I will have them in my Life but not for my current Level now it's more about making, Saving and investing instead of spending. If I want to have does things I Need to Buy the Assets that Pay them of.

I think there are certain levels where it is Easy to Rent and sell you're Property since you're dealing with highly Solvent People and the Most desirable places People always Love to Upgrade so there will always be demand for certain places making it a more low Risk Lifestyle Investment.

But for now here in Germany and soon in Brazil I choose to Rent since with Rent I have Control to Upgrade or Down grad Ase I want.