Sorry, not sorry.

Sorry for dumping 4 post on you in the course of 2 days.  How is it possible for 3 weeks to go by that fast?  Things are busy.  Working on a couple of deals which has taken a lot of my time.  Funny because I'd say that they are only about 10 hours of deliberation, it's just that making offers and talking with partners and talking with people who have the deals takes time.  I'm sure my wife wonders what I do all day.  I kind of do too but I do know I'm cranking away.  Here is a brief summary of what I've been up to other than our Houlton, Hudson, and Prescott properties.

Made offer on mini storage.  Worked with a friend to put the money together for that.  Nothing is solidified.  No response on the offer (is that good or bad?).  Sometimes the offer just is what it is.  I can't pay asking just cuz that's what they're asking.  The numbers gotta work.  At our offer, they still work.  Let's hope that one comes through because I think it would slot nicely into our storage offerings.

Made offer on maxi storage.  Worked with a new friend I met from Bigger Pockets to find and work out an offer on a really awesome property.  I'm trying not to be too much of a fanboy with this property.  I love garages and warehouses and this one is as cool as they come (in my opinion).  I also think it is VERY rentable.  The trouble is that it's completely vacant.  We need the sellers to do seller financing to make the deal happen.  It just is what it is.  I would love to get this property under our umbrella too as it would be another great option for businesses in the SE Twin Cities metro.  This one is a little closer into the Cities which a lot of people have been asking us for.  Like I said, very rentable.

I've been working on a project for a 39.5-lot subdivision.  This one is going to take some creativity.  The price for the lots is really fair.  However, it's up to me to build the roads and get builders on board to buy the lots.  In the end, the lots will sell for $70k each.  That's a lot for a City lot.  But the catch is that the City will allow a Twin Home to be built on the lot thereby reducing the lot price to $35k/side of the Twin Home.  This is great except that it also means that 39 lots turns into 78 buyers.  That's a lot of buyers which means this is a few year long project.  And therein lies the issue.  How much drag is the financing going to be for a project like this?  I would love to do this project but what happens if the market stagnates and you can only sell 1/3 of the lots.  There is real potential that you might sit on a few lots for a while.  But there is also real potential that builders would buy 4-5 lots each and sell you out prior to building the road.  I'm going to meet with a potential partner on this project.  Let's hope that we can figure out a creative way to make this happen.

Lastly, the other items I've been doing is putting together summaries of the projects we've done to give potential investors an idea of my track record.  I'll be sharing those on here as case studies moving forward.  At this point, I think you have enough content for this week.

You Mad Bro?

So the past couple of weeks have been an exercise in anger restraint.  Everything costs more, more expenses than expected, set up a date to film a commercial and it rains (we film anyway - this ought to be interesting), trying to get our buildings up prior to winter and it rains 4 out of 5 days.  All just a head scratcher.  Plus we find out that we'll owe somewhere in the neighborhood of $30k for 2018 taxes (estimate).  Wasn't quite expecting that one.  Oh, and property taxes in Houlton are probably going to double (or close).  So all of these things are conspiring to keep us down.  Frustrating, yes.  Will this hold us back?  No.  As the big guys say, this is what defines you.  Can you keep it together when times get tough?  And you know what, if we can get through this hard time, it's going to increase our confidence and experience and allow us to more easily push through next time.  In the end, $30k isn't going to break us.  But we also know we can't have too many of those types of hiccups and expect to keep it together forever.  So the idea is to keep pushing on and get a few new deals in the works to increase income.  I think once we get to $10k/month net income generation, we'll be able to start really stockpiling money again to go after additional properties on our own.  But then again, our philosophy on venturing out on our own was that we'll need to get partners to continue to expand because no matter what, we're going to run out of our own capital.  So I'm going to keep my eyes on the prize.  There is no time to be mad.

Week 22 of Self Employment: Sink or swim?

This entire process has been refreshing - as in, jump in Lake Superior in April, refreshing. It's allowing us to shoot for the stars which is amazing, but every day is an exercise in cost/benefit for life and business. I love it, no matter how stressful. I know Angie would love a big cushion (who wouldn't) but it's not in the cards right now. The good news is that things are coming to a head. We are getting close to having Hudson come online and there has been a ton of interest in our Building 5 in Houlton seeing that it's heated and people are starting to think about winter. So, in the meantime we'll keep it together with binder twine and chicken wire. Okay, I'm being a little dramatic but some days it feels like this. I think the top of the hill is near! I feel like I could go on like this forever but it's not really fair to continue putting the family through this. 
So with the drama out of the way, on to the good stuff.
Storage Garages of Hudson: At least one wall is up. Building contractor is making serious progress. Grading contractor is all but done for now. They are waiting to put gravel on everything until we dig the frost walls on the next building. Otherwise you end up digging up gravel you just put down. No need to waste perfectly good gravel. Otherwise we have gravel between Building 1 and 3 and that driving area is ready for aprons. Once the aprons are in and complete we can get the pavers in there to do the parking lot. That always makes things look awesome. I'm really looking forward to that. With Labor Day behind us, people are calling us on Houlton Storage Garages and a few don't need something that big. Storage Garages of Hudson might be perfect for them. I'm sure as we get later and later into fall, we'll have more and more interest in both facilities. The nice thing is that they can be cross-marketed pretty well. Renters can rent up or down depending on their needs and budget. 
Houlton Storage Garages: I got the easement over to Xcel for burying the overhead line. That looks to occur in late September, early October. Grading contractor finished things up so the grade is ready for pavement. However, we still need to get electric and gas run under a couple of our driving areas. Then it's on to getting pavement in. I've included a before and after pic of the parking area. It looks nice dressed up. 
Other things: Made an offer on a warehouse facility with another investor. Should be a fun project. This one is in MN for the first time. If things go as planned, my investor friend should see a handsome return. Plus it's close to home. More details coming on this. We're hoping to hear back on Monday (today). Still waiting on a mini storage I made an offer on. Not sure that one is going to happen. I need to revisit the numbers to see if we can bring our offer up a little while also getting solid returns. There may be a little wiggle room left in there. I'll definitely be reporting here if anything changes. 
See you next week.

Week 21 Real Estate Investing Update:

Houlton Storage Garages - Finally met up with Xcel Energy to work on getting our pole line buried so we can build our parking lot/driveway. In the end we have to give Xcel an easement along our north property line so they can legally service it. They currently are grandfathered in to be able to maintain their pole line. Basically, if they've been there for a certain length of time, they have legal rights to keep their power lines there. Anyway, because we are asking them to move their line underground, to be able to maintain it, they require an easement. So we had a meeting onsite and discussed that work. Should happen towards the end of September.
Storage Garages of Hudson - Work continues on Buildings 1 and 3. The frost walls are done on both and Building 1 is backfilled. Some excavation on the north stormwater pond has started and it's actually looking like something. Struggling to get my electrician onsite to discuss our needs. Not sure how this is going to work as I feel like we are running out of time to get wires run to our buildings for lights. I'm sure we'll figure something out but it just never happens as quickly as I'd like.
Other - Looking at a few interesting properties. I basically got booed out of the room on one offer and working on putting together another offer on another property in the near future. I felt like most of my time was spent running numbers on different properties and analyzing deals. I think I found a couple of diamonds in the rough. We'll see. Obviously I'll have a full report on FB. Also looking at a bunch of mini-storage facilities on the left coast. This could be interesting and allow us to try to manage a facility from a distance. Not impossible, not overly complicated, just different.
The last interesting opportunity that came up was the potential to work for an education/investing outfit teaching people about self-storage. They have a "division" focusing on developing properties that falls a little more into the category of consulting. It felt like they didn't want to do that as much. I'm kind of have the opposite feeling in which I think that would be fun. The difficulty with developing is that you don't make money during the construction and rent-up phases. Some investors struggle with the idea of that. Anyhow, I'm going to a conference the last weekend in September to meet the outfit and see if this is something I'd like to do. I see it as a way to network with other people who like the self-storage niche. Seems like a win-win.

Week 20 of Real Estate Investing:

I felt like I spent most of the week answering calls about my car. In the end, I was finally able to sell it. That was a relief. No more dealing with tire kickers. It also adds extra financial security which is nice, but mostly eliminates the future expenses of tabs, insurance, tires, maintenance, etc. and allows us to pay off the family vehicle which amounts to a nice boost in net income (lowered expenses = greater net income). With Brock going back to preschool, the costs pretty much offset which is a net win in my book. Again, the goal of the "game" is to stay liquid long enough to see income from Storage Garages of Hudson kick in. We will be fine but I do know that selling my car now will be easier than selling it mid-winter if need arose. Our philosophy was that it's better to be proactive. 
Houlton Storage Garages: Added a few renters and we've gotten a lot of interest lately. It was getting a little worrisome if I do say so myself. Not much in the way of calls or interest this summer. But after looking at last year's financials and doing some reflecting, last year was the same way. Summers are just slow. Contractors are cranking away and people in general are just busy with life in the summer. So with that we have 2 large unheated units available and 1 small unheated which will likely get rented next week. 
Storage Garages of Hudson: Building #1 has a foundation as of Friday. Yippee. It will get backfilled next week and we'll be able to start on the floor later next week. That is great. I'm still expecting that we'll get the first building up by the end of September (or very close). Just in time to store some boats and RVs for the winter. 
Additionally I've been doing what I can to figure out social media marketing on Facebook and Instagram. We will be filming a commercial in two weeks for our RV and boat storage in Hudson. Should be interesting. Naturally we will be sharing this on FB. Any feedback will be much appreciated if you are so inclined. 
With the commercial we have also been working through getting flyers out to marinas and getting the artwork completed for business cards and our sign in Hudson. Still need to work through the name in Hudson but I think it's going to be Storage Garages of Hudson to eliminate any confusion with our nearby neighbor. I'd hate to give him any undeserved business! Ha. This is a bit of a joke because I don't think our businesses compete at all. He does mini, we do maxi. Anyhow, on to something that matters. 
Other: Spent a good part of the week analyzing other deals that I'd be partnering with others on. One mini storage, a few warehouse buildings and also entertaining the idea of selling Houlton Storage Garages. Not sure if we're ready for that step but it would provide for an injection of capital into our business. However, it also takes away the monthly cashflow which is the reason why we chose to invest in real estate in the first place. But if we could parlay that equity into some other assets that make us a better return, it might be worth it. I am constantly considering our returns on invested capital and our returns on equity that we have in our properties. If the equity gets large in comparison to our returns, it might be time to sell and reinvest to get more return for each dollar of equity. But many real estate investors are talking of a potential downturn and that's where equity can protect us. So we're continuing to weigh the pluses and minuses of this option. I think what will happen instead is we'll find another property to partner with this person on. But it is interesting to consider all of the options.