5 Tips for Buying Rental Property
Hey, guys. I'm Victoria Wilbanks. I'm the team leader here in Little Rock, Arkansas for evernest. Today, we're going to be talking about five major tips for buying property here in Little Rock, Arkansas (Buying Rental Property in Little Rock Arkansas - 5 Tips for Getting Started). So I actually just went through this with my dad, so I just kind of thought, "Man, what tips I gave him?" So I'm here to give you the same ones.
Number One
First, just come to Little Rock. If you see something online and you're like, "Man, these just sound too good to be true," probably is. Come here, come look at it, look at the area, look what's around it, get under the house, look at it, and make sure there's nothing major going on with the house or anything like that.
Number Two
The second would be to work with a reputable real estate agent. There are quite a few here in Little Rock that deals with rental properties. So, you know, any of them can help you out. Just make sure, look at reviews, look that you're not getting Chuck with the truck that runs a real estate company. So just make sure that you're dealing with someone that you trust and that really is working for you.
Number Three
Number three, this is the big one for my dad actually, was making the decision if you want to rent the house out or if you want to flip the house to sell it. And this goes into the repairs for the property. So, for example, the roof, can the roof last another five years? If you're renting it, probably so. If you want to sell it, redoing the roof is going too obviously up the selling price. So those things are going to be something you're going to want to think about on what are you going to do to really sell the house? What repairs are going to be made to the house? Or if you're going to rent it out, what repairs are going to be made to the house? That goes into getting estimates.
Number Four - Get a couple estimates
So don't just go get one contractor and say, "Hey how much is it going to be to get this house ready to go, to either to sale or to rent it?" Really get a couple of estimates. You're going to have a better idea of really what's needed to go into the house at that point versus just taking one person's opinion that's going to charge you whatever. Really get a couple of estimates in that so that you have a better idea of what your costs are going to be and then how long it's going to take you to recoup those costs really.
Number Five
Before you buy, get an independent opinion of the rental rate for the property and this can be done in a majority of ways. Zillow's a great idea. Look on Zillow. See what's for rent in the area. See how much those are renting for. Are they comparable to what you have? We can always do that for you here at gk too. Give us a call, tell us what you're looking at and we can kind of give you somewhat of an idea. There are lots of things that go into that. Just make sure that you're doing your research and not thinking that you know, you're buying it for a certain amount and it's going to rent for $1,500 when in reality it's a $900 house. We don't want that to be a surprise for you on the back end. So just make sure that you're really getting a good idea of how much the house is going to rent for in the end. If you have any questions about anything like this, feel free to give me a call. My number here at the office is 501-366-0919. That would be it. Go ahead and give me a call. Feel free to ask me any questions. Thanks so much.
