340: Finance Friday: When Rental Property Investing Doesn’t Make Sense
BiggerPockets Money Podcast
BiggerPockets
4.6 • 2.9K Ratings
🗓️ 30 September 2022
⏱️ 74 minutes
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Summary
Over the past two years, short-term rental investing has become a financial lifeline for those that are trying to make extra income. A small one or two-bedroom basement, garage apartment, or mother-in-law suite brings in enough cash flow for many to pay off a sizable amount of their mortgage. One such investor is Allen, who turned his low-interest rate primary residence into a lucrative short-term rental in the Portland, Maine area.
Allen is a vacation rental house hacker, leasing his garage apartment at a nightly rate for those visiting the area. Thanks to local laws, he’s unable to increase his nightly rates, but the silver lining means Allen has an almost fully-occupied, revenue-producing rental most of the time. He wants to build his short-term rental empire to even greater heights, but after looking at the math, Scott and Mindy aren’t so convinced that this is the right move.
With six figures in student debt and a moderate credit score weighing him down, Allen may be in a better position to do something else with his money. Scott and Mindy go through the numbers, calculations, and everything else you’d need to see whether or not another real estate investment is the right move for you. Even if you’re someone with a high income like Allen, you may be surprised by what Scott and Mindy propose.
In This Episode We Cover
When is the right time to buy real estate and how high-interest rates hurt your chances of getting a good deal
Limiting your monthly spending and taking advantage of earning a high income
Short-term rental house hacking and using it to cover most of your living expenses
Stocks vs. real estate investing and when it’s the right time to choose one over the other
Aggressive debt payoff and how to know whether an interest rate is too high
Credit score tips and the factors that make yours go up and down
And So Much More!
Links from the Show
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Listen to The “On The Market” Podcast: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, BiggerPockets
Check Out Mindy’s 2022 Live Spending Tracker and Budget
Finance Friday: Self-Employed Income and Short-Term Rental Investing
Are FIRE Naysayers Bad at Math? Yes. with Michael Kitces
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Bigger Pockets Money Podcast, Finance Friday edition, where we interview |
| 0:04.7 | Alan and talk about short-term rentals, credit scores, and student loan debt. |
| 0:09.3 | The other big problem here is your credit score, which is not great right now. |
| 0:13.1 | The approach I like the best is to either just pay down the debt or go a good old-fashioned |
| 0:18.6 | index fund investing instead of sticking all that cash in your bank account. |
| 0:22.9 | Sit tight for a year or two. |
| 0:24.3 | You're going to generate $50,000-$100,000 in free cash flow over the next year after tax |
| 0:29.8 | at the current rate that your life is going. |
| 0:31.9 | You're going to be right back in the same position, but with a cleaner balance sheet at |
| 0:34.9 | that point in time, and a better credit score. |
| 0:37.6 | And during that year, you can put together some really clear business plans for rental |
| 0:42.5 | property investing, short-term rentals, rent by the room, whatever makes sense in your |
| 0:46.2 | local areas that could produce that passive cash flow. |
| 0:49.2 | Hello, hello, hello, my name is Mindy Jensen, and with me as always is my real estate loving |
| 0:53.5 | co-host, Scott Trench. |
| 0:55.5 | You're supposed to say thanks. |
| 0:58.8 | Oh, thanks. |
| 0:59.8 | Go again, sorry. |
| 1:00.8 | It's not paying attention. |
| 1:01.8 | You knew? |
| 1:02.8 | Yes. |
| 1:03.8 | Let's start over. |
... |
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