Quote:
Originally Posted by freakshow
Thanks taylor, that helped a lot!
I'm sure I'll have a few more questions for you and Chuck as I attempt to educate myself.
btw, i also spotted your coming down around westminster & 7/8 road a few weeks ago.
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No prob dude.
I'm a rental property owner and learned most of it by asking other rental property owners that have been doing it for years, best way to learn. I found a couple property owners in Ottawa and took them out for beers to pick their brain, best investment I made: $20 in beer for a mountain of first-hand knowledge.
There are places in Vancouver where you can buy a place and rent it out for a positive cash-flow, yet the amount you're going to make is soooooooo little you might as well put it in a GIC. The only way to make money in this market is to have lots of $$$ to leave huge downpayments and have a low monthly mortgage payment. Yet anyone with lots of $$$ would know wrapping it up in a risky asset with sub-par returns isn't a wise investment.
You best bet is to buy a rental property in a different city/province. I looked at small towns in Ontario, rents were cheap ($300-500) yet I could buy 3-4 unit buildings for $100K, and if all were rented I'd be making $1000/mn. It was ultimately not an investment I felt comfortable taking the risk cause vacancy rates are higher and places can sit empty for months or years.
There's also rental co-ops, my uncle just bought into one near Western University. He gets $100/mn profit for a $20K initial investment if all the units in the building are rented. If some are vacant, that $100 decreases. No one owner suffers if "their" unit is vacant, the profit and pain is shared amoung all the investments. The purpose of this investment is to make small cash flow and build equity slowly with very little risk since the risk is shared unlike if you own a single rental property and have to cover it for a few months unrented.
OK before I start ranting, my point is there's tons of investment strategies out there. Real estate isn't the magical money maker people make it out to be, especially since the bubble has passed. We missed out, it sucks, save for the next bubble.