June 2, 2025 • 42 mins
In episode fourteen of The Rent-ish Pod, Zach and Patrick sit down with guest Levi Abramson, a real estate investor who's learning the ropes and building his portfolio one step at a time.
Levi shares how he got started, what drew him to real estate in the first place, and how he manages his properties today. It’s a candid conversation about what it’s really like starting out—from setting expectations to learning through experience.
The hosts also chat with Levi about what he looks for in a property manager, how he approaches tenant screening, and how he’s learning to stay patient as his journey unfolds.
💬 Honest stories, early lessons, and practical takeaways for anyone just getting started in real estate.
🎧 Tune in for a down-to-earth episode about taking that first step—and what comes next.
📩 Got a question or story for the pod? Email us at questions@therentishpod.com—we’d love to feature you!
Check Innago at https://innago.com/podcast/ to learn more.
Sponsors:
Innago is a free, online property management software designed for landlords, particularly those managing small to medium-sized portfolios. It offers a range of features to simplify tasks like rent collection, lease management, maintenance requests, and tenant screening.
Ledgre is an All-in-One Accounting Software Built for Rentals. Organize property transactions, track expenses, and automate rental accounting with simple software focused on your industry.
Cohorts where serious real estate leaders level up. Join a curated peer group of founders, principals, and GPs who meet monthly in small, high-value circles. No fluff—just real insights, real accountability, and direct access to people who’ve done it before.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_02 (00:00):
What's going on, everybody?
Welcome to another episode ofthe Rentish Podcast.
My name is Zach and I'm herewith my co-host, Patrick.
who just took a big sip ofcoffee.
There it is.
Hey, occupational hazard here,Patrick.
We're trying to be safe on thepodcast.
We don't want you choking oncoffee.
(00:20):
We're trying to get yourcatchphrase out.
We're your host for The RentistPodcast, of course, which is a
podcast that's kind of aboutrental properties and hosted by
two guys that work in the realestate industry and sort of know
what we're talking about.
But mostly don't now coffee.
Yeah, so that's the cadence,right?
Say the quote, drink the coffee.
Yeah, Patrick, mostly we don't,which is why I think you're
(00:41):
You're gonna have fun hearing ustalk to experts.
Experts, huh?
Oh, I see what you did there.
And learning with us or justlaughing along at how little we
know.
Patrick.
How's your day going, buddy?
It's good.
SPEAKER_01 (00:52):
I had some Skyline for lunch.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (00:54):
We're really happy about that.
Explain to our non-Cincinnatiresidents really quickly what
Skyline
SPEAKER_01 (00:58):
is.
So yeah, Skyline's like areligion down here in
Cincinnati.
I said down here because I'moriginally from like the Akron,
Cleveland area.
Okay.
Up here, I guess, if you know.
Sure.
But yeah, it's like whatCincinnati is known for.
It's kind of like a saucy,chili.
I don't really know how todescribe it.
You put it either on noodles ora hot dog.
SPEAKER_02 (01:16):
I've always told people that don't understand,
it's like an old Greek traditionthat came to Cincinnati.
It's basically like a bolognesekind of chili sauce poured over
spaghetti with cheese, onions,beans, crackers, hot sauce.
You calling it a religion ispretty apt, I would say.
SPEAKER_01 (01:35):
I love getting Skyline.
I haven't had it in about threeweeks, so I was due for some
Skyline.
Well,
SPEAKER_02 (01:40):
now you're all greased up and you're ready to
rock and roll.
Now I'm in a small room withyou.
Thanks, Patrick.
Appreciate that.
Well, today it's going to be anawesome episode.
Remember, follow The Rentedonline.
If you're listening on Spotifyor Apple Podcasts or wherever
you get your podcasts, just goahead and give us a follow and
give us a rating or a review.
Five stars.
Give us a comment.
(02:01):
Like the episode.
Whatever positivity you canthrow our direction on the
podcast service you use, wewould really much appreciate
that.
And if you have a question or acomment or any kind of topic
idea or suggestion for Patrickand I to talk about on the show,
feel free to email questions attherentishpod.com.
Patrick.
SPEAKER_01 (02:18):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (02:19):
I don't even want to dance around it.
Typically, I'd be like, Like,you know, let's talk about, I
don't know, Ryan Gosling for afew minutes or whatever, but
we're not going to do that thisweek because we've got too much
to do in so little time.
We actually are joined by a veryspecial guest today, and that's
going to kind of take up theentire episode.
Today, we're excited to welcomeLevi Abramson to the show.
Levi is an experienced realestate investor and entrepreneur
(02:42):
currently working at Inago,where he helps property owners
and landlords simplify rentalmanagement.
Beyond his work in prop tech,Levi has a strong background in
real estate We're diving intohis journey as a property owner,
what he's learned, thechallenges he's faced, and his
(03:03):
best advice for those looking tobuy their first property.
Everybody.
Or Patrick, let's give a warmwelcome to Levi to the show.
There he is.
Hey guys, how are we doing?
Hey Levi.
How are you?
Thank
SPEAKER_00 (03:13):
you for coming on.
Yeah, thank you.
I also had Skyline with Patrickearlier.
SPEAKER_02 (03:18):
I'm outnumbered.
We're glad that you're on theshow.
We're very excited to kind ofjust pick your brain and kind of
chit chat with you for a littlewhile.
And, you know, hopefully it'sfun.
Hopefully, you know, Patrick, itcan get a little loud in this
room.
Hopefully three voices all kindof churning at once.
I don't know what you're talkingabout.
I don't know.
What am I talking about?
(03:38):
What are you talking about?
If that's how you talked all thetime, I don't know if I can
handle it.
Is that your
SPEAKER_01 (03:43):
NPR voice?
This is my normal voice, Zach.
SPEAKER_02 (03:46):
But mostly we don't.
All right, Levi.
So we're here to talk to youabout your experience in the
industry, property management,real estate, entrepreneurism.
We've got all this stuff.
We got tons of questions thatwe're going to kind of go
through.
But before we kind of reallyjump into grilling you on all
your background and everything,just kind of are I'd love to
(04:07):
learn a little bit more aboutyour journey, who you are, what
makes you tick, and why you'rehere today.
SPEAKER_00 (04:12):
Sure.
I don't know how much I'm goingto be able to do on what makes
me tick today.
Hopefully it's not an episodefull of that.
But yeah, about 10 years ago, abuddy from high school and I
invested in our first property.
It was one of those things thatwe had always talked about.
I think a lot of people havethat conversation of what if we
invested in a place and justkind of had it as side income
(04:35):
when retirement rolls around.
and that kind of thing.
And we did one together.
Again, it was a friend from highschool.
So it was somebody I wascomfortable with who I was
pretty confident getting intobusiness with them.
And the one went really well.
We definitely invested at a goodtime.
There's a lot of luck involvedin this as there often is, but
there was a lot of luck.
We did really well on that one.
(04:57):
And I think we just got more andmore interested.
So I had a little bit ofbusiness background.
I went to business school forundergrad and was already
working in the tech space.
And it kind kind of justaligned.
It was a perfect opportunity ofa lot of opportunity for tech to
make it better.
So we pretty quickly went fromcollecting check payments to
(05:17):
online and then startedinvesting in more properties.
The one went well, so we boughtanother one.
They were cash flowing.
The market was going well.
And so that kind of just wentinto a larger and larger
business.
You mentioned the businessschool.
I went to Harvard for businessschool and focused on real
estate there.
And around the same time, theportfolio started getting big
(05:39):
enough that it really becamemore than just a side thing
where we were doing one hour aweek.
And that was when we startedlooking at different ways to
manage the properties.
And so we started out collectingchecks and doing everything on a
spreadsheet.
We moved over to anothersoftware.
I don't know if I'm allowed tosay the name.
SPEAKER_02 (06:01):
We don't know.
Don't ask us.
We'll say whatever we want andthen they just say it.
Censor us later.
They're not around anymore.
Yeah.
Oh,
SPEAKER_00 (06:09):
okay.
Yeah.
Purchased by another company,purchased and not around
anymore.
And then ended up looking fordifferent options, settled on
Inago.
And yeah, the rest is history.
We scaled up the portfolio fromthere and have been using Inago
for about five or six yearssince that.
SPEAKER_02 (06:26):
That is awesome.
I have a quick question.
I don't know
SPEAKER_01 (06:28):
if you want to structure this or anything.
Jump in.
Jump in.
The water's fine.
So I think Zach and I, we'recoming from a place like neither
of us own real estate at thispoint.
But I think we both expressedinterest in owning properties
and a rental property.
Getting your first property, andyou mentioned you did it with a
high school friend.
Did you have to wait for theperfect opportunity for the
stars to align?
(06:50):
Or how did you get the...
How did it work out that youwere able to just buy your first
property?
SPEAKER_00 (06:57):
Yeah, that's a great question.
And I get I obviously get thatquestion a lot.
People are curious, you know, ifthey're kind of on the other
side of having their firstproperty and It really is a
comfort thing, getting the firstproperty.
It's very daunting being on theother side.
I remember we looked for placesfor a really long time and it
did feel like we needed theperfect place.
(07:18):
Now, of course, there's abalance.
I think if you spend yearslooking for the perfect place,
it's never going to come andyou're just never going to get
over that hump.
But on the other side...
you know, it obviously does takesome research and some some idea
of what parameters you'relooking for in a property.
But there's no question thatgoing from zero to one property
(07:40):
was the biggest hurdle by far.
It's a scary thing.
I mean, you're putting realmoney down depending on how you
structure your loan and whateveryour partnership looks like.
It's real money.
You have skin in the game andyou could you could lose money,
too.
So, yeah, getting to that firstone was a big a big hurdle.
I think your question was aroundaround understanding if we had
(08:02):
if the stars had to align or ifit had to be perfect, there's no
question that it took like aleap of faith.
I think the conditions werenever going to be 100% perfect,
but we had some good idea ofwhat we wanted.
And I think we did some goodanalysis on the front end.
It wasn't anything excessive,but just an idea of getting
comfortable with what does amortgage payment look like?
(08:24):
What is escrow?
Some of these basic things.
And also investing in a marketwe were comfortable with.
We're from the Colorado Springsarea originally, and that is
where our first property was.
Gotcha.
SPEAKER_02 (08:35):
And you said that the first property that you got
was with a high school friend.
You were in college at the timewhen you acquired the property.
Is that right?
It
SPEAKER_00 (08:42):
was post-college.
So yeah, we had alreadygraduated.
We were earning a little bit ofincome from our first jobs.
And yeah, you know, I think youpointed out the high school
friend.
It's also a question I get a lotgoing into business with a
friend or family.
I think that's something a lotof people are nervous about or a
frequent question.
And it is something that I thinkis definitely a big
(09:02):
consideration and something thatwe struggled with at first.
You know, we've had our minorblubs for sure, and it isn't
always perfect.
But there's no question that thefirst thing you need to do is
have somebody that you trust.
And I think we do have a lot oftrust for each other.
And that's where we've been ableto manage for 10 years, despite
not having the same closenessthat we did in high school.
SPEAKER_02 (09:23):
Yeah, that's awesome.
Patrick, don't get any ideas.
You and me, baby.
You want to start looking?
Let's do it.
Got it.
Superhouse.
We'll get the Barn Dominiumcomplex started.
Oh, dude, I'm down.
Yeah, shout out to that oldepisode of Rentish.
The real ones now.
The real ones, though.
The one that aired not that longago.
(09:44):
I have no idea when it aired.
So I would like to ask you aquestion.
We can skip over it if you wantto, but before you went to
college to study real estate,your major was what again?
SPEAKER_00 (09:54):
So I did undergrad at University of Pennsylvania.
I was just general business, soeconomics.
I actually in undergrad did notOkay.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(10:32):
at like a frontline level, Ialready had a really good idea
of what property ownership andmanagement looked like.
Of course, there's this wholedifferent ballgame of private
equity and a lot of thecomplicated stuff that most
people would never get into,myself included, that really
came from business school.
But it really, most of theexpertise and the super helpful,
(10:54):
knowledgeable stuff came fromactually managing properties and
learning by doing.
I mean, we made mistakes andthose were some of the most
valuable things that thathappened.
SPEAKER_02 (11:04):
I would like to know your search process.
As you're talking to a couple ofguys in here in this room that,
you know, like Patrick said, weare kind of invested.
You were interested ineventually one day having like
an investment property orpurchasing properties of our
own.
What was your search processlike?
And what is it still like?
I mean, what criteria do youlook for in the perfect house?
Like what are the perfect place?
(11:24):
Like whether it's residential,commercial, like what are the
things that you really startfrom square one
SPEAKER_00 (11:30):
at?
Yeah, I think for me, it's...
I think everybody is going tohave a different answer to this
question.
For me, it's really the marriageof real-world conditions and
what's happening in theneighborhoods that you're
looking at with the hardnumbers.
And I don't think you canover-rely on one of those.
I think when you look at thenumbers side, you always have
(11:50):
things like cap rates, NOI, IRR,and I'm not sure how familiar
you are with those specificterms.
You probably should be a littlebit familiar before you jump in.
Yeah, I I think that's a safebet.
That's
SPEAKER_02 (12:04):
why we have a special guest, like shout out to
Mary, who's on the showsometimes, one of our special
guests, Mary Regano, who givesus those real estate term
question games, so you canlisten to one of those episodes.
SPEAKER_00 (12:16):
We're learning.
I think she's also a businessschool alum, so she probably
picked a lot of those up there,but you look at something like
cap rate, which is basicallyjust the ratio of what a house
costs or a property costs versuswhat you're renting it for, but
those numbers will vary wildlydepending on what market you're
looking at.
If you're looking at a reallybig market in New York City,
(12:37):
you're going to have really lowcap rates because properties are
more expensive relative to therental prices you're getting.
But that doesn't mean that a lowcap rate or a high cap rate is
always good.
You have to marry it with thereal world conditions of what do
I think about this city?
What kind of tenants am I goingto get?
Am I in a neighborhood wherethere's maybe a lot of college
students that are going to, youknow, my property is going to
(13:00):
have a really fast.
So it really is, you know, yourquestion was around the search
criteria.
I think you just have to have anidea of what kind of cap rate am
I looking at?
What kind of return with whatfinancing can I get?
And marry that with yourunderstanding of the market,
which is why we invested thefirst series of properties that
(13:21):
we got in a market that we didfeel comfortable and we knew the
neighborhoods, we knew what kindof cap rate would be worth the
risk to put it.
SPEAKER_01 (13:30):
So I have a question and I'm not sure if you already
kind of covered a little bit ofthis, but with all of the
properties that you have, yousaid the first one was in
Colorado Springs where you'refrom.
Yep, that's right.
From there, other propertiesthat you might have purchased...
Were they like not all based inColorado?
(13:50):
Have you bought properties inother states?
SPEAKER_00 (13:53):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (13:53):
So what
SPEAKER_00 (13:54):
have we, we did purchase the first one in the
first couple of single familyhomes in Colorado Springs.
You know, that the market, thelast 10 years, as anyone who's
paid any attention knows hasbeen pretty crazy.
There's, there's been marketswhere the appreciation has been
great for current owners andmaybe has priced out some people
who live there or who arelooking at investing.
So we had been investing inColorado Springs prices did end
(14:17):
up going up quite a bit, which,you know, appreciation is one of
the ways that you make money inreal estate investing.
So it was good for theproperties that we did purchase.
But by the time that we werelooking to expand more, we did
start looking at other markets.
So we have the portfolio inColorado Springs, but we did a
cash out refi.
So basically refinancing thatloan into one portfolio loan,
(14:41):
which we can go whateverdirection you guys want.
But that might be a We basicallypulled some cash out and then we
looked across the US and welooked at exactly what I was
just talking about around caprates and what our hypothesis
was of all of these differentcities we were looking at and
ended up investing in Tennessee.
So Colorado and Tennessee arethe two states that we have
(15:04):
property.
SPEAKER_01 (15:04):
And what's it like?
Obviously, you can't be in bothColorado and Tennessee at the
same time.
And I don't think you're basedin either state.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (15:43):
You want a good handyman, you want a good team
of people that you trust andthat you think are gonna do you
right when it comes to repairingthose properties.
But the other piece istechnology.
I think a lot of peopleunderestimate Thank you so much
(16:07):
for joining us.
How do I mark this on thespreadsheet?
(16:29):
How do I send out these notices?
It really consolidates all ofthat.
It helps with listing.
So when a property, a lease isgoing to be up, we can relist it
online and use the syndicationnetwork for that.
Leases, e-signing, that'sprobably the biggest one.
That was one of the reasons westarted using Inago in the first
place.
We don't juggle 50 paper leases.
(16:51):
We have it online as a template.
It takes...
probably five, six minutes tocreate a new lease.
And then it just gets sent out,e-signs, and then Inago keeps a
record of all of that.
So when I do need that lease, Ihave a record without even
having to think of, you know,how am I going to organize all
of this, do all of that.
So when you have those twopieces, I think you have a
(17:13):
really valuable toolkit thatmaybe without the internet would
have been really difficult 20,30 years ago.
That really makes it a lot moremanageable.
SPEAKER_02 (17:23):
Yeah, for newcomers too.
I mean, it's like...
You have to imagine now isprobably, in the history of this
planet, probably the best timeto be a small-time landlord.
Right?
I mean, what would you have donedifferently if you had the
access to today's kind oftechnology when you were buying
your first property?
Yeah,
SPEAKER_00 (17:42):
I mean, I'm not that old, so.
SPEAKER_02 (17:45):
That's fair.
That question did make it seemlike you were much older than
you are.
SPEAKER_00 (17:48):
The technology is mostly the same, but I get your,
yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (17:52):
Basically, what's changed since when you bought
your first property?
to now?
SPEAKER_00 (17:56):
Yeah, I think the leases was the biggest thing.
I mean, we really were doing thetraditional paper check leases.
And I remember having to preparethose PDFs.
There were a few that we evensent physically in the mail.
And it's just a process you haveto manage.
And it shouldn't be.
A lease is a lease.
Of course, there are certainthings that you can customize
(18:17):
and you can also do that throughInago.
But there are certain things youhave to customize.
But you sign a lease and thenyou just need the document.
So that was probably the biggestthing.
But But from the beginning, Ithink we've used some technology
for getting it listed, formaking sure people can see it.
Yeah, I don't think there's beenany huge changes the last couple
of years.
Cool.
I think the other thing, theother quick pitch I would give
(18:39):
is, you know, there's that wholeprocess of people moving in and
moving out.
And I think what I love about myjob working at Inago in product
is I also get to focus on whatare things that I want as
somebody who also is a landlord.
And so, for instance, one of thereally big things over the last
couple of months that we hadseen was the same thing as the
(19:02):
leases that I was just talkingabout with move in, move out
checklist.
Right.
Right.
There has to be somebody therewith a physical piece of paper
marking it and saying, whatexactly is wrong with the house?
How do I keep a record of this?
It protects the tenant and thelandlord.
And I think a lot of landlordsdon't do it because there's no
easy solution.
It's not like collecting rentonline.
There's no easy way to do that.
(19:22):
And so at Inago, we rolled outthe move-in, move-out checklist
as a damage report where tenantsgo through the house, they see
what's wrong with it, they markit up, and they submit it
through the app.
And it does the same thing.
It creates a PDF that I have asa landlord when they move So I
know what damage was there.
I don't charge them unfairly,but also I'm protected if they
do do damage and say, nope, itwas there before.
(19:44):
So I got a question.
So with
SPEAKER_01 (19:46):
all this technology.
SPEAKER_02 (19:48):
So with all this technology, we sound, having
Levi is awesome in this room,but it's like, I'm like, man, I
feel not as smart as I did 20minutes ago.
Continue, Patrick.
SPEAKER_01 (20:03):
I don't even know where I was going with that.
Is there anything, because youmentioned having the technology
like Anago and having a team ofmaintenance personnel and
whatever that you can depend on.
Is there anything that you stillhave to go to like Colorado or
Tennessee, like to those rentalproperties that you own
specifically go out there for?
(20:25):
Is there any part of thisprocess that you can accomplish
remotely?
Yeah,
SPEAKER_00 (20:31):
I mean, it's always going to be based on comfort
level and stuff.
I actually wanted to talk alittle bit more about the people
that we have, you know,maintaining the properties and
the team.
I think there's always going tobe some risk there.
So of course, meeting somebodyin person and being able to have
those face-to-face conversationsand relationships, you're never
(20:51):
going to be able to fullyreplicate that.
I think we've, as I mentionedbefore, there's always some
luck.
I think we've been pretty luckywith the people that we found,
but we're in three cities now,one in Colorado, Colorado
Springs, and then Knoxville andChattanooga.
We've struggled a little bitmore in Tennessee because we
haven't been there as long anddon't have those relationships.
And there are times wherefinding the right maintenance
person can be more difficult.
(21:13):
So I wouldn't say it's a must,but there are some benefits for
sure for being in person.
And then you have theunfortunate situations where
it's helpful to just be aroundif you need to stop by and look
at a house or if something goesto court, something like that.
Again, we've been pretty luckyon that front, but there will
always be things that requiresome in-person interaction.
(21:33):
So I wouldn't pick somewherethat you never want to go or
that is impossible for you toget to.
But I would say that if you'redoing the maintenance people and
and you're screening yourtenants correctly, it hopefully
is minimized to as little as youwant to go there.
SPEAKER_02 (21:51):
So circling all the way back around, we've heard a
lot about everything that you'vehad to do with your property
management over the years.
And I wanna know, in terms ofyour first property, Cause I do
think that originally we weresupposed to kind of really get
down to what was it like, youknow, jumping into all of this
from the very, from the very getgo.
(22:13):
So we got a couple of questions,I think, to talk about that very
first property that you got.
Sure.
What was the most stressfulpart?
If you had to pin exactly, likewhat was the, what was the thing
that caused the most, like themost stress or like, Do you ever
feel anxious when you werebuying that first property?
SPEAKER_00 (22:32):
You know, you asked about stress.
I think the honest answer aboutstress is you often stress about
the things that don't end upmattering or that in retrospect
aren't so important or so big.
So I already answered it alittle bit earlier, but I
think...
Looking back, the area where wefelt the most anxiety was
definitely around purchasing itand getting those first tenants
(22:53):
because it is that hurdle.
There was a lot of stressaround, are we making the right
decision?
Did we overpay for thisproperty?
I think that's where the bulk ofthe stress comes from.
I think also the firstmaintenance requests are the
first things that go wrong, evenif they're minor.
We were lucky in that the firstcouple of places we bought were
(23:13):
not disasters.
I mean, we do have a few horrorstories here and there, but we
were pretty lucky at thebeginning.
But, you know, the first timethat there's a major repair that
something goes wrong, I thinkyou're also like, am I in over
my head or did I miscalculatethis property?
Is there a ton of maintenancethat needs to be done?
So I think it's around kind ofthe first learning experiences
(23:35):
cause the most stress.
SPEAKER_02 (23:36):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (23:37):
And I'm sure there will be stressful days ahead for
things that we haven't quitemastered Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (23:42):
Do you feel like you gain a, like a thicker skin to
it over time?
Like
SPEAKER_00 (23:45):
these
SPEAKER_02 (23:46):
things
SPEAKER_00 (23:46):
just bother you less and less?
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, you know, there, thereis all kinds of things that I
think we're, we're just betterat managing the processes too.
I mean, earlier today, a tenantwas texting me about a specific
issue and I think for the firstproperty, it would have been, I
need to be out the door callingthis person and, and, you know,
being ASAP instead of saying,Hey, just put a maintenance
(24:07):
request in, you know, my partnerhandles X, Y, and Z.
Right.
There's a problem.
process for this and we'll makesure it gets done correctly and
fairly.
SPEAKER_01 (24:15):
That's good advice.
And earlier you had said thebiggest hurdle was definitely
going from zero to one.
How was, because obviously youown tons of properties now.
Not quite tons.
More than one, more than two.
You said three different, so atleast three because you said
three locations.
How much different is it nowthan it was when you just had
(24:37):
one property to manage?
SPEAKER_00 (24:39):
Yeah, I mean, listen, I I'm going to be an
advocate for the software I usebecause I work at it, but
there's no question that scalingbecomes a lot easier.
I think it's the same answer.
Zero to one is the biggesthurdle.
Once you have a portfolio andyou're collecting rent, like
you're sending out late notices,you're collecting rent, there's
(25:00):
a process, there's maintenancerequests.
I'm trying to think of thebiggest things that changed.
I think financing is always aninteresting question when you
get to bigger portfolios.
If you're doing one singlefamily home or you're looking at
maybe dipping your toes in thewater, you're probably looking
at going to a traditionalFreddie and Fannie mortgage,
(25:20):
going to a bank and getting oneloan and When you have a larger
portfolio, there's more options.
There's more exciting things youcan do.
You can pull cash out.
Kind of talked about that alittle bit earlier.
So I think financing is a reallyinteresting thing when the
portfolio gets bigger.
But in terms of managing day today, I can't think of any huge
changes.
I think once you nail down aprocess, you know, my business
(25:43):
partner handles some certainthings that he's better at.
He's more on the maintenancefront dealing with handy people
and directly with the tenants.
I do more of the finances andleases and stuff.
And so we have a good split.
I think at a certain point, itdoesn't matter how many
properties we have.
We just do the same thing at abigger scale.
Gotcha.
But there's no question thatmarginally it becomes less and
(26:05):
less when you add more.
That makes sense.
SPEAKER_02 (26:08):
For people like Patrick and I, we've talked on
the podcast for a couple ofweeks, a few episodes about
wanting to buy not justinvestment properties, but your
own personal property, likelooking for just property to
purchase, period.
Do you have any advice forpeople like looking in that
realm as well?
Like you You guys have purchasedproperties, but it sounds like a
vast majority of them have beeninvestment properties that
(26:31):
you're managing rather than yourown personal.
Yeah, that's
SPEAKER_00 (26:35):
a good question.
I've thought a lot about thisbecause I think once you get in
that mindset of viewingproperties as an investment and
as a tool for cash flow orwhatever your goals might be in
purchasing properties, there isthis risk of viewing all
property as just an investment.
I think you hear it a lot.
I think you hear people doingthe trade-offs of, is it worth
(26:58):
renting or buying?
Or is this property, what doesthe cap rate look like?
Whatever.
For a property that they'reactually purchasing to live in.
And I think that there's twosides of that coin.
I think it can be a hugepositive.
I think it's valuable tounderstand those metrics and
understand, am I throwing awaymoney in rent or is this
actually a good investment?
But of course, I think the otherside of that coin is you don't
(27:19):
want...
Not everything needs to beviewed in that lens.
If you're buying a property tolive in, it doesn't need to be
the best financial decisionever.
It doesn't need to be perfectcap rate or a property that you
would want to rent out.
So I I think there's a lot ofvalue in that.
And I think if somebody, if, ifthat fits with their lifestyle,
you know, they want to have anADU on the property that they're
(27:41):
renting out or Airbnb atsometimes, um, more power to
them.
But I, I think it's, it's a toolto have rather than how you
should be viewing propertiesthat you're buying.
Um,
SPEAKER_01 (27:51):
so yeah.
Cool.
I actually have a follow-up onthat.
Cause like, I think maybe it wasthe last episode or two episodes
ago, we were talking about likebuying a rental property while
still renting yourself.
Like when you, when you boughtyour, your first rental property
with your friend, were you stilllike the property you were
living in?
Were you still renting?
SPEAKER_00 (28:11):
Yeah.
I still rent now.
Okay.
Yeah.
I live in New York and I rentthere and yeah, I go through a
lot of the same calculation of,you know, does it make sense to
buy?
What would that look like?
I think, No question.
As I spoke to earlier, I wouldbe a lot more comfortable
purchasing a house to live injust because it's a it's a
process.
And all of these terms thatmight scare people like mortgage
(28:32):
escrow are super familiar to menow.
But I Yeah, I still rent aswell.
Gotcha.
What
SPEAKER_02 (28:40):
would it take for you to buy property in New York
City?
A few million more.
Okay, cool.
Patrick, what do you say we diveinto the listener mailbag and
ask Levi?
I know we got some backup.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I think we can answer.
We'll just kind of throw it outinto the group and discuss, and
(29:02):
we'll see where it goes.
UNKNOWN (29:07):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (29:10):
kick it off or you want me to?
SPEAKER_01 (29:11):
Sounds like you want me to kick it off.
I think I do want you to kick itoff.
SPEAKER_02 (29:15):
Say what you feel.
Patrick, do it.
SPEAKER_01 (29:17):
Okay.
First question.
Annabelle from Orchard Park, NewYork asks, what's the best way
for renters to evaluate whethera neighborhood is right for
them?
I mean, I don't know.
As a renter, I think it dependsso much on what you want to get
out of the neighborhood.
Yeah,
SPEAKER_02 (29:36):
this is a tough question for me because it's
like I've always lived in thegreater Cincinnati area and I
know the neighborhoods.
So it's like I pick theneighborhood, I go to the
neighborhood, I know what thevibe is like.
So it's easy for me to be like,as a renter, kind of be like,
oh, I know what this part oftown's atmosphere is like
compared to this part of town.
I know I'm going to be safer inthis part of town than another
one.
So I don't know.
(29:57):
I mean...
It's kind of like instinctualalmost.
I don't know how you feel.
SPEAKER_00 (30:00):
Yeah, I mean, I mentioned I live in New York.
I'm a big walker.
Not every city in the U of mostcities in the U.S.
are not super walkable.
But right.
Yeah.
Whether you you think you'regoing to be walking around or
driving around a lot, I thinkvisiting the area you're going
to be in and just feelingcomfortable there.
No question.
I mean, I walked around where Ilive quite a bit before I moved
there.
And I mean, I find myselfwalking five miles a day in the
(30:23):
area.
So, yeah, that's that's probablythe biggest thing for me.
SPEAKER_01 (30:26):
No, that makes sense.
And I remember when I firstmoved to Cincinnati and I was
asking some people who werefamiliar with Cincinnati like
any recommendations on likeneighborhoods or properties or
whatever and it was interestingbecause like depending on who I
asked there were different kindsof recommendations like I know
for some people it's importantto have a big apartment complex
with a ton of amenities somepeople like don't want to share
walls and and yeah you know likewhen I have some friends come
(30:48):
visit me they're like they theylike my apartment they
understand why I want to livewhere I do but they would never
want to live in that sort ofsituation you know in the city
like well I like like walking,but some people would not want
to live downtown the
SPEAKER_02 (31:01):
city.
Well, I figured it would be mostimportant to you, the radius of
fast food
SPEAKER_01 (31:05):
restaurants.
Yeah.
That was definitely a...
Skyline Chili.
There was a Skyline Chilinine-minute walk from my
apartment.
You've mapped it out exactly.
It's exactly
SPEAKER_02 (31:15):
1,200 feet.
All right.
Next question.
Jasmine from Minneapolis writesin, says, what are some
strategies for purchasing ahigh-quality investment property
at a low price?
So she's looking to get the bestbang for her buck in some
respects.
So I wonder if this might begeared for our friend Levi to
(31:36):
answer.
SPEAKER_00 (31:36):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I mean, I think anyone wants tobuy the best property you can at
the lowest price.
SPEAKER_01 (31:46):
That's a hot take, Jasmine.
SPEAKER_00 (31:51):
Yeah, and there's no question, too, that it's a lot
more competitive the last coupleof years.
And a lot of the things aroundrentals that we talked about
with technology, I think, hasalso made it more competitive.
It isn't the days where you canfind a to sign and go talk to
the owner with all of the onlinesyndication for properties that
(32:13):
are for sale.
Anyone can find, at least ifthey're listed publicly.
So when you're actually innegotiations, I think one of the
biggest takeaways I had is toalways think about what the
other side wants.
There can be win-wins in thesenegotiations and these
conversations.
A seller might be less worriedabout what closing costs look
like because they're about toget a big payout.
(32:34):
Whereas a buyer might be moreconcerned because they're the
ones putting money down.
And so you might be able tonegotiate on the selling price,
but have some of that come backat closing where the numbers are
actually the same, but the buyeris significantly happier because
they're not putting down as muchmoney or other conversations
(32:54):
like that.
So I think there are win-winsand there's a lot of interesting
things specifically withinfinancing and negotiations that
you can work on there.
SPEAKER_02 (33:02):
Yeah, cool.
SPEAKER_00 (33:03):
Oh, am I up?
SPEAKER_02 (33:04):
I think you're up.
I mean, unless you want to justkeep, you know, just staring at
each other in dead
SPEAKER_01 (33:10):
air.
Okay, we got Max from ColoradoSprings.
Hey, look at that.
That's where you're from, right?
Yep.
Do you know Max?
I know a few.
Okay, Maddox asks, what's theweirdest real estate trend
you've seen come and go?
Barn Dominiums.
SPEAKER_02 (33:31):
We did talk about Barn Dominiums.
I don't know how weird.
It's pretty
SPEAKER_00 (33:36):
funky.
SPEAKER_02 (33:36):
I don't
SPEAKER_00 (33:36):
know about that.
What are some trends?
(34:08):
even over the next couple ofyears and we see more changes
there.
SPEAKER_02 (34:12):
So short-term rental, like the amount of
people that are doing it, youthink that that's like
decreasing generally?
SPEAKER_00 (34:20):
Yeah, I think you had this huge jump in people
seeing it, especially in thepost-COVID era of it was at its
height.
I think there were a lot morepeople using the services and it
was a lot more popular forrenters.
And it really got flooded withso many investors.
And then you started seeingcities pull back.
(34:40):
So yeah, I mean, I think there'sno question that there will be
more changes.
And I'm not going to predictwhat the short-term market is
going to look like in five or 10years.
But there's some pretty bigchanges that I think will
continue to happen.
SPEAKER_02 (34:52):
Okay.
Maybe we'll have to have youback on for short-term rental
diagnosis, the state of theindustry kind of thing.
All right.
We got two more questions.
I think we can fit in all five.
We'll do really quick round thetable.
You guys ready?
Just like first thing that comesto your mind.
What's your dream renovationproject and what room would you
tackle first?
Patrick.
(35:13):
Dream renovation.
Why did I have to go first?
Because I pointed at you first.
All right, fine.
Levi.
SPEAKER_00 (35:19):
Dream renovation project.
You better be thinking of youranswer than one.
I think when I think of myliving space, I love a good
movie, TV show, reading, and afireplace.
So that kind of coalesces intoit.
I would say a living room.
Um, so I'm going to do a niceentertainment where the TV can
(35:40):
be hidden, but a reallycomfortable couch to, to read on
and a fireplace.
So living room is my spot.
SPEAKER_02 (35:47):
Patrick.
SPEAKER_01 (35:48):
Can I, I'm going to pick a little bit of a different
approach.
No, I'm not.
I'm thinking outside.
Okay.
I want like, I want a veryspecific kind of like wooden
fence, uh, Like, do you guysknow what I'm talking about?
I'm a big fence guy.
Like there's that one fence.
(36:09):
What's it called?
Where it's just like the oldlooking wood.
Like, you know what I mean?
It looks kind of like atic-tac-toe board.
You know, like that fence?
Like a picket fence?
No, not picket.
No, not a picket.
Like, what's it called?
SPEAKER_02 (36:22):
I don't know, Patrick.
I like the fence.
The first thing I'm doing...
You're saying that you want todo, like, a backyard.
You want to renovate a
SPEAKER_01 (36:29):
backyard.
Yeah, it was like, I want abackyard to look a very specific
way because there's a fence.
It's not like a picket fence.
It's like, it's one of thosefences that has, like, that, and
it's got the two bars.
SPEAKER_02 (36:38):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (36:38):
You know?
One of those?
No, you guys aren't grasping.
Anyways, first thing I'm doingwhen I buy a property.
I trust you.
I really like the aesthetic ofthose fences, and I want to
build that fence around my yardand then have a grill there and
then grill hot dogs andhamburgers while looking at the
fence.
That's my first renovationproject.
SPEAKER_02 (36:58):
Wow.
That seems doable.
That seems very doable.
I don't know why you didn't saythis.
I was going to say I'd renovatean old theater or something and
turn it into a house.
It's a dream project.
We can do whatever we want.
Oh, I misunderstood.
What if there was a cool vintagetheater that I could just
renovate and turn into my ownhouse?
SPEAKER_00 (37:18):
Yeah, I just did one room.
SPEAKER_01 (37:19):
Oh, I didn't understand the question.
SPEAKER_02 (37:21):
It's a big
SPEAKER_01 (37:22):
room.
My mind went to the fence.
SPEAKER_02 (37:24):
My mind went to the fence.
All right.
I think we got time for one moreand then wrap it up.
Yeah?
Okay.
So Emily from Long Beach,California writes in and says,
what do you do if a potentialtenant doesn't have any credit
history or rental history?
How do you decide whether togive them a chance?
So we had a little ha-ha's andnow we're going to actually get
into the serious stuff to end.
UNKNOWN (37:46):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (37:47):
That's a good question.
It's a tough one because youalways want to be fair to
tenants.
I think everyone's been a tenantor most people have been
tenants.
A lot of us have been inpositions where we maybe don't
have credit history coming outof college, maybe have debt.
So in addition to being fair andbeing ethical in the first
(38:08):
place, you also have rules andregulations depending on what
city or state you're in.
So there's a lot that goes intothat.
In some places, you can't useincome or you can't use income
in a specific way.
I think subject to your city'srules, We always look for some
(38:30):
sort of income.
So if they don't have previousincome, do you have some sort of
job offer, future income, somesort of evidence that they can
provide?
You can also, in most places,talk to previous landlords, even
if they were college students,whatever else.
Co-signers are always a goodoption.
So they might have a parentthat's willing to sign.
So yeah, it's a tough questionto answer, but Again, having
(38:54):
been in those shoes before,there are a lot of options for
the landlord also to both befair and make sure that they're
protected as well.
SPEAKER_02 (39:02):
Yeah, for sure.
You got anything insightful,Patrick?
I agree.
I agree.
And there's a lot of goodsoftwares out there, resources
out there to use to get thisinformation if you were so
inclined to.
Isn't that right, Levi?
SPEAKER_01 (39:15):
Yes, there are.
SPEAKER_02 (39:18):
Okay.
Nice segue.
Yeah.
All right.
Guys, thanks for hanging out anddiscussing everything.
Levi, thank you for being hereto kind of talk.
Yeah, thank you for having me.
It's a good conversation.
Yeah, for sure.
It's been enlightening.
It's been awesome to hear aboutyour adventures and experiences
in the industry.
Obviously, Patrick and I wishyou both luck in all future
(39:39):
endeavors in propertymanagement, and we hope that
you'll continue to come back andteach us things because we need
some more learning, I think.
SPEAKER_00 (39:47):
I think so, too.
Yeah, I'm excited to hear aboutyour guys' first place, too.
It sounds like you might begoing to business together.
SPEAKER_02 (39:51):
Well, I guess we're buying a theater with a really
nice fence.
It's going to be the wonkiestproperty in the greater
Cincinnati area.
Okay, cool.
Well, that is another episode ofthe Rentish Podcast in the
books.
Remember, follow us on all thesocial media platforms that are
out there and make sure tosubscribe to the podcast.
Five stars, review, rate,comment, whatever the thing is,
(40:14):
clapping hands, emojis, andstuff like that in the comments.
And then email any of your topicsuggestions, feedback, you know,
just general praises.
I know Patrick needs those.
To questions attherentishpod.com.
You need positive feedback andencouragement.
Yeah, that's okay.
Keeps me going.
You're doing a great job.
Thanks.
(40:35):
All right.
I've been Zach.
That's been Patrick.
That was Levi.
Thank you guys.
And yeah, we'll see you later.
What's going on, everybody?
Welcome to another episode ofthe Rentish Podcast.
My name is Zach and I'm herewith my co-host, Patrick.
who just took a big sip ofcoffee.
There it is.
Hey, occupational hazard here,Patrick.
We're trying to be safe on thepodcast.
We don't want you choking oncoffee.
(00:20):
We're trying to get yourcatchphrase out.
We're your host for The RentistPodcast, of course, which is a
podcast that's kind of aboutrental properties and hosted by
two guys that work in the realestate industry and sort of know
what we're talking about.
But mostly don't now coffee.
Yeah, so that's the cadence,right?
Say the quote, drink the coffee.
Yeah, Patrick, mostly we don't,which is why I think you're
(00:41):
You're gonna have fun hearing ustalk to experts.
Experts, huh?
Oh, I see what you did there.
And learning with us or justlaughing along at how little we
know.
Patrick.
How's your day going, buddy?
It's good.
SPEAKER_01 (00:52):
I had some Skyline for lunch.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (00:54):
We're really happy about that.
Explain to our non-Cincinnatiresidents really quickly what
Skyline
SPEAKER_01 (00:58):
is.
So yeah, Skyline's like areligion down here in
Cincinnati.
I said down here because I'moriginally from like the Akron,
Cleveland area.
Okay.
Up here, I guess, if you know.
Sure.
But yeah, it's like whatCincinnati is known for.
It's kind of like a saucy,chili.
I don't really know how todescribe it.
You put it either on noodles ora hot dog.
SPEAKER_02 (01:16):
I've always told people that don't understand,
it's like an old Greek traditionthat came to Cincinnati.
It's basically like a bolognesekind of chili sauce poured over
spaghetti with cheese, onions,beans, crackers, hot sauce.
You calling it a religion ispretty apt, I would say.
SPEAKER_01 (01:35):
I love getting Skyline.
I haven't had it in about threeweeks, so I was due for some
Skyline.
Well,
SPEAKER_02 (01:40):
now you're all greased up and you're ready to
rock and roll.
Now I'm in a small room withyou.
Thanks, Patrick.
Appreciate that.
Well, today it's going to be anawesome episode.
Remember, follow The Rentedonline.
If you're listening on Spotifyor Apple Podcasts or wherever
you get your podcasts, just goahead and give us a follow and
give us a rating or a review.
Five stars.
Give us a comment.
(02:01):
Like the episode.
Whatever positivity you canthrow our direction on the
podcast service you use, wewould really much appreciate
that.
And if you have a question or acomment or any kind of topic
idea or suggestion for Patrickand I to talk about on the show,
feel free to email questions attherentishpod.com.
Patrick.
SPEAKER_01 (02:18):
Yes.
SPEAKER_02 (02:19):
I don't even want to dance around it.
Typically, I'd be like, Like,you know, let's talk about, I
don't know, Ryan Gosling for afew minutes or whatever, but
we're not going to do that thisweek because we've got too much
to do in so little time.
We actually are joined by a veryspecial guest today, and that's
going to kind of take up theentire episode.
Today, we're excited to welcomeLevi Abramson to the show.
Levi is an experienced realestate investor and entrepreneur
(02:42):
currently working at Inago,where he helps property owners
and landlords simplify rentalmanagement.
Beyond his work in prop tech,Levi has a strong background in
real estate We're diving intohis journey as a property owner,
what he's learned, thechallenges he's faced, and his
(03:03):
best advice for those looking tobuy their first property.
Everybody.
Or Patrick, let's give a warmwelcome to Levi to the show.
There he is.
Hey guys, how are we doing?
Hey Levi.
How are you?
Thank
SPEAKER_00 (03:13):
you for coming on.
Yeah, thank you.
I also had Skyline with Patrickearlier.
SPEAKER_02 (03:18):
I'm outnumbered.
We're glad that you're on theshow.
We're very excited to kind ofjust pick your brain and kind of
chit chat with you for a littlewhile.
And, you know, hopefully it'sfun.
Hopefully, you know, Patrick, itcan get a little loud in this
room.
Hopefully three voices all kindof churning at once.
I don't know what you're talkingabout.
I don't know.
What am I talking about?
(03:38):
What are you talking about?
If that's how you talked all thetime, I don't know if I can
handle it.
Is that your
SPEAKER_01 (03:43):
NPR voice?
This is my normal voice, Zach.
SPEAKER_02 (03:46):
But mostly we don't.
All right, Levi.
So we're here to talk to youabout your experience in the
industry, property management,real estate, entrepreneurism.
We've got all this stuff.
We got tons of questions thatwe're going to kind of go
through.
But before we kind of reallyjump into grilling you on all
your background and everything,just kind of are I'd love to
(04:07):
learn a little bit more aboutyour journey, who you are, what
makes you tick, and why you'rehere today.
SPEAKER_00 (04:12):
Sure.
I don't know how much I'm goingto be able to do on what makes
me tick today.
Hopefully it's not an episodefull of that.
But yeah, about 10 years ago, abuddy from high school and I
invested in our first property.
It was one of those things thatwe had always talked about.
I think a lot of people havethat conversation of what if we
invested in a place and justkind of had it as side income
(04:35):
when retirement rolls around.
and that kind of thing.
And we did one together.
Again, it was a friend from highschool.
So it was somebody I wascomfortable with who I was
pretty confident getting intobusiness with them.
And the one went really well.
We definitely invested at a goodtime.
There's a lot of luck involvedin this as there often is, but
there was a lot of luck.
We did really well on that one.
(04:57):
And I think we just got more andmore interested.
So I had a little bit ofbusiness background.
I went to business school forundergrad and was already
working in the tech space.
And it kind kind of justaligned.
It was a perfect opportunity ofa lot of opportunity for tech to
make it better.
So we pretty quickly went fromcollecting check payments to
(05:17):
online and then startedinvesting in more properties.
The one went well, so we boughtanother one.
They were cash flowing.
The market was going well.
And so that kind of just wentinto a larger and larger
business.
You mentioned the businessschool.
I went to Harvard for businessschool and focused on real
estate there.
And around the same time, theportfolio started getting big
(05:39):
enough that it really becamemore than just a side thing
where we were doing one hour aweek.
And that was when we startedlooking at different ways to
manage the properties.
And so we started out collectingchecks and doing everything on a
spreadsheet.
We moved over to anothersoftware.
I don't know if I'm allowed tosay the name.
SPEAKER_02 (06:01):
We don't know.
Don't ask us.
We'll say whatever we want andthen they just say it.
Censor us later.
They're not around anymore.
Yeah.
Oh,
SPEAKER_00 (06:09):
okay.
Yeah.
Purchased by another company,purchased and not around
anymore.
And then ended up looking fordifferent options, settled on
Inago.
And yeah, the rest is history.
We scaled up the portfolio fromthere and have been using Inago
for about five or six yearssince that.
SPEAKER_02 (06:26):
That is awesome.
I have a quick question.
I don't know
SPEAKER_01 (06:28):
if you want to structure this or anything.
Jump in.
Jump in.
The water's fine.
So I think Zach and I, we'recoming from a place like neither
of us own real estate at thispoint.
But I think we both expressedinterest in owning properties
and a rental property.
Getting your first property, andyou mentioned you did it with a
high school friend.
Did you have to wait for theperfect opportunity for the
stars to align?
(06:50):
Or how did you get the...
How did it work out that youwere able to just buy your first
property?
SPEAKER_00 (06:57):
Yeah, that's a great question.
And I get I obviously get thatquestion a lot.
People are curious, you know, ifthey're kind of on the other
side of having their firstproperty and It really is a
comfort thing, getting the firstproperty.
It's very daunting being on theother side.
I remember we looked for placesfor a really long time and it
did feel like we needed theperfect place.
(07:18):
Now, of course, there's abalance.
I think if you spend yearslooking for the perfect place,
it's never going to come andyou're just never going to get
over that hump.
But on the other side...
you know, it obviously does takesome research and some some idea
of what parameters you'relooking for in a property.
But there's no question thatgoing from zero to one property
(07:40):
was the biggest hurdle by far.
It's a scary thing.
I mean, you're putting realmoney down depending on how you
structure your loan and whateveryour partnership looks like.
It's real money.
You have skin in the game andyou could you could lose money,
too.
So, yeah, getting to that firstone was a big a big hurdle.
I think your question was aroundaround understanding if we had
(08:02):
if the stars had to align or ifit had to be perfect, there's no
question that it took like aleap of faith.
I think the conditions werenever going to be 100% perfect,
but we had some good idea ofwhat we wanted.
And I think we did some goodanalysis on the front end.
It wasn't anything excessive,but just an idea of getting
comfortable with what does amortgage payment look like?
(08:24):
What is escrow?
Some of these basic things.
And also investing in a marketwe were comfortable with.
We're from the Colorado Springsarea originally, and that is
where our first property was.
Gotcha.
SPEAKER_02 (08:35):
And you said that the first property that you got
was with a high school friend.
You were in college at the timewhen you acquired the property.
Is that right?
It
SPEAKER_00 (08:42):
was post-college.
So yeah, we had alreadygraduated.
We were earning a little bit ofincome from our first jobs.
And yeah, you know, I think youpointed out the high school
friend.
It's also a question I get a lotgoing into business with a
friend or family.
I think that's something a lotof people are nervous about or a
frequent question.
And it is something that I thinkis definitely a big
(09:02):
consideration and something thatwe struggled with at first.
You know, we've had our minorblubs for sure, and it isn't
always perfect.
But there's no question that thefirst thing you need to do is
have somebody that you trust.
And I think we do have a lot oftrust for each other.
And that's where we've been ableto manage for 10 years, despite
not having the same closenessthat we did in high school.
SPEAKER_02 (09:23):
Yeah, that's awesome.
Patrick, don't get any ideas.
You and me, baby.
You want to start looking?
Let's do it.
Got it.
Superhouse.
We'll get the Barn Dominiumcomplex started.
Oh, dude, I'm down.
Yeah, shout out to that oldepisode of Rentish.
The real ones now.
The real ones, though.
The one that aired not that longago.
(09:44):
I have no idea when it aired.
So I would like to ask you aquestion.
We can skip over it if you wantto, but before you went to
college to study real estate,your major was what again?
SPEAKER_00 (09:54):
So I did undergrad at University of Pennsylvania.
I was just general business, soeconomics.
I actually in undergrad did notOkay.
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah.
(10:32):
at like a frontline level, Ialready had a really good idea
of what property ownership andmanagement looked like.
Of course, there's this wholedifferent ballgame of private
equity and a lot of thecomplicated stuff that most
people would never get into,myself included, that really
came from business school.
But it really, most of theexpertise and the super helpful,
(10:54):
knowledgeable stuff came fromactually managing properties and
learning by doing.
I mean, we made mistakes andthose were some of the most
valuable things that thathappened.
SPEAKER_02 (11:04):
I would like to know your search process.
As you're talking to a couple ofguys in here in this room that,
you know, like Patrick said, weare kind of invested.
You were interested ineventually one day having like
an investment property orpurchasing properties of our
own.
What was your search processlike?
And what is it still like?
I mean, what criteria do youlook for in the perfect house?
Like what are the perfect place?
(11:24):
Like whether it's residential,commercial, like what are the
things that you really startfrom square one
SPEAKER_00 (11:30):
at?
Yeah, I think for me, it's...
I think everybody is going tohave a different answer to this
question.
For me, it's really the marriageof real-world conditions and
what's happening in theneighborhoods that you're
looking at with the hardnumbers.
And I don't think you canover-rely on one of those.
I think when you look at thenumbers side, you always have
(11:50):
things like cap rates, NOI, IRR,and I'm not sure how familiar
you are with those specificterms.
You probably should be a littlebit familiar before you jump in.
Yeah, I I think that's a safebet.
That's
SPEAKER_02 (12:04):
why we have a special guest, like shout out to
Mary, who's on the showsometimes, one of our special
guests, Mary Regano, who givesus those real estate term
question games, so you canlisten to one of those episodes.
SPEAKER_00 (12:16):
We're learning.
I think she's also a businessschool alum, so she probably
picked a lot of those up there,but you look at something like
cap rate, which is basicallyjust the ratio of what a house
costs or a property costs versuswhat you're renting it for, but
those numbers will vary wildlydepending on what market you're
looking at.
If you're looking at a reallybig market in New York City,
(12:37):
you're going to have really lowcap rates because properties are
more expensive relative to therental prices you're getting.
But that doesn't mean that a lowcap rate or a high cap rate is
always good.
You have to marry it with thereal world conditions of what do
I think about this city?
What kind of tenants am I goingto get?
Am I in a neighborhood wherethere's maybe a lot of college
students that are going to, youknow, my property is going to
(13:00):
have a really fast.
So it really is, you know, yourquestion was around the search
criteria.
I think you just have to have anidea of what kind of cap rate am
I looking at?
What kind of return with whatfinancing can I get?
And marry that with yourunderstanding of the market,
which is why we invested thefirst series of properties that
(13:21):
we got in a market that we didfeel comfortable and we knew the
neighborhoods, we knew what kindof cap rate would be worth the
risk to put it.
SPEAKER_01 (13:30):
So I have a question and I'm not sure if you already
kind of covered a little bit ofthis, but with all of the
properties that you have, yousaid the first one was in
Colorado Springs where you'refrom.
Yep, that's right.
From there, other propertiesthat you might have purchased...
Were they like not all based inColorado?
(13:50):
Have you bought properties inother states?
SPEAKER_00 (13:53):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (13:53):
So what
SPEAKER_00 (13:54):
have we, we did purchase the first one in the
first couple of single familyhomes in Colorado Springs.
You know, that the market, thelast 10 years, as anyone who's
paid any attention knows hasbeen pretty crazy.
There's, there's been marketswhere the appreciation has been
great for current owners andmaybe has priced out some people
who live there or who arelooking at investing.
So we had been investing inColorado Springs prices did end
(14:17):
up going up quite a bit, which,you know, appreciation is one of
the ways that you make money inreal estate investing.
So it was good for theproperties that we did purchase.
But by the time that we werelooking to expand more, we did
start looking at other markets.
So we have the portfolio inColorado Springs, but we did a
cash out refi.
So basically refinancing thatloan into one portfolio loan,
(14:41):
which we can go whateverdirection you guys want.
But that might be a We basicallypulled some cash out and then we
looked across the US and welooked at exactly what I was
just talking about around caprates and what our hypothesis
was of all of these differentcities we were looking at and
ended up investing in Tennessee.
So Colorado and Tennessee arethe two states that we have
(15:04):
property.
SPEAKER_01 (15:04):
And what's it like?
Obviously, you can't be in bothColorado and Tennessee at the
same time.
And I don't think you're basedin either state.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (15:43):
You want a good handyman, you want a good team
of people that you trust andthat you think are gonna do you
right when it comes to repairingthose properties.
But the other piece istechnology.
I think a lot of peopleunderestimate Thank you so much
(16:07):
for joining us.
How do I mark this on thespreadsheet?
(16:29):
How do I send out these notices?
It really consolidates all ofthat.
It helps with listing.
So when a property, a lease isgoing to be up, we can relist it
online and use the syndicationnetwork for that.
Leases, e-signing, that'sprobably the biggest one.
That was one of the reasons westarted using Inago in the first
place.
We don't juggle 50 paper leases.
(16:51):
We have it online as a template.
It takes...
probably five, six minutes tocreate a new lease.
And then it just gets sent out,e-signs, and then Inago keeps a
record of all of that.
So when I do need that lease, Ihave a record without even
having to think of, you know,how am I going to organize all
of this, do all of that.
So when you have those twopieces, I think you have a
(17:13):
really valuable toolkit thatmaybe without the internet would
have been really difficult 20,30 years ago.
That really makes it a lot moremanageable.
SPEAKER_02 (17:23):
Yeah, for newcomers too.
I mean, it's like...
You have to imagine now isprobably, in the history of this
planet, probably the best timeto be a small-time landlord.
Right?
I mean, what would you have donedifferently if you had the
access to today's kind oftechnology when you were buying
your first property?
Yeah,
SPEAKER_00 (17:42):
I mean, I'm not that old, so.
SPEAKER_02 (17:45):
That's fair.
That question did make it seemlike you were much older than
you are.
SPEAKER_00 (17:48):
The technology is mostly the same, but I get your,
yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (17:52):
Basically, what's changed since when you bought
your first property?
to now?
SPEAKER_00 (17:56):
Yeah, I think the leases was the biggest thing.
I mean, we really were doing thetraditional paper check leases.
And I remember having to preparethose PDFs.
There were a few that we evensent physically in the mail.
And it's just a process you haveto manage.
And it shouldn't be.
A lease is a lease.
Of course, there are certainthings that you can customize
(18:17):
and you can also do that throughInago.
But there are certain things youhave to customize.
But you sign a lease and thenyou just need the document.
So that was probably the biggestthing.
But But from the beginning, Ithink we've used some technology
for getting it listed, formaking sure people can see it.
Yeah, I don't think there's beenany huge changes the last couple
of years.
Cool.
I think the other thing, theother quick pitch I would give
(18:39):
is, you know, there's that wholeprocess of people moving in and
moving out.
And I think what I love about myjob working at Inago in product
is I also get to focus on whatare things that I want as
somebody who also is a landlord.
And so, for instance, one of thereally big things over the last
couple of months that we hadseen was the same thing as the
(19:02):
leases that I was just talkingabout with move in, move out
checklist.
Right.
Right.
There has to be somebody therewith a physical piece of paper
marking it and saying, whatexactly is wrong with the house?
How do I keep a record of this?
It protects the tenant and thelandlord.
And I think a lot of landlordsdon't do it because there's no
easy solution.
It's not like collecting rentonline.
There's no easy way to do that.
(19:22):
And so at Inago, we rolled outthe move-in, move-out checklist
as a damage report where tenantsgo through the house, they see
what's wrong with it, they markit up, and they submit it
through the app.
And it does the same thing.
It creates a PDF that I have asa landlord when they move So I
know what damage was there.
I don't charge them unfairly,but also I'm protected if they
do do damage and say, nope, itwas there before.
(19:44):
So I got a question.
So with
SPEAKER_01 (19:46):
all this technology.
SPEAKER_02 (19:48):
So with all this technology, we sound, having
Levi is awesome in this room,but it's like, I'm like, man, I
feel not as smart as I did 20minutes ago.
Continue, Patrick.
SPEAKER_01 (20:03):
I don't even know where I was going with that.
Is there anything, because youmentioned having the technology
like Anago and having a team ofmaintenance personnel and
whatever that you can depend on.
Is there anything that you stillhave to go to like Colorado or
Tennessee, like to those rentalproperties that you own
specifically go out there for?
(20:25):
Is there any part of thisprocess that you can accomplish
remotely?
Yeah,
SPEAKER_00 (20:31):
I mean, it's always going to be based on comfort
level and stuff.
I actually wanted to talk alittle bit more about the people
that we have, you know,maintaining the properties and
the team.
I think there's always going tobe some risk there.
So of course, meeting somebodyin person and being able to have
those face-to-face conversationsand relationships, you're never
(20:51):
going to be able to fullyreplicate that.
I think we've, as I mentionedbefore, there's always some
luck.
I think we've been pretty luckywith the people that we found,
but we're in three cities now,one in Colorado, Colorado
Springs, and then Knoxville andChattanooga.
We've struggled a little bitmore in Tennessee because we
haven't been there as long anddon't have those relationships.
And there are times wherefinding the right maintenance
person can be more difficult.
(21:13):
So I wouldn't say it's a must,but there are some benefits for
sure for being in person.
And then you have theunfortunate situations where
it's helpful to just be aroundif you need to stop by and look
at a house or if something goesto court, something like that.
Again, we've been pretty luckyon that front, but there will
always be things that requiresome in-person interaction.
(21:33):
So I wouldn't pick somewherethat you never want to go or
that is impossible for you toget to.
But I would say that if you'redoing the maintenance people and
and you're screening yourtenants correctly, it hopefully
is minimized to as little as youwant to go there.
SPEAKER_02 (21:51):
So circling all the way back around, we've heard a
lot about everything that you'vehad to do with your property
management over the years.
And I wanna know, in terms ofyour first property, Cause I do
think that originally we weresupposed to kind of really get
down to what was it like, youknow, jumping into all of this
from the very, from the very getgo.
(22:13):
So we got a couple of questions,I think, to talk about that very
first property that you got.
Sure.
What was the most stressfulpart?
If you had to pin exactly, likewhat was the, what was the thing
that caused the most, like themost stress or like, Do you ever
feel anxious when you werebuying that first property?
SPEAKER_00 (22:32):
You know, you asked about stress.
I think the honest answer aboutstress is you often stress about
the things that don't end upmattering or that in retrospect
aren't so important or so big.
So I already answered it alittle bit earlier, but I
think...
Looking back, the area where wefelt the most anxiety was
definitely around purchasing itand getting those first tenants
(22:53):
because it is that hurdle.
There was a lot of stressaround, are we making the right
decision?
Did we overpay for thisproperty?
I think that's where the bulk ofthe stress comes from.
I think also the firstmaintenance requests are the
first things that go wrong, evenif they're minor.
We were lucky in that the firstcouple of places we bought were
(23:13):
not disasters.
I mean, we do have a few horrorstories here and there, but we
were pretty lucky at thebeginning.
But, you know, the first timethat there's a major repair that
something goes wrong, I thinkyou're also like, am I in over
my head or did I miscalculatethis property?
Is there a ton of maintenancethat needs to be done?
So I think it's around kind ofthe first learning experiences
(23:35):
cause the most stress.
SPEAKER_02 (23:36):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (23:37):
And I'm sure there will be stressful days ahead for
things that we haven't quitemastered Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (23:42):
Do you feel like you gain a, like a thicker skin to
it over time?
Like
SPEAKER_00 (23:45):
these
SPEAKER_02 (23:46):
things
SPEAKER_00 (23:46):
just bother you less and less?
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, you know, there, thereis all kinds of things that I
think we're, we're just betterat managing the processes too.
I mean, earlier today, a tenantwas texting me about a specific
issue and I think for the firstproperty, it would have been, I
need to be out the door callingthis person and, and, you know,
being ASAP instead of saying,Hey, just put a maintenance
(24:07):
request in, you know, my partnerhandles X, Y, and Z.
Right.
There's a problem.
process for this and we'll makesure it gets done correctly and
fairly.
SPEAKER_01 (24:15):
That's good advice.
And earlier you had said thebiggest hurdle was definitely
going from zero to one.
How was, because obviously youown tons of properties now.
Not quite tons.
More than one, more than two.
You said three different, so atleast three because you said
three locations.
How much different is it nowthan it was when you just had
(24:37):
one property to manage?
SPEAKER_00 (24:39):
Yeah, I mean, listen, I I'm going to be an
advocate for the software I usebecause I work at it, but
there's no question that scalingbecomes a lot easier.
I think it's the same answer.
Zero to one is the biggesthurdle.
Once you have a portfolio andyou're collecting rent, like
you're sending out late notices,you're collecting rent, there's
(25:00):
a process, there's maintenancerequests.
I'm trying to think of thebiggest things that changed.
I think financing is always aninteresting question when you
get to bigger portfolios.
If you're doing one singlefamily home or you're looking at
maybe dipping your toes in thewater, you're probably looking
at going to a traditionalFreddie and Fannie mortgage,
(25:20):
going to a bank and getting oneloan and When you have a larger
portfolio, there's more options.
There's more exciting things youcan do.
You can pull cash out.
Kind of talked about that alittle bit earlier.
So I think financing is a reallyinteresting thing when the
portfolio gets bigger.
But in terms of managing day today, I can't think of any huge
changes.
I think once you nail down aprocess, you know, my business
(25:43):
partner handles some certainthings that he's better at.
He's more on the maintenancefront dealing with handy people
and directly with the tenants.
I do more of the finances andleases and stuff.
And so we have a good split.
I think at a certain point, itdoesn't matter how many
properties we have.
We just do the same thing at abigger scale.
Gotcha.
But there's no question thatmarginally it becomes less and
(26:05):
less when you add more.
That makes sense.
SPEAKER_02 (26:08):
For people like Patrick and I, we've talked on
the podcast for a couple ofweeks, a few episodes about
wanting to buy not justinvestment properties, but your
own personal property, likelooking for just property to
purchase, period.
Do you have any advice forpeople like looking in that
realm as well?
Like you You guys have purchasedproperties, but it sounds like a
vast majority of them have beeninvestment properties that
(26:31):
you're managing rather than yourown personal.
Yeah, that's
SPEAKER_00 (26:35):
a good question.
I've thought a lot about thisbecause I think once you get in
that mindset of viewingproperties as an investment and
as a tool for cash flow orwhatever your goals might be in
purchasing properties, there isthis risk of viewing all
property as just an investment.
I think you hear it a lot.
I think you hear people doingthe trade-offs of, is it worth
(26:58):
renting or buying?
Or is this property, what doesthe cap rate look like?
Whatever.
For a property that they'reactually purchasing to live in.
And I think that there's twosides of that coin.
I think it can be a hugepositive.
I think it's valuable tounderstand those metrics and
understand, am I throwing awaymoney in rent or is this
actually a good investment?
But of course, I think the otherside of that coin is you don't
(27:19):
want...
Not everything needs to beviewed in that lens.
If you're buying a property tolive in, it doesn't need to be
the best financial decisionever.
It doesn't need to be perfectcap rate or a property that you
would want to rent out.
So I I think there's a lot ofvalue in that.
And I think if somebody, if, ifthat fits with their lifestyle,
you know, they want to have anADU on the property that they're
(27:41):
renting out or Airbnb atsometimes, um, more power to
them.
But I, I think it's, it's a toolto have rather than how you
should be viewing propertiesthat you're buying.
Um,
SPEAKER_01 (27:51):
so yeah.
Cool.
I actually have a follow-up onthat.
Cause like, I think maybe it wasthe last episode or two episodes
ago, we were talking about likebuying a rental property while
still renting yourself.
Like when you, when you boughtyour, your first rental property
with your friend, were you stilllike the property you were
living in?
Were you still renting?
SPEAKER_00 (28:11):
Yeah.
I still rent now.
Okay.
Yeah.
I live in New York and I rentthere and yeah, I go through a
lot of the same calculation of,you know, does it make sense to
buy?
What would that look like?
I think, No question.
As I spoke to earlier, I wouldbe a lot more comfortable
purchasing a house to live injust because it's a it's a
process.
And all of these terms thatmight scare people like mortgage
(28:32):
escrow are super familiar to menow.
But I Yeah, I still rent aswell.
Gotcha.
What
SPEAKER_02 (28:40):
would it take for you to buy property in New York
City?
A few million more.
Okay, cool.
Patrick, what do you say we diveinto the listener mailbag and
ask Levi?
I know we got some backup.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I think we can answer.
We'll just kind of throw it outinto the group and discuss, and
(29:02):
we'll see where it goes.
UNKNOWN (29:07):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (29:10):
kick it off or you want me to?
SPEAKER_01 (29:11):
Sounds like you want me to kick it off.
I think I do want you to kick itoff.
SPEAKER_02 (29:15):
Say what you feel.
Patrick, do it.
SPEAKER_01 (29:17):
Okay.
First question.
Annabelle from Orchard Park, NewYork asks, what's the best way
for renters to evaluate whethera neighborhood is right for
them?
I mean, I don't know.
As a renter, I think it dependsso much on what you want to get
out of the neighborhood.
Yeah,
SPEAKER_02 (29:36):
this is a tough question for me because it's
like I've always lived in thegreater Cincinnati area and I
know the neighborhoods.
So it's like I pick theneighborhood, I go to the
neighborhood, I know what thevibe is like.
So it's easy for me to be like,as a renter, kind of be like,
oh, I know what this part oftown's atmosphere is like
compared to this part of town.
I know I'm going to be safer inthis part of town than another
one.
So I don't know.
(29:57):
I mean...
It's kind of like instinctualalmost.
I don't know how you feel.
SPEAKER_00 (30:00):
Yeah, I mean, I mentioned I live in New York.
I'm a big walker.
Not every city in the U of mostcities in the U.S.
are not super walkable.
But right.
Yeah.
Whether you you think you'regoing to be walking around or
driving around a lot, I thinkvisiting the area you're going
to be in and just feelingcomfortable there.
No question.
I mean, I walked around where Ilive quite a bit before I moved
there.
And I mean, I find myselfwalking five miles a day in the
(30:23):
area.
So, yeah, that's that's probablythe biggest thing for me.
SPEAKER_01 (30:26):
No, that makes sense.
And I remember when I firstmoved to Cincinnati and I was
asking some people who werefamiliar with Cincinnati like
any recommendations on likeneighborhoods or properties or
whatever and it was interestingbecause like depending on who I
asked there were different kindsof recommendations like I know
for some people it's importantto have a big apartment complex
with a ton of amenities somepeople like don't want to share
walls and and yeah you know likewhen I have some friends come
(30:48):
visit me they're like they theylike my apartment they
understand why I want to livewhere I do but they would never
want to live in that sort ofsituation you know in the city
like well I like like walking,but some people would not want
to live downtown the
SPEAKER_02 (31:01):
city.
Well, I figured it would be mostimportant to you, the radius of
fast food
SPEAKER_01 (31:05):
restaurants.
Yeah.
That was definitely a...
Skyline Chili.
There was a Skyline Chilinine-minute walk from my
apartment.
You've mapped it out exactly.
It's exactly
SPEAKER_02 (31:15):
1,200 feet.
All right.
Next question.
Jasmine from Minneapolis writesin, says, what are some
strategies for purchasing ahigh-quality investment property
at a low price?
So she's looking to get the bestbang for her buck in some
respects.
So I wonder if this might begeared for our friend Levi to
(31:36):
answer.
SPEAKER_00 (31:36):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I mean, I think anyone wants tobuy the best property you can at
the lowest price.
SPEAKER_01 (31:46):
That's a hot take, Jasmine.
SPEAKER_00 (31:51):
Yeah, and there's no question, too, that it's a lot
more competitive the last coupleof years.
And a lot of the things aroundrentals that we talked about
with technology, I think, hasalso made it more competitive.
It isn't the days where you canfind a to sign and go talk to
the owner with all of the onlinesyndication for properties that
(32:13):
are for sale.
Anyone can find, at least ifthey're listed publicly.
So when you're actually innegotiations, I think one of the
biggest takeaways I had is toalways think about what the
other side wants.
There can be win-wins in thesenegotiations and these
conversations.
A seller might be less worriedabout what closing costs look
like because they're about toget a big payout.
(32:34):
Whereas a buyer might be moreconcerned because they're the
ones putting money down.
And so you might be able tonegotiate on the selling price,
but have some of that come backat closing where the numbers are
actually the same, but the buyeris significantly happier because
they're not putting down as muchmoney or other conversations
(32:54):
like that.
So I think there are win-winsand there's a lot of interesting
things specifically withinfinancing and negotiations that
you can work on there.
SPEAKER_02 (33:02):
Yeah, cool.
SPEAKER_00 (33:03):
Oh, am I up?
SPEAKER_02 (33:04):
I think you're up.
I mean, unless you want to justkeep, you know, just staring at
each other in dead
SPEAKER_01 (33:10):
air.
Okay, we got Max from ColoradoSprings.
Hey, look at that.
That's where you're from, right?
Yep.
Do you know Max?
I know a few.
Okay, Maddox asks, what's theweirdest real estate trend
you've seen come and go?
Barn Dominiums.
SPEAKER_02 (33:31):
We did talk about Barn Dominiums.
I don't know how weird.
It's pretty
SPEAKER_00 (33:36):
funky.
SPEAKER_02 (33:36):
I don't
SPEAKER_00 (33:36):
know about that.
What are some trends?
(34:08):
even over the next couple ofyears and we see more changes
there.
SPEAKER_02 (34:12):
So short-term rental, like the amount of
people that are doing it, youthink that that's like
decreasing generally?
SPEAKER_00 (34:20):
Yeah, I think you had this huge jump in people
seeing it, especially in thepost-COVID era of it was at its
height.
I think there were a lot morepeople using the services and it
was a lot more popular forrenters.
And it really got flooded withso many investors.
And then you started seeingcities pull back.
(34:40):
So yeah, I mean, I think there'sno question that there will be
more changes.
And I'm not going to predictwhat the short-term market is
going to look like in five or 10years.
But there's some pretty bigchanges that I think will
continue to happen.
SPEAKER_02 (34:52):
Okay.
Maybe we'll have to have youback on for short-term rental
diagnosis, the state of theindustry kind of thing.
All right.
We got two more questions.
I think we can fit in all five.
We'll do really quick round thetable.
You guys ready?
Just like first thing that comesto your mind.
What's your dream renovationproject and what room would you
tackle first?
Patrick.
(35:13):
Dream renovation.
Why did I have to go first?
Because I pointed at you first.
All right, fine.
Levi.
SPEAKER_00 (35:19):
Dream renovation project.
You better be thinking of youranswer than one.
I think when I think of myliving space, I love a good
movie, TV show, reading, and afireplace.
So that kind of coalesces intoit.
I would say a living room.
Um, so I'm going to do a niceentertainment where the TV can
(35:40):
be hidden, but a reallycomfortable couch to, to read on
and a fireplace.
So living room is my spot.
SPEAKER_02 (35:47):
Patrick.
SPEAKER_01 (35:48):
Can I, I'm going to pick a little bit of a different
approach.
No, I'm not.
I'm thinking outside.
Okay.
I want like, I want a veryspecific kind of like wooden
fence, uh, Like, do you guysknow what I'm talking about?
I'm a big fence guy.
Like there's that one fence.
(36:09):
What's it called?
Where it's just like the oldlooking wood.
Like, you know what I mean?
It looks kind of like atic-tac-toe board.
You know, like that fence?
Like a picket fence?
No, not picket.
No, not a picket.
Like, what's it called?
SPEAKER_02 (36:22):
I don't know, Patrick.
I like the fence.
The first thing I'm doing...
You're saying that you want todo, like, a backyard.
You want to renovate a
SPEAKER_01 (36:29):
backyard.
Yeah, it was like, I want abackyard to look a very specific
way because there's a fence.
It's not like a picket fence.
It's like, it's one of thosefences that has, like, that, and
it's got the two bars.
SPEAKER_02 (36:38):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (36:38):
You know?
One of those?
No, you guys aren't grasping.
Anyways, first thing I'm doingwhen I buy a property.
I trust you.
I really like the aesthetic ofthose fences, and I want to
build that fence around my yardand then have a grill there and
then grill hot dogs andhamburgers while looking at the
fence.
That's my first renovationproject.
SPEAKER_02 (36:58):
Wow.
That seems doable.
That seems very doable.
I don't know why you didn't saythis.
I was going to say I'd renovatean old theater or something and
turn it into a house.
It's a dream project.
We can do whatever we want.
Oh, I misunderstood.
What if there was a cool vintagetheater that I could just
renovate and turn into my ownhouse?
SPEAKER_00 (37:18):
Yeah, I just did one room.
SPEAKER_01 (37:19):
Oh, I didn't understand the question.
SPEAKER_02 (37:21):
It's a big
SPEAKER_01 (37:22):
room.
My mind went to the fence.
SPEAKER_02 (37:24):
My mind went to the fence.
All right.
I think we got time for one moreand then wrap it up.
Yeah?
Okay.
So Emily from Long Beach,California writes in and says,
what do you do if a potentialtenant doesn't have any credit
history or rental history?
How do you decide whether togive them a chance?
So we had a little ha-ha's andnow we're going to actually get
into the serious stuff to end.
UNKNOWN (37:46):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (37:47):
That's a good question.
It's a tough one because youalways want to be fair to
tenants.
I think everyone's been a tenantor most people have been
tenants.
A lot of us have been inpositions where we maybe don't
have credit history coming outof college, maybe have debt.
So in addition to being fair andbeing ethical in the first
(38:08):
place, you also have rules andregulations depending on what
city or state you're in.
So there's a lot that goes intothat.
In some places, you can't useincome or you can't use income
in a specific way.
I think subject to your city'srules, We always look for some
(38:30):
sort of income.
So if they don't have previousincome, do you have some sort of
job offer, future income, somesort of evidence that they can
provide?
You can also, in most places,talk to previous landlords, even
if they were college students,whatever else.
Co-signers are always a goodoption.
So they might have a parentthat's willing to sign.
So yeah, it's a tough questionto answer, but Again, having
(38:54):
been in those shoes before,there are a lot of options for
the landlord also to both befair and make sure that they're
protected as well.
SPEAKER_02 (39:02):
Yeah, for sure.
You got anything insightful,Patrick?
I agree.
I agree.
And there's a lot of goodsoftwares out there, resources
out there to use to get thisinformation if you were so
inclined to.
Isn't that right, Levi?
SPEAKER_01 (39:15):
Yes, there are.
SPEAKER_02 (39:18):
Okay.
Nice segue.
Yeah.
All right.
Guys, thanks for hanging out anddiscussing everything.
Levi, thank you for being hereto kind of talk.
Yeah, thank you for having me.
It's a good conversation.
Yeah, for sure.
It's been enlightening.
It's been awesome to hear aboutyour adventures and experiences
in the industry.
Obviously, Patrick and I wishyou both luck in all future
(39:39):
endeavors in propertymanagement, and we hope that
you'll continue to come back andteach us things because we need
some more learning, I think.
SPEAKER_00 (39:47):
I think so, too.
Yeah, I'm excited to hear aboutyour guys' first place, too.
It sounds like you might begoing to business together.
SPEAKER_02 (39:51):
Well, I guess we're buying a theater with a really
nice fence.
It's going to be the wonkiestproperty in the greater
Cincinnati area.
Okay, cool.
Well, that is another episode ofthe Rentish Podcast in the
books.
Remember, follow us on all thesocial media platforms that are
out there and make sure tosubscribe to the podcast.
Five stars, review, rate,comment, whatever the thing is,
(40:14):
clapping hands, emojis, andstuff like that in the comments.
And then email any of your topicsuggestions, feedback, you know,
just general praises.
I know Patrick needs those.
To questions attherentishpod.com.
You need positive feedback andencouragement.
Yeah, that's okay.
Keeps me going.
You're doing a great job.
Thanks.
(40:35):
All right.
I've been Zach.
That's been Patrick.
That was Levi.
Thank you guys.
And yeah, we'll see you later.
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