Sorta CEPR - Do you own rental properties?

[bowies]

This has been a topic of conversation in our house over the past few months. We’ve encountered multiple people recently who own properties as an investment. This is outside our experience growing up and I’m curious how commonplace this is. My H and I can barely keep up with the one we live in, not even taking into account the financials that would go into it.

[joy]

Yes, we have a rental. But none of your choices apply.

We bought our first house in 2013. We renovated it. We needed a bigger house eventually and we found one a few blocks away at a great price. The idea of selling our first house was too much for me. My husband - more practically - said our area of the city was great for investment and wanted to keep it. So, now we rent it.

[mrspez07]

I bought my condo before meeting DH. We lived in it for a little over a year around the time we got married. Bought our house in 2008 and it didn’t make sense to sell the condo at the time. So we rent it. It doesn’t really “make” us money, but we don’t really lose any either, and wasn’t bought as an investment. We’ll probably sell around the time the boys enter college, if that’s their route.

[Vespasia]

Technically I own a second property but it's a family cottage and my sister and I hold our father's third under an LLC. He is still paying for everything though, he just wanted out due to some family drama.

It is one of a cluster of cottages that have been owned by a few families for over 100 years so the costs are just upkeep and taxes.

My aunt's cottage on the same property will probably be sold in the next few years and we would be very interested but I have no idea how we would swing it financially. Renting it out would not go well with my family or the other homeowners in the area.

[Deleted]

LOL.

I really don’t understand how people my age own multiple properties.

[Vespasia]

Oh, and we have also discussed renting out our current house if we move out of the area. I am not sure if it would be worth the headaches but in theory the rent would be about 50% above our current PITI. I personally would like to hold onto it in case a move didn't work out but it's all just theoretical right now.

[goldengirlz]

Nope, just the one.

I fantasize about having a weekend home in Sonoma though. Maybe one day ...

[mrsukyankee]

We owned a property that we lived in. We then inherited half of my IL's house after my FIL died. We moved in with my FIL and rented out our old property. We're currently selling both so we can move to another area and we'll eventually buy another rental property.

[Pom]

3 Inherited. Two rentals converted to Land contracts. Farm land cash rents. Vacation cottage (my first home) rented infrequently.

[scm1011]

We own a 2-family house where we live in one unit and rent out the other.

[vlinder]

Yes, but as a matter of circumstance, not intentionally. Our first home was a condo that we bought in 2005, so when we were ready to move to a SFH we were underwater on it. We’ve been renting it to the same tenant for the past few years. We lose a little on it each month, but much much less than we’d have to bring to the table to sell.

[anodyne]

Yes. When I was single I bought a 2 family and rented the downstairs. After getting married and needing more space we decided to buy a 4 family, turn 1/2 into a 3 bdrm townhome and rent 2 units. We kept the 2 family, but it wasn't making us much money, if any. We sold it this past year. With the one property and living in it, we only pay about $250 towards mortgage, taxes, and insurance a month. It has its drawbacks but the units being right here and our home too, makes upkeep much easier.

[kadams767]

Well, we own one rental property that is a duplex. My husband bought it before we got married or lived together, it was a fixer upper in an up and coming area of the city we now live in. He lived in one unit with a roommate and rented the other, and then eventually I replaced the roommate. We lived in that apartment for 6 years and did work on the house as we could afford it, all while continuing to rent the second apartment. We saved our down payment for our current, Single family home while doing that and once found our current house, we decided to keep the old one as a rental property. It’s not really an intentional investment strategy, as we won’t be buying any additional properties or anything like that, but it has worked out relatively well for us in the years that we’ve had it. If it gets to be a burden, we’d probably sell.

[mbcdefg]

We do not.

I’d love to own a Jersey Shore house someday ... ideally split between my brother and sister and me (and SOs), so that we could share the expenses and use it as a way to spend time together, but I know that’s just a disaster waiting to happen.

If MH and I were in a position to buy one then we could rent it out periodically during the summer.

[pantsparty]

Yes, I bought one specifically as an investment this year. A property management company manages it, there's a renter in place. H and I plan to buy 1 property per year for the foreseeable future. We look at it as additional retirement plan / possible early exit from the workforce if we continue to grow at a slow but steady clip.

[wawa]

We've talked about it, but haven't pulled the trigger yet. I keep an eye on listings though.

[mouse]

Not rental but maybe extra property? Mr M's family owns a ranch in the California redwoods, and I think you inherit your share once you're 23 or something. But Mr M's dad pays the taxes for all his kids and no one has explained how the whole thing works or given us any paperwork or anything. We think you get an individual piece because one cousin sold his share to pot farmers and the rest of the family is super pissed at him. That's all I know. Mr M won't ask and I don't know how to find out more without being the bitchy daughter in law.

[aliciabella]

Yes, but for none of the reasons you listed. We bought our townhouse in 06 at the height of the market. I needed to get out of there for my own insanity and needed a bigger place for the pending twins. We didn't have the money for the price difference so rented it out. We got INSANELY lucky with our tenants who have been there 5 years now.

[morecoffeeplease]

Yes we do. We are military and loved the town we were in. We bought and wanted to hold onto it in case we move back. We have had renters in there for almost 3 years. We won’t be moving back so now we are deciding if we should continue to rent it or sell it in a year after the current lease is up. The town we own in has shitty base housing so the rental market is always really steady and will continue to stay that way as the base won’t be building any nicer housing.

Edit to add: We live on base now so we don't have two mortgages. 

[msmerymac]

LOL at the, "when we bought a bigger house, we just rented out the one we don't need anymore. NBD." Most people need to use their current home equity to buy a bigger house and wouldn't be able to afford two mortgages if a property was vacant for any period of time. But sure.

(I will inherit our family lake house someday, along with my brother, but do not plan to rent it out.)

[morecoffeeplease]

Nov 23, 2018 18:11:12 GMT -5 msmerymac said:

LOL at the, "when we bought a bigger house, we just rented out the one we don't need anymore. NBD." Most people need to use their current home equity to buy a bigger house and wouldn't be able to afford two mortgages if a property was vacant for any period of time. But sure.

(I will inherit our family lake house someday, along with my brother, but do not plan to rent it out.)

I should have added that we now live on base so we don't have a second mortgage and we don't pay have to pay out of pocket.

[litebright]

We don't, but I know a few people who do/did. In most cases the rental was something that the person bought when they were young and single, in many cases for way cheaper than a house could be had today. Then they met & married someone who also had a house, and the two of them kept both properties and rent out one of them.

One if my BIL/SILs who are both lawyers bought two houses to basically serve as college investments for their two kids. They're rentals now, but when it comes time, they will sell those houses to pay the cost of college. Or that is the plan, anyway.

[msmerymac]

Nov 23, 2018 18:17:19 GMT -5 morecoffeeplease said:

Nov 23, 2018 18:11:12 GMT -5 msmerymac said:

LOL at the, "when we bought a bigger house, we just rented out the one we don't need anymore. NBD." Most people need to use their current home equity to buy a bigger house and wouldn't be able to afford two mortgages if a property was vacant for any period of time. But sure.

(I will inherit our family lake house someday, along with my brother, but do not plan to rent it out.)

I should have added that we now live on base so we don't have a second mortgage and we don't pay have to pay out of pocket.

Oh yeah, my parents live near an army base and I don’t think that situation is uncommon.

[sparrowsong]

Not now but considering getting into this as a way to invest the profit from a property sale I just had.

[t]

We bought a second home this summer to function as a rental property. It is in the beach town we visit frequently (MIL lives down the street). We actually rented the house ourselves several summers and loved it. Nothing big or extravagant, but it’s perfect for a family. We’ve been renting it via Airbnb and have had good luck with tenants so far. Historically the house books up completely in the summer and that essentially covers the mortgage for the year.
We had been toying with the idea for 2 years and have been saving up for it since then.

[sent]

No. I could not handle the mental space owning a second location and managing tenants would involve. My dad does this. I remember taking messages when people would call our landline in the 80s for a vacancy or an apartment issue. Now the tenants text him with their issues. It's not for me.

[sarahsays]

I own a lake house that I inherited when my parents died. I don't rent it out and haven't sold it because the market hasn't been great since I inherited it.

I don't really consider it an investment property because while I would consider selling if I could get a good price, the taxes are low and I have an emotional attachment so I enjoy having it.

[WOT?*]

I can’t talk my husband into it but it’s something I’ve wanted to do for a number of years. Living here though, it’s now too expensive to purchase for rentals in too many areas and we’re now too old for it to be considered a good idea for our retirement. If we’d bought 10-15 years ago, when I wanted to, the places would be half- or fully-paid off and would be paid off by the time we were ready to retire.

Our house now would be an excellent rental for our area (we have a number on our street already) when we retire and move to a lower COL area, but DH still doesn’t want to hear of it. It will be paid off and there’s no way we’d be able to bring in the monthly income in investments that we’d get in monthly rent ($2,500+/month and the house will be paid off by retirement.) My grandparents owned a small community of ten cluster homes that gave them excellent lives and my brother owns and manages several rental properties in California.

DH doesn’t want to deal with headaches. I think that if it’s done wisely and well there are more benefits than detriments. But it’s too late for us now, I think, especially with DH not on board.

[aliciabella]

Nov 23, 2018 18:11:12 GMT -5 msmerymac said:

LOL at the, "when we bought a bigger house, we just rented out the one we don't need anymore. NBD." Most people need to use their current home equity to buy a bigger house and wouldn't be able to afford two mortgages if a property was vacant for any period of time. But sure.

(I will inherit our family lake house someday, along with my brother, but do not plan to rent it out.)

It isn't LOL when you bought a house at the worst possible time and still haven't broke even 15 years later. Our choices were to stay in the home which I hated and was too small to add our surprise twins, bring 90 k to the table which we don't have to sell, foreclose or rent it out.

A lot of good people got fucked when the market tanked so it isn't as simple as a "rich person problem" at all. We are lucky we qualfied for a second mortgage and was able to find great long-term tenants but know we are always on the brink of foreclosing if something happens and it is not fun living with that anxiety everyday :/ I also have no properties to inherit.

[2curlydogs]

No.

Could we afford it? Probably.

Do I have any desire to do it? NOPE.