Hello and welcome to my company website. Rosewood Holdings, LLC is a single-
member company and you're looking at the guy running this company. I have over 15
years of experience investing in real estate. I've built my own portfolio of real estate
which will some day provide a significant part of my retirement income. I currently
devote a very large portion of my time working with other investors (many of them new
to this business) that are in the process of building their own portfolios. I've seen the
good and the bad in this business, and I know what works, and what doesn't work.
I will detail to you what all I do. My goal is to create a growing repository of good, solid
information that should aid you significantly as you either begin, or look to begin, your
endeavors as a real estate investor. You won't find any of the B.S. teaser crap here.
All of the information I make available here is free and should be quite valuable to both
new and experienced investors alike. This page will be loaded with quite a bit of infor-
mation that will hopefully prompt you to action. In my opinion, there's been no better
time than now to build a nice real estate investment portfolio - especially single-family
investments. I've never seen it better in the 15 years I've been doing this. Home prices have depressed, but rental demand and rental rates continue to increase. Additionally, loan terms, especially as they pertain to rates, are still extremely favorable. The key is finding a good solid investor lending program.
If you are new to real estate investing, or if you are considering jumping into this business, the most important thing that I can convey to you is that you take your time and make sure that you align yourself with reputable folks. Who you associate yourself with early-on will have a huge effect on how well you will ultimately perform in this business. I can't emphasize that enough. Unfortunately, like most everything in this country anymore, you've got "vultures" flying about just waiting on easy prey to take advantage of. Real estate has been one of the big areas that these jerks do their thing... take advantage of someone else's lack of knowledge in an effort to make an easy buck with total disregard as to how they screw someone over. Take time and do a little background checking on the people you're looking to work closely with. Don't be afraid to ask tough questions. The good guys out here will appreciate and actually welcome it! Feel free to check me out. I'm a wide open book as you should be able to see as you peruse my website.
You've obviously stopped by this site to see what I can do to help you out. As I mentioned above, I currently devote time in assisting newer investors. I occasionally speak at real estate training meetings, and I often have one-on-one meetings with folks contemplating on entering this business. I don't charge a dime for any of those services. I just thoroughly love talking to others about the enjoyment I receive in the various aspects of this business. One of them - being a landlord. You don't hear that very often. In fact, you generally only hear the horror stories associated with being a landlord. Yes, you'll have your own horror stories some day if you become a landlord, but it's the positive stories that you can experience that more than off-set the bad.
I've got my own philosophy on how a newer investor should start and where he or she should focus initially to succeed. I think it's a tried and tested philosophy that works and I'll go into that a bit in a second. You may speak to someone that thinks differently than I do and that's great! Gather other's opinions and question. Then go out and get started!
Before I go further, I want to first emphasize that you must have good credit in order to begin building a strong rental portfolio. If you don't have decent credit, I'm probably not going to be able to help you out in your real estate investing endeavors. You may resent me for saying this, but your credit standing is a pretty good indicator of how well you'll be able to manage rental property. Generally speaking, If you can't manage your own current finances, you probably won't do very well in this business. That's not necessarily true in all cases, but it is in most. So if you don't have good credit, take time now and focus on cleaning that up before moving forward in real estate investing. I'd be happy to give you some pointers there - just call me.
You should additionally have put in some significant real estate investment studying before "jumping into the tub". Take your time and learn as much as you can. There are tons of great free resource sites right here on the web. You'll find links to some of those sprinkled around my site. To become successful in this business, you need to know what the heck you are doing. Read books, listen to tapes, browse the Internet, and attend various local real estate investment group meetings. Only when you feel solidly comfortable with what you are about to do, should you then jump in and get going.
Building a rental portfolio is where I believe the new investor should focus his/her energy early-on. It doesn't have to be a very large portfolio at all. One, two, maybe even three houses would be fine. It could also be a nice double. You'll learn so much about the various aspects of real estate investing simply by owning a rental; all of which will be extremely beneficial should you decide to branch out into other channels of real estate investing like wholesaling (flipping) property, short sales, lending on projects, or renovation work. As you build a rental portfolio, or if you're simply researching potential geographic areas to invest, you'll absolutely want to get answers to the following:
1. "real" vs. inflated house values for the neighborhoods you're targeting
2. rental rates for targeted neighborhoods
3. various neighborhood trends (crime rates, foreclosure activity, appreciation/depreciation rates)
If you don't have a solid understanding of those three key points, don't buy any property for which you may be contemplating purchasing. You're simply sticking yourself out on a limb if you do.
You additionally have two extremely important elements in the purchase of that initial and any subsequent rental property, and they are:
- purchase price of the property
- loan terms on the mortgage
So many people got stuck on the idea that they could buy a home for no money down that they let slip by what the heck they were paying for the home and the terms on the loan itself. This included homeowners and real estate investors alike. In fact, the terms on your mortgage are nearly AS important if not MORE important than the price you are paying for the property. Always remember that! It's a big part of the reason we're experiencing the foreclosure problems we are.
I buy and renovate property in specific neighborhoods with the intent to improve those neighborhoods and increase the value of the property that has been renovated. I'll talk in more detail about this below, but this is an area that I believe I can aid you significantly. I assist others that want to build rental portfolio's by renovating the property, placing a solid tenant in that property, and then selling the property to the investor at a significant discount from its market value. I'll work as closely with you as you'd like, but I make myself as available to you as you'd like to ensure you get up and running smoothly. I additionally locate investor lending programs that offer some of the best permanent financing available. It's a great way for a newer investor to pick up solid single-family rentals without having to worry about doing any improvement to the property, or find new tenants right out the shoot. It's all done for you. You can use your own financing sources if you'd like, but I try and establish relationships with some of the best available that will not require a huge amount of your own capital to start building your portfolio.
I wish I had someone like me out there when I first started. I didn't. I went through the school of hard knocks and had to learn most all of this on my own. I could (and some day maybe I eventually will), write one heck of a book on the things I experienced that could have out-right driven me to the poor house. Actually, I'm looking to eventually post some of those stories right here on my site, so check back periodically. These will be eye-opening and will really show just how easy it can be to fail if you're not careful. The fact that I was really lucky to have aligned myself with some reputable people, aided in keeping me afloat when I went through some of my own trials and tribulations as I grew. I don't mean it lightly when I say that real estate investing is not meant for everybody. It's a major financial decision you are taking, so please don't be afraid to ask alot of questions and do a little planning before jumping in. Take your time.
Obviously I would hope to ultimately sell a finished product (a renovated home with a good tenant) to someone I've worked with, but I'd never shove a sale down someone's throat if they didn't feel comfortable with what they were doing. After all, the homes I sell are in the very neighborhoods I've got my own portfolio, and the last thing I want to see is someone else fail and pull down the value of my own holdings. In fact, you may learn quite a bit from my own site, or from speaking with me, and then ultimately use other contacts to begin your investment endeavors. That's quite fine with me. Hopefully I'll have at least educated you in a positive manner some way.
So many newer folks jumped right into this business to flip houses. Television shows like "Flip That House" made that angle of real estate investing look so easy. Trust me, it's not! There are many, many "land mines" that can trip you up and lead to a financial disaster if you're not experienced. Those horror stories I'll be writing about? One of the first will be about a property that I purchased to rehab and sell to another investor. I purchased that property over two years ago, sunk over $40,000 into the purchase and rehab, and now watch it sit empty. It can't be inhabited (yet). What a blow that could have been to a newer investor looking to jump right in and flip a house. It's one of many stories I'll detail in the near future just to show one of the many pitfalls you can face in the "flipping" business.
My company actively seeks homes that can be purchased at a low enough price point to allow:
- a nice renovation job to the home- a resale to the end investor for no more than 80% of its market value- a monthly cash flow of $100+I focus my work in specific neighborhoods which I think is extremely important, given what's currently happening in regards to the utter decimation of many (what had been) very stable neighborhoods. Below is a graphic that shows three of these neighborhoods on the northeast side of Columbus...
ROSEWOOD HOLDINGS, LLC
This page was last updated: February 6, 2009
Call us now: 614-865-0807
Rosewood Holdings, LLC
1237 Three Forks Dr. S.
Westerville, OH 43081
614-865-0807
Email: Rosewood Holdings
Now let's go inside the home. The photo's below actually show the home after one of my renovation crews had already started the restoration process.
Here's the bathroom (right). The tub and sinks
were a lovely pink. They had already been
removed at the point this picture was taken. The
plumbing was also shot and needed redone.
The window in the back is a single-pane structure
that has been in existence since the home was
built in the early 60's. Most every home I renovate
will have any single-pane windows removed and
upgraded with newer insulated units...
Below is one of the bedrooms. You'll note that
the window was totally gone in this room, and
is boarded. On the right side of this photo
you'll see insulation. This bedroom had been
an addition that someone added after the house
was initially built. They failed to insulate the
exterior walls. We removed the drywall and
were in the process of insulating those walls
when this picture was taken.
Below is another view of that same bedroom that is further along in the renovation work. Walls have been insulated and drywall is in the finishing stage. Window openings are being prepped for the new vinyl windows.
Here we're putting in the new windows...
The above map may be a bit difficult to read, but the neighborhoods represented are:
Arlington Park - North of Mock Rd. and West of Sunbury Rd.
Brentnell - South of Mock Rd. and West of Sunbury Rd.
Cassady Peake - East of Cassidy Ave., between 5th Ave. and 13th Ave.
Why do I like these specific neighborhoods? The reasons are many. First, lets take a look at some of the demographics of these areas. The graphic below shows a breakdown of household income for the Columbus area. The orange-colored bars shows the average household incomes for zip codes 43211 and 43219. Arlington Park and Brentnell subdivisions are in the 43211 zip code. Cassady Peake is in the 43219 zip code. The yellow bar highlights the average hoiusehold income for Franklin County. As you can see, 43211 and 43219 populations have household incomes that are on average, $10,000-$25,000 under the average household income for Franklin County as a whole. It's an income demographic that I like target. Why?
If you look at the income characteristics of the population as a whole, it tends to look like a pyramid. The highest income-earners would be at the top of the pyramid, and the lowest at the bottom. Now, think of the rental market for a moment. My target areas are made up of folks that aren't at the very bottom, nor are they in the middle. They're just under the mid-point. I like this target market as it generally represents folks that are blue-collar workers. These are people that are out to improve their lifestyles - they'll be moving right into and through the type of housing I offer. These are also people that may be in their later stages of life and are looking to settle into affordable housing. I'll detail demographic trends in a later article, but those trends are always at the top of my mind as I look for projects to take on.
Next, let's take a look at the home values in these specific zip codes. Take a look at the charts below. In the lower corner of each chart, you'll see the 2005 median home values for 43211 and 43219. The median home value for zip code 43211 was $75,448, and for 43219 it was $88,111. Highlighted in orange are the average values of the projects I try and pick up for investors I work with. It also shows how many homes fall in each value range. They tend to fall right smack in the middle of the housing stock available in each of those zip codes. It's right where you want to be as an investor. Same thing if you're buying a house to live in. You never want to own the most valuable home in the neighborhood. You want to be right in the middle or even just under the average value for all homes in your neighborhood.
When I'm looking at a potential project to pick up and renovate, I'm doing it with the intent to resell it to the investor at no more than 80% of its market value. So in these zip codes (43211/43219), I'm looking for projects that I'll be able to sell to the investor generally in the $42,000 - $48,000 range. The end-project would be a nicely renovated home that could actually be sold at market value for $58,000 on the very low end. I'll detail one of these projects below.
Let's further zoom in on one of the target neighborhoods I focus. Below is a map showing the Arlington Park subdivision...
The yellow dots represent homes that I personally own and maintain in my own portfolio. The red dots are other homes that were purchased and renovated, and sold to other investors that I work closely with. Blue dots show newer projects that were purchased and ultimately renovated, not yet sold to another investor. This graphic was created late summer of 2007. As of this writing (late 2007), there are several more new projects in this same neighborhood that are not represented above. As a side note, do you see the large brownish plot above? That's actually one large wooded tract that the city owns. What does this mean? Future potential on the doorstep!
I'm showing the above graphic to highlight what in my opinion is a great strategy. That is, target specific neighborhoods for investing, know that neighborhood like the back of your hand, and work closely with other investors and homeowners in that same area to ensure everyone is on the right page in ensuring a thriving and prospering neighborhood. In the neighborhood above, the number of dots you see should give you a pretty good idea of the amount of control we're building there. If we run our properties properly, we should ultimately maintain and hopefully even grow a demand to live there. Obviously it's not shown on the map, but we are also actively working with law enforcement officials to track and deter criminal activity in the area. There are so many positives in this strategy in my opinion. I think some of them are probably popping off like light bulbs in your head right now. Not only are these going to be solid investments financially, they're going to also be solid investments in the reward you'll feel for making a positive difference in the neighborhood and the lives of those that live there.
Let's drill down a little further and actually look at a single project that was recently completed in the Arlington Park neighborhood. Below is a picture of a home located at 2432 Century Drive. This picture shows you the exterior of the home as it existed when I purchased it. Most of the windows were broken out or missing, the siding (aluminum) was beat to heck from a hail storm the prior fall, and the roof had worn out its life...
This photo shows the tub dropped in, along with some of the new plumbing.
Here we have a new base kitchen cabinet going in...
Let's take a look at what the finished product looks like. Again this rehab. is typical of what you can expect from my company....
This three bedroom, 1 bath, 1,086 square foot home is currently for sale at $48,000. It rents for $635/month. You can do the math to quickly see that it'll be a great income producing property. Additionally, very little repairwork will be necessary, as alot of that has been addressed during the renovation.
I mentioned above that there's been no better time than now to build a portfolio. Take a look below. This is a home I actually have in my own portfolio. It's the very first home I bought when I got into this business. The numbers shown in the graphic were as of 2006. Market values have since dipped a bit as a result of the "mortgage meltdown". A realistic market value on this home would be in the $60,000-$62,000 range. It now rents for $645/month. As a side note, the first tenant I placed in this home lived there until just two months ago...over 10 years of occupancy!
BEFORE
AFTER
1996
2006
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The real estate market is in a very challenging time. Neighborhoods are being decimated with the an ever growing number of eye-sore properties. Where and how you choose to invest in real estate will be of utmost importance. This page is just a thumnail sketch of some of what I do when I pick up an investment. There's ALOT more that goes into it, and that information will continue to be shared on this website. I find it appalling that these supposed "real estate guru's" try and charge an arm-and-leg for little bits and pieces of "gold mine" information. I've even seen folks try and charge money for basic rental application forms and leases! Amazingly, people still line up like lemmings with their wallets wide open! Don't do that! Keep your wallet locked up and educate yourself by aligning with reputable people.
I hope some of this has piqued your interest. Feel free to call me anytime to chat. As always, I'd be more than happy to help you in any way I can. Good luck!
...keep an eye on this site, as it will continue to grow with great information throughout 2008!
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