Growing a Real Estate portfolio is not as complicated as you might think, suggests Charlie Peters; long time Tallahassee real estate investor. In this episode, we’ll explore Charlie’s background and how he went from selling pharmaceuticals to scaling a large, multi state real estate portfolio.
Tune in to hear:
- How Charlie transitioned from a “real job” to a full time Real Estate investor at scale.
- The challenges you can expect to encounter as you grow your real estate portfolio and the skills you’ll likely need to get past those hurdles.
- The argument, again, for why your first investment should be a multi-family property.
- The importance of understanding the numbers and why studying something like Accounting can be a good early step in an Investor’s career.
- Charlie’s experience investing in good economic times versus bad economic times.
- And more.
Episode Timeline:
5:22: Charlie describes his background in medical sales and how he successfully transitioned in to real estate investing over time.
7:31: We discuss Charlie’s first investment in 1996; a quadruplex in Tallahassee and how investing in a multi-family property as a first time home buyer can get you off to a great start.
8:04: Charlie explains his largest project to date and gives us an idea of the scale his group is investing in today.
10:04: We discuss Charlie’s strategy for investing in Real Estate and how it’s more opportunistic than strategic. He explains that there are always problems with whichever growth strategy you implement and how you just need to figure out how to get past it.
14:45: Charlie explains how the biggest problem when you first start investing in real estate is that you simply don’t know anything. He describes his first tenant’s first problem; an oven door came off. He describes how building relationships with tenants and simply being able to work with people will be a valuable thing.
16:05: Jason explains his initial investment strategy; investing in concrete multi-family homes in Tallahassee and why. We get into more of Charlie’s transition from a single quadruplex to another triplex and a handful of town homes.
17:36: Charlie explains why he found investing in multi-family investments more appealing and how you need to maximize the fixed rate financing.
19:00: We talk about how having a solid understanding of Accounting and why you need to be a “numbers guy” if you want to invest in multi-family properties. Charlie explains how, if he had to start over, he would have started by working for an institutional investment firm or REIT.
21:12: Charlie explains how there are investors out there who will finance your deals with equity; as opposed to lenders who will finance your deals with debt. He explains when and how that sort of financing can make sense.
22:58: Jason and Charlie talk about what he did when he maxed out the fixed rate financing loans and how his portfolio changed a bit. Charlie explains why he stuck with multi-family investing and why you need to keep management in mind as you scale your portfolio.
24:40: We discuss Charlie’s 1st goal; owning 10 quadruplexes and how he transitioned out of medical sales and into becoming a full time landlord. We talk about the point at which is simply became more beneficial for Charlie to do real estate investing.
29:07: We discuss how you need to have a solid understanding of loan to value and debt to income ratio formulas that bankers use if you want to scale your real estate portfolio.
34:17: Lastly, we discuss Charlie’s approach to investing in good economic times versus bad economic times and how finding a good deal is more important than playing the market. Charlie reminds us of the pros and cons of leverage and how becoming over leveraged can work against your favor.