Can't afford to buy investment real estate? Think again!

We meet people all the time that wish they could get into the lucrative residential rental real estate market but just don’t see how they could ever afford it. After all, you need a minimum of 20% down! That’s a far cry from the 5% needed when buying your personal home. But for most, there is a way. And it’s quite simple…

The first question is “Do you own a home?”. If so, “How long have you owned your home?”. An answer of yes to the first question and more than 2-3 years to the second are the key to unlocking this lucrative investment.

If you are a homeowner with a few years of home ownership under your belt you have built equity in your home. And it is likely that your lender will lend you up to 80% of that equity at a very low interest rate via a Home Equity Line of Credit or HELOC. Unlike a personal home where you cannot borrow the necessary 5% down, when purchasing a rental property you can lend yourself the entire downpayment via a HELOC. That means you can put the equity in your home to work making you more money! It’s really that simple.

And we have done this ourselves. We just closed on our fourth rental property with a tenant moving in next month. What other investment has someone else pay for the whole investment while you reap the rewards? None that we are aware of. The tenant pays for the downpayment, taxes, mortgage payments and any possible condo fees.

The great thing about owning rental properties is that they are building equity as well. And before long you can put HELOCs on these properties as well and use those to buy additional properties. And in no time at all you will have your own little real estate empire. Chances are if you know someone that has accumulated substantial wealth, a large portion of their portfolio will be held in real estate.

If we look at Woodstock as a place to invest in residential real estate, the numbers tell a wonderful story. Looking at numbers from the Woodstock/Ingersoll Real Estate Board, we see that the average sold price in Woodstock in June 2020 was $484,948. That is up 43.6% from June 2017. So, in 2017, the average home price was $337,707. That’s a difference of 147,241. If you are buying a $300,000 condo townhome, a 20% downpayment is $60,000.

And voila, you are in a position to purchase your first rental property.

We recently had a young couple who were first time buyer do exactly this. We sold them their first home three years ago and it took every penny they had worked so hard to save just to get that 5% down. But a few short years later they had a HELOC and purchased their first rental property and are excitedly thinking about when they will be in a position to purchase their second. And it won’t take long!

If this has piqued your interest we are always available to discuss your options. We have experience working with all types of real estate investors and love helping people on the path to building their own empire. We would love to help you get started too!

Ontario Home Sale Trends (Looking into 2017)

The Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) recently released their sales statistics for Ontario for the month of October. New sales records were set, and it looks like we will be maintaining a strong seller's market into the foreseeable future.

There were 20,583 units sold in October 2016. This was an increase of 8.9% from at the previous year. This set the highest October sales figure to date.  This is also the first time that more than 20,000 units were sold in Ontario in the month of October. 

Provincial home sales were up 9.7% over the first 10 months of 2015. As of October, 216,028 homes have been sold in Ontario in 2016 and the industry is on track to set a new annual record. The provincial average sale price for a home was up 19% from at the previous October. New listings on MLS® was down 2.6% in the same time period. And thus sets in the law of supply and demand. Less homes on the market with a good supply of buyers means that home prices are still on the rise. Active residential listings were down 29.8% over the previous October. Supply is at near record lows.

At the end of October, there was just two months of existing inventory. This was down from 3.2 months from the previous October. The number of months of inventory is the number of months it would take to sell current inventories at the current rate of sales activity.

Although conventional thinking would lead people to think they should "wait until Spring" if they are thinking of selling their home, that is not necessarily true in the current marketplace. The market is still strong with buyers, and inventory is down. That all adds up to it being a fantastic time to sell. We in the industry are truly having trouble finding homes for our buyers because of the very limited inventory. 

Please give Tracey or I a call if you have any questions about how this market would benefit you in the sale of your home in Oxford County.