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| Real Estate Condo Crazy |
| by: Mark Walters |
| Making money through real estate investing can be a fickle business. Here's a surprising trend that can put money into your pocket. Traditionally those of us who own rental property looked upon condos as competition. They offered a relatively low cost way for renters to move into home ownership. This demand for condos has fooled many of us. With low rates of interest on home loans and plenty of money available... the logical expectation would be that instead of buying condos, buyers would move into the single family home market. Of course... many of them have done that and home prices continue in an upward trend in many areas. But thousands are choosing condos rather than a detached home. The National Association of Realtors reports that condo sales averaged less than 200,000 annually in the 1980s. That number jumped to 500,000 in the 1990s... and over the last three years has rocketed to over 800,000 sales each year. Take note of this.... In quarter number two of 2004, condo sales nearly hit the 1 million mark. Right now the condo market is hot in most parts of the country. Prices have reached record levels and continue to climb. While condo values go up... the rental market has gone soft. That has prompted many of the biggest apartment owners to begin converting apartment complexes into condos. They are converting their own complexes while looking for other existing buildings to buy and convert. The business has become so profitable that many of these big guys are slowly moving out of the apartment business by either converting owned properties, buying others... or building new condo developments. This is a wake up call for the small real estate investor. Start looking for motivated condo owners! But watch out for this! Many lenders will stop financing condos if the percentage of non-owner occupied units building reaches a level they consider dangerous. This means that you could have trouble selling units you own at some time in the future if you're not careful. Stay in touch with the condo association and be ready to move quickly if too many investors are buying units in the development. You can use most of the same tactics you use to buy single family homes with condos. Two of the most powerful tools are lease/options and buying "subject to" Click Here About the Author Mark Walters is an investor-entrepreneur helping other investors from his Web pages at |
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