The Complete Guide to Buying and Selling Apartment Buildings

I found this book to be a quick read that was clear and concise. unlike many books of this topic this one was not heavily weighed down with short stories how the author made a million dollars on a specific deal. Each chapter was finished of with a recap to solidify lessons learned. This book did a good job at introducing 5 very common formulas that are used in the valuation of properties that you may not be familiar with from single family homes perspective. The book does get a bit light on the back-end as it got away from the real purpose behind the book and dabbled in the why you should "do it". by a percentage this last chapter was nominal and could be skipped altogether. Having read more than a half a dozen books on this subject this is one of the better ones where i wasn't trying to skim past the fat to get to the meat of the subject.I recommend this book if you are not in need of a pep talk in order to get started. i consider the fact that you are reading the book as evidence enough that you are taking action and don't need to hear all of the benefits to take the next step.

I bought this book, along with two others, after some careful research into real estate investing books on Amazon (customer ratings, reviews, etc.). These were part of a Christmas present several years ago to my younger brother who is working hard - very hard, actually - to break into the real estate investment world. I wanted to report back that he found this book informative and insighful and still refers to them today from time to time. I had been over at his house this weekend, and he actually mentioned the presents, and told me that he actually found some useful info in this book, and that it wasn't just another get-rich-quick or uninformed hack job, both of which are so prevalent in real estate literature (and have been for years, as you probably know). So, I can say that I definitely recommend this book to anyone - especially someone starting out in the field of real estate investment properties.

This book made me realize the whole point that I got into commercial apartments was to get away from owning 100 homes...but I was on a path to own 100 apartments, not anymore. Scaling up rather than out! The case studies are amazing and being from Michigan, I was able to relate to a number of them.

I bought this book a number of years ago. I already owned five houses and some small multi-family properties. This book opened my eyes to a new understanding of income stream valuation. With individual homes and small multi-family units, your capital appreciation is limited by the comparable properties in the area. Having a higher rent doesn't make any real difference. With larger multi-family properties you can increase the value substantially by finding a poorly run property and managing it better. This may involve renovation or it may simply be a matter of understanding and achieving market rents. After buying this book I bought a 6 unit property, a 21 unit property, a 22 unit property and now have a 44 unit under contract which will take my portfolio over 100 units. I'm refinancing my 21 and 22 unit properties and pulling out enough equity that I'll be able to buy the 44 unit without any cash out of pocket. Steve's spreadsheet product has been very helpful in evaluating properties for a number of different variables many of which are also used by lenders which allows you to talk the same language when you seek financing. The reason I gave the book 4 stars as opposed to 5 is that the time frames he suggests based on a 20% increase in value just aren't typical due to the costs of buying and selling. You need more like a 35-40% increase to trade up. That said, the theory works, it just takes longer.

Although some of the info is outdated, this book still provides great insights.

This book was so helpful and given me a better understanding about real estate. It showed me some areas I needed to learn and grow in.

Admission: I'm only on page 37. That being said, I would like to point out what I see as a flawed theory that the author calls the Value-Play Strategy. He compares a buy and hold strategy to a buy and flip strategy. However, in his graphs he presents an apple to oranges comparison. The first is a person who buys one house per year for ten years. He compares the wealth accumulation to a person who buys a property each year and then flips that property the next year. The problem is that in a graph he allows the flipper to acquire properties with equity and to also improve the property, but he doesn't allow the buy and hold person to do the same. The buy and hold person in his graph is apparently buying homes with zero equity and not doing anything to improve the properties. He then shows how the flipper earned more money. Oh, and I almost forgot, his graph shows the flipper turning $100,000 into $200,00 in just one flip, which would be difficult but OK maybe so, but at the far end of the timeline he suggests that the flipper will turn 12 million into 25 million in a single flip. That I find very very hard to believe. As for me, my strategy is buy and hold. And I will press on with this book to find out if he has any valuable advice on buying.

I am a seasoned investor and yet I learned from the info included in this book. Berges writes well and this is a MUST for any beginning investor. NO scamming in this book! This man is a proven entity who lays it all out. If you do what he demonstrates in this book, the way he demonstrates it , I dont see how you can fail, Every fail safe is there, and the How-To content is remarkable. Better than 99% of the " gurus" out there at nowhere near the cost!!! I highly recommend this book!