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Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

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Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#181

Post by paulkon »

jackcosgrove wrote: post #155
Anon84 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would you recommend as training/resources to get started in real estate investing? I was thinking of getting a real estate dealer license as a way to get a better idea of how the system works and go from there, but any words of wisdom from someone already doing it successfully would be most welcome. There's plenty of "real-estate investing" information online but most of it looks scammy as hell. EDIT: I'm based…

Real estate is local, so I would be wary of any "system" that purports to be able to identify undervalued properties using a one-size-fits-all approach. I would not recommend buying a property that's far away from you. As far as landlording a small number of properties, most of the knowledge involved is how to be handy, or knowing trustworthy people who are handy. One piece of advice I would offer here is to charge s…

Is a REIT usually better for a more passive investment? Or does investing directly in a property gives greater control of returns?

Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#182

Post by ImpressiveWebs »

My primary frontend blog/website (https://www.impressivewebs.com/) is mostly passive, I post maybe one article per month, usually not even that much. The blog has been active for about 10 years, so I get lots of SEO traffic, which brings in about $400-500 per month.

I also sell ebooks that are compilations of articles and tips from my newsletter (see below) on Leanpub and Amazon. (https://leanpub.com/b/javascriptdombundle)

My main newsletter (https://webtoolsweekly.com/) is now also a regular income stream (about $400-700 per month and growing), but not exactly passive. Takes regular research, writing, etc. But it’s fun to do and leads to all sorts of paid tech writing projects.

Finally, my newest newsletter (https://techproductivity.co/) is not yet making money but that’s starting to change as the subscription number has started to rise to a decent number and it’s very easy to write that one, maybe 2 hours of work per week.

Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#183

Post by davismwfl »

southphillyman wrote: post #53
davismwfl wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct in my experience 10% is a good guideline. I actually set things up slightly different but essentially it follows the same process. I have service providers I negotiated and setup that manage different aspects for me, so most all I have to do is make an approval or call and I don't have to pay a percentage fee each month. I learned how to do this after I had a bunch of properties in the past and was paying 8-1…

Do you have any advice on finding service providers or contractors? It seems like it's mostly word of mouth but people with dependable providers/contractors don't want to lose them to other landlords or developers.

It is somewhat trial and error but a lot of it is based on recommendations. It took me 4-5 years before I found a handyman type that I trust to just take care of little things. But for other things I signed up with larger known brands. Like our AC maintenance contract is with one hour AC for all our units, this means they take care of preventative maintenance as well as fix things as needed at a reasonable rate.

Plumbing I found through trial and error, and to be fair for any job where I see a bigger repair bill, e.g. > $500 I'll generally get quotes to keep everyone honest. There are exceptions of course, but when I start seeing bigger repairs being requested it sends up some red flags because we maintain everything really tightly.

Our lawn service and our pest service are the same ones we have do all the units and our own home too. We found both of them through a referral and tried them at our home first. Then slowly gave them more.

Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#184

Post by davismwfl »

paulkon wrote: post #123
davismwfl wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct in my experience 10% is a good guideline. I actually set things up slightly different but essentially it follows the same process. I have service providers I negotiated and setup that manage different aspects for me, so most all I have to do is make an approval or call and I don't have to pay a percentage fee each month. I learned how to do this after I had a bunch of properties in the past and was paying 8-1…

Do tenants communicate with you via email for repairs, etc?

Email or text. I setup Twilio as my go between so I can receive and send texts (or calls) to renters without them having my personal number. There are a couple of long term renters who I have had for many years that have my personal cell, but most don't.

Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#186

Post by greeniron »

cannabis online store. my profit share currently nets me around than CAD10k per month.

started about a year ago when a few friends pooled money together to take over a failing online cannabis store, which are not legal in Canada but are sort of outside of law enforcement interest currently so we operate pretty freely at this moment. i've always been keen to do this as i've heard how profitable it is, so when they asked me to manage all the computer stuff in exchange for a small profit share, i agreed. i had minimal experience with SEO, but learned along the way how to tweak little things here and there, like which types of promos worked, etc and managed to do a decent job in the end. it did require some work at the beginning but once most of the things were set in place, my role was reduced down to mostly designing promos and customer service, which i performed simultaneously at my full-time job which i maintained. the customer service largely involves me just engaging with customers on Discord and answering emails.

it didn't start off 100% passive, and it probably still isn't considered passive, but i don't feel that i do much work for it now and i'm still getting paid roughly CAD10k. my next step is i'm in discussion with one of the partners to start up a new shop, this time as an owner.

Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#187

Post by davismwfl »

jawns wrote: post #115
davismwfl wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have myself setup where no, I don't personally do any active work as a landlord. I get payments deposited into my account every month and I have some loan payments go out but outside of that I am not active month to month doing anything. When things to break or need service (usually a few times a year something minor pops up), my involvement is approving a repair or calling on a company I have used prior to take ca…

Has there been any point at which you have lost money, e.g. expensive repairs, long vacancies, etc.?

Yes, but only short term. For example, I only do rentals when I can make them cash flow positive monthly. But there are times when say, you need to replace a water heater and that requires a permit and licensed plumber, so say $600-$1200 in my area depending on the unit etc. So I might lose my cash flow positive side for the next few months to pay that back, but in the end the net/net of the unit will be cash flow positive.

I did have one home we sold at a loss because of the housing crash. It sucks, but it also taught me a number of valuable lessons, and really improved my game.

With real-estate, there is a cliche saying, you make the money when you buy the property not when you sell. This is so true. If you buy it right, you will do well, when you buy it wrong it will almost always bite you.

Flipping is an easier place to lose money if you aren't careful. But if you are flipping you aren't doing it for passive income. I do like flipping but it is not passive and in my area has been hard the last few years because of the local market trends.

Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#188

Post by davismwfl »

Anon84 wrote: post #98
davismwfl wrote: post #8

Not what you were looking for but real estate (mostly rental) has been and remains my primary passive income.

What would you recommend as training/resources to get started in real estate investing? I was thinking of getting a real estate dealer license as a way to get a better idea of how the system works and go from there, but any words of wisdom from someone already doing it successfully would be most welcome. There's plenty of "real-estate investing" information online but most of it looks scammy as hell. EDIT: I'm based…

Also, one bit of advice I have found true in most states (but NYC may be different). Avoid home owners associations (HOA), they are almost always the death of a successful venture. I have only one property left in an HOA and we have been trying to sell it for 2 years but the HOA is known as an activist HOA so selling in that neighborhood, even at a discount, is hard. HOA's make rentals really hard, make flipping hard and drive the costs of everything up. And most investors will tell you the place you make money in real estate is in the older neighborhoods which are established, free of HOA's and are either being revitalized or have been already.

Townhomes and Condo's are a little different because you will always have a board for those, and I have had some good luck with Condo's but in general I avoid anything where another entity besides the local city/county can dictate what I can or cannot do.

Re: Ask HN: What is your passive income 2019?

#190

Post by deanmoriarty »

A diversified portfolio of index funds. This year return so far is ~15% (which in absolute amounts is more than my after-tax salary, even after accounting for long term capital gains), and my annualized return since when I started investing (~a decade ago) is ~10%.
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