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Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

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201–210 of 266 posts

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#201

Buying real estate for short-term or long-term rentals is buying yourself a second job. If you want something more passive, consider investing in several different real estate syndications. You can find them on CrowdStreet or FundRise although I believe you will get into better deals if you join a local investor group and learn from the experienced members. If there isn't a group near you, I'm enjoying participating…

I knew a person running one of these in the UK. It was basically a massive con, where the investors took all the risk and he took all the profit.

So buyer beware.

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, your returns are likely significantly above the 5% mark you're referencing. You haven't factored in the unrealized gain of 500k, which would significantly change your returns. All in all, you've got a cash flow positive real estate asset who's valuation has doubled. Unless you purchased 15 years ago, you're likely looking at returns in the mid twenties. My advice; learn how to actually put together a DCF model…

Pretty sure that’s Discounted Cash Flow

It is. I typed too fast and can't edit now

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#203
post #35

Other say how landlord ON USA are not that passive, but maybe do it in other countries? Here in Colombia being landlord is very good, because most use an agency that manage the property (collect the money and do some basic fixes). I probably have called the actual owner 1 or 2 times in a decade for approval for some fixes.

In Finland you don't buy apartments/flats, instead you buy a share of the company that owns the block. The housing-company takes a fee every month which is used for common-repairs, replacing the roof, etc. If you rent out your flat the tenant pays for their own insurance to protect their possessions, and the housing-company takes care of things like leaks, broken windows, etc. So being a landlord is mostly hands-off.…

I loved our rental apartment when I lived in Finland! For those who had never been there, here's what we had: Studio flat with a kitchen and decent size bathroom. Nothing special so far. There were 2 storey basement: 1 floor for bikes, some bulky stuff, while the second,much colder,for food storage. There was also a laundry room: semi-industrial washing machine, thumble drier, some ironing device and a spacious clothes drying room with a dehumidifier. Even though all the apartments had washing machines, to have a dedicated space for this was super useful. The there was a sauna too for an additional €15/month. The playgrounds for kids outside were really nice and I even saw how they replaced perfectly fine slides and other equipment with brand new stuff. All of this in an area with apartment blocks built in 70-80s on cheap. In London you'd need to pay a fortune to have something similar. Finland always felt like designed for people,not the other way around.

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#204
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over the lifespan of owning the building, say a few decades, you can expect: 1. Rare but highly expensive major expenses like a new roof, new heating system, etc. It's like a tail risk- you don't pay for it most years, but when it comes up, it costs a lot. 2. Required renovations- just to stay at your current level of quality. I.e. let's say you rent to normal middle class tenants now. In 10-15 years, you'll need to…

> Source, am actually familiar with the true rate of return for properties over a long enough time span to judge. What is it? 7% 11%? Do you factor in financing leverage when you make the tenant pay the principal to your mortgage (if any)?

1-4%? At first you are just paying almost 66% or more interest and mostly not the mortgage principal, here is an amortization calendar https://www.bankrate.com/calculators/mortgages/amortization-...

If you want leverage, you can get vastly more leverage for risky stock market trades (I am not advocating for doing that, I just think it's odd when real estate proponents talk about 'leverage' as if it's unique to buying a building)

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#205

My advice is this: Think about your unique domain knowledge. Ask yourself: * What do I know that gives me an advantage over the average joe? * What other resources do I have that give me an advantage over the average joe? Generally speaking, if your idea to make money sounds really lame, boring, risky, complicated and/or esoteric to an uneducated layperson - but due to your domain knowledge you know that it's not - y…

"What do I know that gives me an advantage over the average joe?

What other resources do I have that give me an advantage over the average joe?"

What if my answers are none and none?

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#206

Credit card cash back, it’s easy to get 5% on most purchases. That’s $1,000 tax-free a year for $20,000 expenses you’ll have either way.

I still would rather not spend or cut down $20k expenses to $19k or less. Somehow not spending money feels like a better option.

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#207

Publish books on Amazon. I've published 4 and make about $3k in profit per month, after paying for ads on amazon. Don't write them yourself, that's a lot of work. Instead, do key word research about what books sell in non-fiction categories (fiction is a whole different ballgame). Look for keywords that 1) auto complete in the amazon search bar, and 2) have less than 4,000 matching books, and 3) have an average Amazo…

This is not passive advice whatsoever. It all requires regular "maintenance".

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#208

Publish books on Amazon. I've published 4 and make about $3k in profit per month, after paying for ads on amazon. Don't write them yourself, that's a lot of work. Instead, do key word research about what books sell in non-fiction categories (fiction is a whole different ballgame). Look for keywords that 1) auto complete in the amazon search bar, and 2) have less than 4,000 matching books, and 3) have an average Amazo…

First of all thanks for sharing "inside" secret. Old me would have judged you but not any more. Man got to do what he need to do. All the best :)

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Finland you don't buy apartments/flats, instead you buy a share of the company that owns the block. The housing-company takes a fee every month which is used for common-repairs, replacing the roof, etc. If you rent out your flat the tenant pays for their own insurance to protect their possessions, and the housing-company takes care of things like leaks, broken windows, etc. So being a landlord is mostly hands-off.…

I loved our rental apartment when I lived in Finland! For those who had never been there, here's what we had: Studio flat with a kitchen and decent size bathroom. Nothing special so far. There were 2 storey basement: 1 floor for bikes, some bulky stuff, while the second,much colder,for food storage. There was also a laundry room: semi-industrial washing machine, thumble drier, some ironing device and a spacious cloth…

I did come to love the storage for prams, especially in winter-time. That meant we didn't need to take ours inside our flat, when it was dripping snow and ice.

The communal gardens that are shared between buildings are really nice for children. As you say there is often equipment as well as toys, a sandbox, and similar.

We've got something like 11 children aged 1-11 in our buildings, and they're often playing together on weekends and in the early evenings.

Re: Ask HN: What passive income investments exist to supplement your salary?

#210
post #206

Credit card cash back, it’s easy to get 5% on most purchases. That’s $1,000 tax-free a year for $20,000 expenses you’ll have either way.

I still would rather not spend or cut down $20k expenses to $19k or less. Somehow not spending money feels like a better option.

Then do the 5% math on $19k spending (or $15k), it doesn’t have to be $20k.

In the US $20k of credit card expenses is not insane as an adult living by yourself.

After factoring in groceries, gas, insurance, utilities, a few dinners out and a couple flights a year, that’s very reasonable.

I am a relatively frugal person who spends $40k a year in a HCOL area in the US (but get paid 25X that fortunately), and $20k is my credit card spending, I basically put everything on my cards except for rent. Cards are in autopay every month, so no risk of extra fees. I also have enough financial discipline to obviously not spend more than I strictly need to, I am a very aggressive saver actually.

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