← BiggerPockets Real Estate Podcast
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- [00:00]
A
Do brrrrs still work in 2025? It's been one of the most tried and true investing formulas over the last couple years. You buy a property, you rehab it, you rent it out, then refinance your cash back out and you repeat the process. But with higher home prices and higher interest rates today, some people say the BRRRR is dead. Today we're making a ruling on that question. Hey, everyone. I'm Dave Meyer, a rental property investor and the head investing here at Bigger Pockets, and with me today on the podcast is my friend Henry Washington. Henry, how's it going?
- [00:39]
B
What's up, bud? Glad to be here.
- [00:41]
A
I'm glad to have you because I saw this question on the BiggerPockets forum and I wanted to break it down with you specifically. You've done a lot of brrrrs, right?
- [00:51]
B
Oh, yeah.
- [00:51]
A
Good. I figured you have. So you are the right person to help me break this down. I have also done several brrrrs in my investing career. I think it's a great strategy, or I should say it has been a great strategy for me in the past, but we're gonn but it's still a great strategy going forward. So a community member Posted on the BiggerPockets forum is a community member named Kyle asked, and I quote, I'm curious what people are seeing for leverage on brewer acquisitions. Has anyone successfully acquired, rehabbed and refi'd a deal with less than 20% of their own cash in? Not trying to overleverage, just exploring what's realistic in 2025? So let me just explain this question a little bit and Henry, feel free to jump in here. Kyle's referring to the BRRRR strategy, which, if you've never heard it before, it stands for buy, rehab, rent, refinance and repeat. It's basically an approach to real estate where you're buying a rental property. That's the B. Then what you're doing is rehabilitating it. That's adding value. You're taking a property that needs to work. You're putting that love and that effort into it to boost your equity. Then once you're done with that project, you rent it out to new tenants. Hopefully you pulled it up to market rents and are generating good cash flow. And at that point, you refinance so you can take some of the equity that you have built in this property, some of the equity that you've put into this property, and use it for future acquisitions. That's the last R, the repeat part of it. And this has become A very popular strategy over the last 10, 15 years because it's a great way to scale your portfolio. If you're able to execute this in a short timeline, you can do a renovation, build equity, get a cash flowing rental, and then have the same amount of money to go buy the next one. But as interest rates have gone up, properties have gotten more expensive, it's gotten a little bit harder. And so what Kyle is asking is, is it still realistic to be able to use the BRRRR strategy to grow and scale? Or perhaps is there a better approach that people should be using? So it's a question you should be asking right now. So I'm just gonna ask you, have you done this?
- [02:57]
B
Yes, I have done this. But the caveat is, as far as a real estate investor goes, I would consider myself a professional real estate investor. It's what I do for a living. And finding deals is what I specialize in. And so for someone like me to say yes to that question doesn't mean it's a viable strategy for most casual real estate investors, if that makes sense.
- [03:19]
A
It does. It's important to point out, and one of the reasons it's great to have you here is like, Henry does this full time. He's acquiring deals all the time. He's doing off market deals. He does heavy rehabs. What he can accomplish is totally different from what I get and what I look for. Because I work full time. I am not someone who's going to job sites every day. I'm not doing direct to seller marketing. So I do think this is perfect because we can have two different perspectives on this. So maybe let's start with you and I'll tell you my side of things. Like, for you, as a professional, is this normal or like, are you getting these? But not every deal pencils out this way.
- [03:53]
B
So it was a whole lot easier to find deals to burr three years ago. We still find them now, but less frequently. Flip numbers tend to make more sense in this market than rental numbers. But because we're looking for deals in volume and we're finding deals in volume, every so often we get one that makes a great brrrr. And then I think you have to put some parameters around brrrr. Mostly like a timeline.
- [04:21]
A
Yeah.
- [04:22]
B
Because you can buy, renovate, rent, and then refinance in a short period of time, or you can do it in a much longer period of time. I've refinanced multiple properties this year and pulled cash out of them when I bought them three to five years ago. And I just put them on adjustable rates and that adjustable rate now came due. I refinanced it into a 30 year fixed and pulled cash out. And those long term brrrrs are still brrrs.
- [04:53]
A
Henry, that's a great point. I think it's a really important caveat cause I've been calling it the delayed brrrr or people in YouTube gave me new ideas of what to call it. Cause I suck at this, but I couldn't come up with a better name. We'll call it the delayed brrrr. But I think there's two different things that you can do. One thing I've been doing is delaying the renovation. You buy something fully occupied rather than vacant and not trying to do the brrrr on this flipped timeline. Because like as you said, there is this approach to doing the brrrr method which is like, I'm going to do this in six months or whatever. I'm gonna get in there, I'm gonna renovate it quickly, I'm gonna get rents up to market rate, then I'm gonna do this cash out and I'm gonna go acquire the next deal really rapidly. And that did work really well for a while. I think it's hard to line up two deals. Like you're saying I can't do it right now realistically. But even you, Henry, it sounds like it would be hard to even line up two brrrrs in that time frame where it would even be advantageous for you to even do that. And so what you could do is either take sort of the more delayed approach, which is getting the occupied units and opportunistically renovating when there's time, or you know, doing the renovation up front but not refinancing until you need the capital. I'm actually looking at refinancing a deal I bought like six years ago because it's cash flowing well. But like I think that there's going to be good deals coming and I'm seeing more deals coming and I just might want to free up some capital. And so I'll just do the refinance. But it's way later.
- [06:21]
B
Yep. I think when, when BRRR was originally pitched, it was pitched as a way to scale a real estate business because you could line up back to back brrrs and you could repeat this process and you can still repeat it. I think the timeline for the normal investor is to be longer.
- [06:39]
A
I think that's right. There is this assumption in this question, and I get this question all the time. I'm sure you do too. Like do brrrrs work. Is it dead? There's this assumption that the only reason to do a brrrr is that you can refinance 100% of your capital. You got a full brrrr Right? Exactly. You need a quote unquote perfect brrrr or full brrrr. But is not that common? Maybe if you're doing Henry's kind of deals and you're in the right market at the right time, that can be. But I think if you just kind of like reframe the conversation and don't assume that you need to take 100% of your capital out, then I would say brrrr is absolutely still a way to grow your business. You're still able to refinance some of your money out and you're buying, ideally, if you're doing it right, a cash flowing rental property that has you've built equity in. You're getting some of your money out of it to go scale again. That's still a win even if it's not perfectly super 100% recycling of your capital like it was for that brief moment in time.
- [07:43]
B
Can I give you a hot take?
- [07:44]
A
Yes. That's right here.
- [07:46]
B
Even when burrs were easy to do, I didn't really like doing that.
- [07:52]
A
Really? Why?
- [07:53]
B
I didn't like pulling my cash out. Like I liked the cash flow.
- [07:56]
A
That's the other thing. Yeah.
- [07:57]
B
When you refinance a deal, what's essentially what you're doing is you're getting a new loan at a higher amount.
- [08:03]
A
Yeah.
- [08:04]
B
And that new loan at a higher amount comes with a mortgage payment.
- [08:07]
A
Yeah.
- [08:07]
B
And that mortgage payment is going to be higher than than the previous one because now it's a higher mortgage. When you get a new mortgage, they front load the interest in the first five to seven years and so most of your payment is going to interest and so you put this money in your pocket and a lot of people, especially the casual investor may not have had the next spur lined up. They pulled the cash out of their last spur and then they blow a chunk of it before they get to their next deal. And then that kills the like it kills the purpose. What I was doing and what I still like to do is instead of refinance I just get access to a line of credit on that equity and then that way I don't get a new loan at a higher amount. I keep my lower mortgage payment which keeps my cash flow and then I have access to the money in the event I need it instead of just Pulling it out and starting to pay on a new loan and then not spending that money wisely.
- [09:00]
A
Yeah, because that's a great point. If you don't immediately reinvest your capital that you pull out, you're essentially just reducing your cash flow for no reason.
- [09:08]
B
Right.
- [09:09]
A
That, to me, is a really important thing. All right, this is a great conversation. We have a lot more of it, but we do have to take a quick break. We'll be right back. They say real estate is passive income, but if you've spent a Sunday night buried in spreadsheets, you know better. We hear it from investors all the time. Spending hours every month sorting through receipts and bank transactions, trying to guess if you're making any money. And when tax season hits, it's like trying to solve a Rubik's Cube blindfolded. But that is where Baseline comes in. BiggerPocket's official banking platform. It tags every rent payment and expense to the right property and schedule E category as you bank. So you get tax ready financial reports in real time, not at the end of the year. So you can instantly see how each unit is performing, where you're making money and where you're losing money. And then you can make changes while it still counts. So head over to baselane.com biggerpockets to start protecting your profits and get a special $100 bonus when you sign up. Thanks again to our spons. Baseline let's talk about a real estate backed investment with major tax advantages. Car washes PBR's Opportunity Fund offers accredited investors access to a high margin, recession resistant industry with passive income tax efficiency and significant upside potential. With operations in prime locations. Using best in class technology. Managed via a vertically integrated team, this fund is designed to deliver strong, stable returns. Backed by over $1 billion in assets under management, PPR has provided passive returns to thousands of investors since 2007. Don't miss out. Learn more today@biggerpockets.com PPRCAR that's biggerpockets.com PPRCAR so I tried explaining a sandwich lease to my insurance guy once and he just blinked at me like I made it up. And that's sort of the thing, right? Most insurance companies don't understand how we invest. You go vacant for a few weeks, you switch strategies, you hold stuff in an LLC and suddenly your coverage doesn't fit. That's why I recommend National Real Estate Insurance Group. They actually get real estate investors their coverage adjusts as your property changes and you get one monthly bill for everything. No matter how weird your portfolio is. You can check them out@nreig.com bppod that's n r e I g.com bppod do you want to invest in cash flowing rentals but don't have the time to manage the properties? Is your local market too competitive or expensive to invest in? Rent to Retirement offers new construction turnkey investment properties that you can buy with as little as 5% down and rates as low as 3.99%. Their team handles everything from financing, management, insurance and more so you can live where you want and invest in the markets that offer the best returns. Rent to Retirement has the best reputation in the industry with more five star reviews than any other company on the BiggerPockets website. To learn more, visit biggerpockets.com retirement or just text REI 233777 to start investing in the best markets today there's something surprising A lot of investors don't realize landlords actually file more insurance claims than homeowners. But most of the big traditional insurance companies, they're just not set up to handle those claims quickly or easily. That's why so many real estate investors are switching to steadily they focus exclusively on landlords. So whether you got a single family rental, need a builder's risk policy for a BRRRR or focusing on growing your portfolio, you get fast quotes, flexible coverage and protection for property damage, liability and loss of rental income. It's a good idea to review your rates and coverages every year on your rentals. So go get a quote in minutes@biggerpockets.com landlordinsurance today steadily landlord Insurance for the Modern Investor welcome back to the Bigger Pockets podcast. I'm Dave Meyer here with Henry Washington talking all things brrrr in 2025. And I also think what you brought up about HELOC people should take notice of. It's not the only option for, you know, brrrr. Is that the only option? I think brrrr can work for people. I'm not saying it's not good, but like there are other ways to pull out equity like Henry said. Maybe you can explain to everyone sort of like the HELOC approach and just reiterate sort of like who that might work for and who it it might not work for.
- [13:28]
B
Let's assume you buy a property, you renovate it, you rent it out. Now you have this option I can refinance, right and pull cash out whatever I put into it maybe plus some and then I could go do my next deal. Or you can get a line of credit and the way the line of credit works is similar to a refi. If you go into a refi, whatever bank you're going to do the refi with is going to appraise that property. And then it should, you know, theoretically appraise for more than you have into it. So for more than you've purchased it, plus you plan to renovate it. So if you bought it for 100, you put 50 in it and it appraises for 250, you should be able to refinance all of your money out because that appraisal value is higher than typically what they want, like 75%, 80% loan to value. And so you should be able to pull all of your money out. The HELOC method is very similar. You would just go to a bank and say you want to take a line of credit out on the equity you have in your property. That lender would then order an appraisal. Let's say the appraisal comes back at 250,000. The way the line of credit would work is they will give you access to 75% of the equity. And so if the appraisal comes back at 250,000, you bought it for 100, you put 50 in it, you owe 150. That means you technically have about $100,000 of equity. And if they give you access to 75% of that equity, that means you should get a line of credit for around $75,000. And then what? The way that line of credit works is you don't pay anything interest wise as long as you haven't used any of that money. So now what that means is you now have access to that money. So if I need that money tomorrow, I can get access to that money tomorrow. I can just tell the bank, hey, I need access to $20,000 for a down payment for a property, they literally drop it in your account that same day. And so you have liquidity because you have access to that money, but you don't have to pay any interest on that money unless you use it. And you only pay interest on the money you use. And so if I have access to 75, but I only need, you use 25, and I have a 6% interest rate on that HELOC. That means I'm paying 6% interest on the $25,000 that I have taken out of my line of credit. If you refinance it, you're essentially paying interest on all of that money immediately because it's rolled into your monthly payment.
- [15:47]
A
Yeah, it just gives you optionality, which is a really really nice thing, especially if you don't know exactly what deals you're going to use next or how you want to use the money. Like sometimes you might want to use it to fund a down payment, but other times you may want to use it to fund a rehab or do something else with the money.
- [16:02]
B
And again, when we're going back to looking at the times when people were really loving the brrrr strategy, a lot of people were using short term loans to get into properties. And so they would use something like hard money or private money with a high interest rate to buy that property and renovate that property. And so then they're left with only one option is you've got to refinance that to pull that cash out and pay back those lenders because you don't want to be stuck in a note with a 12 or 13% interest rate.
- [16:30]
A
That's exactly right.
- [16:31]
B
That strategy is much tougher now because it requires you to find a phenomenal deal so that you can complete a full burr. And I think if you're just a casual investor, that's something you need to be cautious of if you're going to buy a property. You can find a property to burr but you got to be careful how you purchase it. You probably don't want to use high interest money to get into the deal because what if you don't get that appraisal on the back end? What if your value doesn't come back what you thought it was? Now you're stuck in a loan with high interest that you can't get out of unless you pour even more of your own capital into that refinance.
- [17:08]
A
That's such a good point. The longer I am in this industry and do deals, it's like the debt is really what tells you the debt is basically yeah, if you succeed or fail, it's so much like how much you choose to finance strategically. But what Henry said is so important. Like I'm just representing this sort of casual investor and like, you know, I do a fair amount of deals but like I work full time. Like I'm not going out and doing what Henry is doing. And as someone who does that, like to me I really like optionality. I don't like putting myself in a situation where I have to go refinance this or I have to finish a renovation in six months. I have other stuff to do, you know, like I can't be on that kind of timeframe. And so that's why I sort of like this delayed Burr. If you do this thing where you get an occupied home, you can typically, in my experience, always get a conventional mortgage on it. And that's so valuable. You just get, you know, you still have to put 25% down if you're an investor, but you can go get, you know, a 6 1/3 loan in today's day, maybe a 7% loan in today's day and age. I would only buy that deal if it cash flows like that. Day one, I buy it. 7% conventional loan. With the current rents, they would need to be cash flowing. I need this to be at least positive cash flow. It doesn't need to be great cash flow. I think that's sort of the thing that Henry and I were arguing with James about on the market the other day. But like I would buy that at 2% cash on cash return knowing that the rents are under market rate and that when my tenants choose to move out, I'm going to renovate that and I'm going to get it up to an 8 or a 10 or ideally a 12% cash on cash return. That's what I'm looking for. I'm okay. If that period of stabilization takes me a year, I'm fine with that because I have that 6 or 7% interest rate. That is the difference because I am building equity, I'm getting the tax benefits, I'm doing all that. But I'm not under pressure to go refinance some hard money loan that I would have gotten if I was going to try and do this Sprint Burr that Henry's talking about.
- [19:14]
B
You know what that's called? What? You just described what it's called real estate investing.
- [19:19]
A
Yeah, exactly. It's not Burr. This is just like bread and butter. Boring.
- [19:24]
B
I say that as a joke, but it's a testament to like how spoiled we've been to have gotten in the game.
- [19:30]
A
That's right.
- [19:30]
B
Like for me, I got in the game in 2017, and in 2017 things were about to get great in 2020. Right. Like Covid aside, what it did for real estate was crazy. And so you didn't have to put as much thought. I know that sounds bad, but it's true. You didn't have to put as much thought and strategy into real estate investing because the market was going to save you if you just bought something and you waited for a little bit. You were going to be in a better position. And so you didn't have to be a strategic, you didn't have to plan out a long term Burr. You could just do it in three to six months and you were going to be great. Like now the market is requiring more of us. The market is requiring us to be more educated. The market is requiring us to be more prepared before we jump in. Because the market's not saving you anymore. You've got to save yourself with your strategy, you have to save yourself with your planning, you have to save yourself with understanding how to pivot, and you have to save yourself with managing your portfolio throughout its life cycle. Those weren't things you really had to pay attention to before because you would just go, yeah, my portfolio is good. It was good back then. It's better now. Keep on trucking, right? Like, it's not that way anymore.
- [20:48]
A
Oh, it's been a week, it's worth 5%. Everything's going well. I think what you're saying is so right. What we need to do as an industry is a shift of expectations. It's not like real estate is no longer good. And the reason I liked this question in the forums that I wanted to bring in and talk to you about is like, Kyle is asking, what should his expectations be in 2025? And that's a great question that everyone should be asking themselves because so many folks are comparing to 2020 and saying, oh my God, you can't do brrrr anymore. It's like, well, you could buy a lot of deals right now that will improve your financial situation a lot. That will really help you, in my opinion, more than any other asset class. Is it going to help you as much as this Goldilocks period in 2020 when every damn thing went right for real estate investors? No. And that literally may never happen again. I know people are waiting, say, oh, rates are going to go down. It's going to go crazy again. I don't know. I don't think it will. It might never happen again in our lifetimes. I really mean that, and that's fine. I've said this before, but I really mean it. We didn't have those conditions in the 70s, the 80s, the 90s. Real estate was still a great business. People still made money. They just had appropriate expectations and adjusted their strategy accordingly. And that's why, when I'm talking about this delayed burr, it might sound like super boring to people, but this is just bread and butter.
- [22:15]
B
It's just real estate, bro.
- [22:16]
A
Super low risk, high, still has a high upside, right? Like, it's just bread and butter, not doing anything fancy.
- [22:23]
B
I go to these conferences all across the country all the time when I Get asked to speak and inevitably like, you know, 100 different people who are there, you know, whether they know me or not, they'll say, oh, so what do you do? And I always like, it's always like I, I just, I buy houses and I fix them up and then I either rent it out or I sell it. And then I was like, oh, that's cool. I'm like, yeah, yeah, it's super boring. Like I just do regular boring real estate. I'm not doing some fancy boutique hotel. I'm not doing some $4 million short term rental. I'm not buying things on some super creative fancy financing strategy that's brand new. I just buy houses and then I fix them and then I rent them or I sell them. And that's worked long before I ever invested in real estate. And that same strategy will work long after I'm done investing in real estate. And I am a okay with that.
- [23:21]
A
Well, I want to get back to the brrrr thing here. Cause you mentioned something earlier that I think is a super important topic. You said that you weren't a fan necessarily the brrrr even when it was sort of this perfect time to do it because it reduces your cash flow. And I honestly have thought about that too. And I've done that in the past when I've refinanced a burr or just property I've owned for a while, whatever. When I refinance, I don't always take out max leverage.
- [23:46]
B
Yes, I don't either.
- [23:47]
A
And that was even true during a time when people were benefiting from max leverage. And what I mean by that is a lot of times when you refinance property, if you go and do a burp, basically you'll have to leave a certain amount in like you're getting a new mortgage, right? And so you essentially have to keep an amount in that is equivalent to what a down payment would be. So for most investors, that's 25% down. So if you refinance it, it gets appraised at $400,000. You have to keep $100,000 in equity into that deal. Of course you have to pay off your own mortgage, but during this process, the bank will tell you the most amount that you are able to take out. So, so let's just use a nice round number here and say they have the option to give out $100,000. So if you wanted to max your leverage, basically what you would do is keep that $100,000 in and borrow $300,000. You take 200 of that to pay off your own mortgage. And 100 you can walk away with. Now, you could do that. But of course, borrowing $300,000 instead of borrowing $200,000 has implications for your cash flow. Right. That is going to reduce your monthly cash flow. It also increases your risk a little bit. Now, I don't think putting down 25% is a huge amount of risk. That's like an appropriate amount of leverage, I think, in most cases. But it does increase your risk. When you do take out more leverage, as Henry said, it restarts your loan. And so what I've done in the past is often leave 30, 35, maybe even 40% in instead of taking out max leverage. And that does mean that I won't have as much capital to go buy the next deal or to fund the next renovation. But to me, it preserves cash flow, which is my long term goal as an investor. It is not my immediate term goal. I'm not trying to maximize my cash flow today, but by leaving 30, 35%, it gets me closer to my long term goal, which is to fully replace my income with real estate.
- [25:38]
B
Yeah, absolutely. You keep your cash flow. And again, like, it's not like you can never access that money in the future. Like, if you had to go get a line of credit two, three years from now to access that money, you could. I mean, it's there. Like the value is going to be there. Your real estate portfolio is not going to take, you know, 50 to 75%. Like, it's going to be there. It's going to be more in the future. So yes, you can still access it later on if you need to.
- [26:05]
A
That's so true. It's funny, I had a similar experience when we were on the cash flow roadshow. I was talking to an agent in Madison, Wisconsin. I was talking about doing sort of like a cosmetic delayed kind of bur the stuff that I like to do. I was like, is this going to work in this market? And he was like, I don't know, it's pretty tight because I want, you know, a certain amount of cash flow if we can go buy this deal. He's like, I don't know. And I was like, well, what if I just put left 35% in the deal? And his like, face lit up. He was like, you would do that? And I was like, yeah, of course I would do that. Like, why? You know, like, I get that some people want to recycle 100% of your capital. I'm further in my investing career. So, like, I have different perspective here. But he was like, oh my God, yeah, I can find you those deals all day. And I was like, yeah, okay, wait a minute.
- [26:46]
B
So you're telling me as a real estate investor, you were willing to invest your money in your deal?
- [26:54]
A
That's such a good point. I've never even thought about it that way. It's like, oh my God, you actually have to keep your money tied up in this investment to make money. Yes, that is, that is possible. Right? So yeah, he was like the tone of the toll conversation changed, right? Because I was like, oh yeah, I'll leave 30% in. I'll put 40% in to make this deal work. Because if this is a great, like, if it's a great asset that I want to hold on to long term, if it was something I was trying to get rid of in a few years, which is not something I really do, I would think about this differently. But I approach all of my real estate acquisitions with that lens. Like, do I want all this for 10, 20 years? Then yeah, I'm willing to keep 30% into it to make this cash flow and to hold onto this awesome asset for sure. All right, well, let's take a quick break, but I want to leverage your expertise while you're here, Henry, and just talk about like if people want to do brrrr, how do they do it as best as they possibly can in 2025? Let's talk some tactics. We'll get into that right after this quick break. We'll be right back. Want to earn passive income every month without the hassle of property management? If you're an accredited or high net Worth Investor, PBR Capital Management offers a proven solution. Since 2007, PPR has helped nearly 2,000 investors earn over $100 million in consistent, predictable passive returns. Headquartered just outside Philadelphia, PPR manages a 1.1 billion billion diversified portfolio designed to provide steady income and long term growth. With decades of in house expertise, their team strategically mitigates risk to help investors achieve their financial goals. See how a PPR fund could fit into your portfolio? Visit biggerpockets.com PPR today. That's biggerpockets.com PPR okay, let's say you're one property's mid flip, one's between tenants, one's on Airbnb. Now try explaining that setup to a regular insurance company. Yeah, it's not fun. But with National Real Estate Insurance Group, it's actually easy. They're built for this stuff, whether it's flips, short term rentals, even creative deals like subject to or sandwich leases. It doesn't matter if you've got properties in an LLC or a trust either. They just roll it all into one bill and their coverage flexes as your properties change. If you invest in real estate, this is who you want. Go to nreig.com bppod to check it out. That's n r-e I g.com bppod want to invest in real estate but don't have the time or know the best local markets? Rent to Retirement has got you covered. Here's the deal. They've helped thousands of investors just like you find turnkey homes across the best US Markets. And best of all, they do all the heavy lifting for you. With over 255 star ratings on bigger pockets, Rent to Retirement experts help you build strategies to retire early through real estate. And right now, Rent to Retirement offers some amazing incentives on turnkey new construction properties. Just for example, you can get up to 30% off new build prices or you can get 0% down low loan options or interest rates available as low as 3.99%. So don't miss out. These deals will not last. Text REI to 33777 or visit biggerpockets.com retirement to start investing in top cash flow markets today.
- [29:50]
C
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- [30:50]
A
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- [32:06]
B
Well, yeah. First of all, you definitely have to know your buy box because this strategy is going to require you to have some knowledge about your market and knowledge about what you want to buy. Because you have to be able to go and find that deal at a price that's going to upgrade, allow you to pull off your brrrr in the time frame you want to pull it off in. Right? So if you wanna pull off a burr in six months, like the quick burr like we talked about before, the discount you have to buy that property at is much deeper. Then you have to have a strategy for exactly what to go look for and how you're gonna look for it. Are you gonna spend money on marketing? Are you gonna spend time on the mls? How are you gonna generate the leads in a timeframe enough that's going to allow you to find a deal at a deep enough discount to pull it off in the short term. If you want to pull it off in the long term, you have to understand your buy box and understand your market from the perspective of knowing or having a good idea of what is a typical equity increase year over year in that market? What are the typical rent increases year over year in that market, and then what is your current cash on cash return that you're looking for? Because then that helps you go and pinpoint and run numbers on deals that specifically in deals that are probably on the mls, it will help you weed out the property. So now you can look at a handful of properties that may potentially hit your number. Because some neighborhoods may increase in value more than others, some zip codes may increase in value more than others. So in one neighborhood, you may be able to buy a property at X XYZ price point, but in another town or another neighborhood, you may have to pay a little more. Right? Or you may be able to pay a little less. So, understanding your timeframe, if you're like, hey, I want to refinance this thing in five years, I need it to come close to breaking even now. And then you can look in your market and say, okay, well, in my market, typically 2 to 3% of a value increase year over year. And you can do that calculation to figure out, if I bought this property for this price, this is what I would expect it to be worth in the future. Plus, if I do the value add that I'm looking to do, I expect that it'll add this much value. And so that means I can offer X for this property. I hope that kind of made sense. You have to understand what it is you want to buy, where you want to buy it, and where you think the market's going. So you can buy the property at the right price point to execute your strategy in the future.
- [34:27]
A
Well said. Totally agree with that. I'll just add one other thing, and this is just my advice to everyone all the time right now. So. So you're going to hear it again. Sorry, everyone. It's just conservative underwriting right now. Like, I think we got into this era where people were taking the max comps and then they were assuming that they were going to be able to get this appraisal that was going to work out really well for them right now. Like, the market could turn. Like, instead of counting on appreciation, like you could, you know, in 2020, you could probably count holding the property for six months, probably 2, 3% appreciation. That matters on a $400,000 purchase. That's 12 grand in equity that you're building for doing nothing. You can't count on that. And in fact, I recommend people sort of count on the opposite happening. We were just seeing across the country, it's different in every market, but there's a chance that property values in your six months might drop 1%. They could drop 2%. I don't think there's a crash. But if you are Counting on that equity. You really want to be conservative about that and make sure that you're assuming, I would say at best, assume flat. If you want to be a conservative investor like I am, I would say just count on going 1 to 2% below. That's a way to still invest during a buyer's market like we're in, and be confident. Right. Like if you are accounting for that, your deal is going to work out because you're just taking the risk out up front in your underwriting and your deal selection. Like that's kind of the really important thing for you to do. And just say the same things about rent. Like I, I do think rents probably in the next year or two are gonna start accelerating again. But I wouldn't count on it. I would just assume that that's not going to happen. I would, as Henry said, and always caution. Henry is very adamant about this point all the time, which he should be. Is like having the multiple exit strategies too. What happens if you don't get the appraisal? Like, can you still hold onto it? Is it still okay? Those are the kinds of things in this kind of market it makes sense to be defensive. It makes sense to protect the downside. So I think there's still absolutely upside. I would still buy brrrr deals. I'm still looking at them all the time, but I just underwrite them in a way to protect myself.
- [36:26]
B
Right. And I think what we're both saying is this strategy is going to require you to look at a lot of deals and probably make a lot of offers and probably hear a lot of no's. Both Dave and I have different strategies for finding deals. But I can tell you one thing, we both analyze a lot of deals before we actually end up getting one.
- [36:45]
A
But that's the fun part. I love that part.
- [36:47]
B
Yeah, me too, because I'm a deal junkie. Right. But like, even though your strategy doesn't cost you money and it's fairly, you know, air quotes, easy for you to get deals across your desk, you still look at a ton before you're actually pulling the trigger on offers on some. And the same for me. I generate leads, I spend money to generate leads, and I analyze a ton of deals and I make a ton of offers before I get a yes. That amount of work doesn't change based on the strategy that you do. There's, there's very few investors in this world who just a deal pops on their desk and they buy it because it's that like if they're doing that they're not investing for cash flow. They're just investing because they need to save taxes somewhere and throw a bunch of cash at real estate. Like, we have to analyze a lot of deals.
- [37:29]
A
That's the job. That is literally the job of the investor is like to go do that stuff. All right, great. Well, this was a lot of fun. Henry, thanks for being here.
- [37:36]
B
I love talking about this topic because it pushes a lot of people's buttons. When you start, oh, they're still talking about, about Brrrr 2025. Look, man, just be easy on what you think a BRRRR is. If you think it's the strategy where you can spend very little money and refinance your deal in 90 days, you're right, that's dead. That's. That's very uncommon. But doing a successful BRRRR project can be done in a lot of markets across the country. If your expectations are more realistic.
- [38:04]
A
Absolutely. Let's just call it the like value add, cash out. Like you decide the timeline, but what you're doing is buying an asset that is not up to its highest and best use. You're adding value. Right. And then at some point you're cashing out a little bit or you're taking a HELOC out on it. Like Henry said, like adding value, building equity, and then leveraging that equity you created either through a cash out or a heloc. You can do that. Like, that is the game. That is real estate investing.
- [38:30]
B
That is called real estate investing, folks.
- [38:31]
A
Yes, you can absolutely still do that. One last thing. This is kind of a new format that we're doing on the show where we're taking one question. Henry and I are doing a deep dive, just sharing our personal experiences around it, but also just our opinions about it. We'd love to know if you like this format. So if you're watching this on YouTube or if you are watching on Spotify where you can make comments now, don't know if you know that, but Spotify, you can make comments on specific episodes. Let us know if you like this format and we'll do more of them. Thank you all so much for listening to this episode of the Bigger Podcast Podcast. We'll see you next time. Thank you all for listening to the BiggerPockets Real Estate Podcast. Make sure you get all our new episodes by subscribing on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, or any other podcast platform. Our new episodes come out Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I'm the host and executive producer of the show, Dave Meyer. The show is produced by Ian K. Copywriting is by Calico. Content and editing is by Exodus Media. If you'd like to learn more about real estate investing or to sign up for our free newsletter, please visit www.biggerpockets.com. the content of this podcast is for informational purposes only. All host and participant opinions are their own. Investment in any asset, real estate included, involves risk, so use your best judgment and consult with qualified advisors before investing. You should only risk capital you can afford to lose, and remember, past performance is not indicative of future results. Biggerpockets LLC disclaims all liability for direct, indirect, consequential, or other damages arising from a reliance on information presented in this podcast.