A Guide to Scaling Your Portfolio with Long-Term Rental Real Estate

Rental property investments continue to be the best way for individuals to invest their money and build long-term wealth. While growing a portfolio of profitable real estate investments can be a difficult task, especially in today’s competitive market environment, the prospect of financial freedom is well worth the effort. Understanding all the aspects of rental property acquisition and management will help set you up for success. An effective strategy will require careful planning, due diligence in research, and continual effort in optimizing the cash flow of your investments. Want to learn more? Continue reading for our guide on scaling your portfolio with long-term rental real estate.

Understanding the Benefits of A Rental Portfolio

The best thing about rental property investments is that they provide multiple benefits to investors beyond regular rental income.

• Real estate makes for such a strategic investment since it tends to grow in value over time through appreciation regardless of greater market conditions. This also makes rental property a great hedge against inflation.
• You can build a strong, diverse portfolio by investing in multiple areas and a different variety of properties such as multifamily homes.
• The equity you build over time may be used in refinancing to acquire more real estate property and continually grow your portfolio.
• By hiring a property management company to handle the day-to-day tasks, you can effectively turn your rental properties into passive income generating assets.

Setting Clear Investment Goals

Your first steps will involve establishing a clear goal for your investment strategy, as this will help give all your efforts direction. Your goal is likely to evolve over time, so you should try and set a goal that is ambitious yet attainable. Then you will need to build a strategy to help you achieve that goal. A winning strategy involves identifying profitable markets and good investment opportunities, as well as working to improve the cash flow of your portfolio over time. Be sure to choose investments that align with your personal risk tolerance, and be patient, as good deals can be hard to find in today’s competitive market environment.

Identifying Opportunities in the Market

Acquiring profitable investments starts with taking the time to research different markets and properties, and comparing them in order to find the most appealing prospects. While location is an incredibly important factor, you will also want to take into account demographics, property condition, rental demand, and appreciation potential as well as how these things may change over time. Doing your research allows you to identify emerging trends such as a rapidly growing job market, which can in turn lead to a very lucrative investment. Do not underestimate the power of due diligence.

Financing Strategies for Portfolio Scaling

You should understand that you have a few financing options available to you, and that you may have to utilize multiple options if you’re planning to grow a portfolio quickly. Traditional mortgages from a bank are always an option; these loans offer attractive interest rates, but often have a lengthy application process with lots of hoops to jump through. Alternatively, you may seek out a loan from a private or hard money lender. This gives you the benefit of more flexibility and an easier application process, which means you can acquire a properties faster than when using traditional mortgage loans, and there are less restrictions on the types of properties which qualify for financing.

Managing and Optimizing Your Rental Portfolio

We want to give some best practices to help you manage your rental portfolio effectively. It’s important to implement scalable systems that you can use across all your properties to make managing them all easier. This means having an effective system for filling vacancies, property maintenance, requests, and making improvements to the units. We also mentioned how hiring a property management company can be effective, but you will have to compare the cost against your portfolio’s cash flow. Technology can also be very beneficial here, helping you keep track of legal paperwork, tenant requests, and billing at the click of a few buttons.

Tracking Performance and Evaluating Growth

Speaking of technology, one of the best ways to track your portfolio’s growth over time is through using rental property management platforms. But why would you want to make an effort to track your portfolio’s performance? For starters, it can help you identify poorly performing rentals, giving you the chance to make strategic improvements or exit the investment. It will also help you identify the best performing markets for rental property investing. You can take a look at key performance indicators such as cash flow, net operating income, cash-on-cash return, and appreciation as an easy way to compare different properties.

RCN Capital

The easiest way to save on rental property financing is to find a trusted lender that can get you the best leverages and rates. RCN Capital lends to real estate professionals, commercial contractors, developers & small business owners across the nation. We provide short-term fix & flip financing, long-term rental financing, and new construction financing for real estate investors. RCN Capital also has flexible and competitive loan options available. Are you looking to purchase or refinance an investment property?