Commercial Real Estate Pro Network

The American worker has been indoctrinated to regularly invest in the stock market for retirement.  Buy dollar cost averaging, starting aggressive, and as you reach the age of concern, dial back the risk to some municipal bonds that pay 3 to 4 percent.  Then when you retire, withdraw up to 4% and live happily ever after.

If you study this model closely, you will come to the conclusion that this will not allow you to continue to live the lifestyle you are accustomed.  You need to consider an Alternative Investment, maybe cash flowing real estate.

Passive income is the goal.  In real estate, the opportunities for passive income are numerous.  You can buy single family turn key properties, invest in note funds, etc working with people dialed into the market providing returns well above 3-4%.  This is a good option for someone looking for more control.

However, Ross recognized the challenge of scale that exist when investing in single family properties.  He liked real estate, but really wanted to be able to scale. Something he could share with others.

After sifting through multiple real estate asset classes, multifamily mobile home, retail and assisted living, he landed on self storage.

While Self Storage is a want instead of a need.  He recognized a positive characteristic about Self Storage: Americans love our stuff.  In good times, we buy stuff. In bad times, we don’t want to get rid of our stuff. As long as we have more stuff, the demand for self storage will remain strong.

Dialed into the asset class, he had to determine where to invest.  Looking for opportunities, his team identified that coastal and large metro areas were heavily saturated with existing self storage.  The underserved opportunity exist in the midwest secondary, tertiary and rural markets.

There are multiple ways to get into self storage.  You can buy an existing property, build new, or convert an existing vacant property.  

Limited supply is another benefit.  Self storage has been identified by many cities as unwanted.  They have passed building ordinances, rules and zoning laws, etc to make developing any additional self storage difficult for any future potential competitors.