All Topics / Commercial Property / How to get started in commercial property

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  • Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    @dwolfe
    Join Date: 2009
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    Hi,

    Can anyone give me some hints on where I can find info on starting out in commercial properties. What sort of returns should I be looking for. Are there any good books anyone can recommend. Anything to avoid like the plague? If anyone can give me any hints on how I can talk my other half into it that would be great too !

    Thanks All!

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of Scott No MatesScott No Mates
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    'Commercial' is a pretty wide field when it covers retail, industrial & office space, each having its own metrics and risk profile. Return varies even around the country for similar property. Any more specifics?

    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Thanks Scott,

    I guess I'm thinking along the lines of shops or warehouses when I say commercial. But I think that is a pretty limited view. I don't think I'm interested in hotel rooms or car spaces. But I don't know what there is out there.

     I'm based in Melbourne but not really worried where I buy as long as the return is there. If purchasing interstate it would be sight unseen as I can't just jump a plane and go there. I just think I'm missing something by sticking to residential property and that my money could be earning me more money somewhere else. But feel free to correct me if I am wrong.

     I don't really understand even the basics such as what outgoings are and whether say a rental rise of 4% a year  is good, bad or ugly. So really any information you can point me to would be a real help . We will be ready to start another project/investment probably Jan/Feb (We've got pre approval now but it requires pretty much all of our cash reserve as deposit so I'd rather wait)

    I'd like to go hardcore research/groundwork mode so that I can be sure that the money is going in the right place and that we are ready to move the minute everything else is finished.

    Thanks for your time on this and any help is greatly appreciated

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    mattnz
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    Typically in commercial property there are no outgoings. The contract with the tenant will almost always state that they must pay for them (as long as you have a tenant of course).

    The main restrictions with commercial are higher interest rates, lower lvr, higher entry cost and longer vacancy periods than in residential.

    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    @dwolfe
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    Thanks Mattnz! The LVR is about 65% as far as I understand, does a commercial property generally return enough that it can cover those empty times? I understand there is higher risk but is there a lot higher return? I feel like I am wading around in my lack of knowledge but hey if you don't ask some dumb questions you don't find out what questions you really need to ask!

    Thanks guys, keep it all coming I  like a steep learning curve

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    mattnz
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    Steve McKnight says that Commercial is the direction all residential investors should head long term. He states that typically commercial returns around 8%. Because there are no outgoings, this is 8% net.

    Profile photo of thecrestthecrest
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    Hi D
    What price bracket are you looking in ?
    What geographical area ?
    Any industry type preferences? e.g. factory, office, shop, storage, ?
    Minimum return required?
    Type of deposit or equity as collateral – cash, residential ?
    Time period of investment ?
    Cheers
    thecrest 

    thecrest | Tony Neale - Statewide Motel Brokers
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    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Hi Crest,

    I guess I was thinking Kosciusko rather than Everest but hey…

    How bout a scenario,

    Price under $500k (for this exercise)
    Melbourne
    Factory, office or shop
    Min 8%
    residential equity
    do you buy and hold commercial? or do u sell after x amount of time? Do I just go on commercial real estate sites and go purely on return or are their other factors as with residential?

    It would be great if someone could do me a mini case study on a property in their portfolio (one they think is the best roi for instance), a breakdown like above so I can understand what I'm looking for. No hens teeth or gold nuggets just something that I would be able to hunt down in the real world.

    When looking for commercial do you look at something that is located well? or something already tenanted? I need more information!!!!

    Any help is really great! Thanks everyone.

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Ok heres one,

    Box Hill warehouse, new and reasonably located, 315sqm, Price is excluding GST so yes this might be a really dumb question but I add the 10% to get the right asking price? 713,750ex (785,125inc) the lease amount is $49,962.

    So if you wanted to lease it not buy it would be that amount but if you wanted to lease it out after purchase it would the same amount?

    By using Steve's 1 Per cent rule I get a return of 6.36% so does this make this a not so great investment or am I missing 10 other things to take into consideration?

    Please excuse me if this questions are totally beginner but I need to start somewhere on this

    Thanks all

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of thecrestthecrest
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    No tenant? No income. Need to know the area very well to know what the market rent return would be and how long you would have to wait to get a tenant.

    If looking at a tenanted property, important to assess the stability of the tenant and ability to pay.

    Sometimes existing landlords have inside info about the tenant's forward plans and may try to sell the property as "tenanted," before it becomes vacant.  Watch for leases getting close to periodic renewal, better to have been just renewed or renew lease for a longer term as part of purchase contract.

    Usually the better the tenant, the higher the price of the tenanted property due to lower risk of vacancy or rent problems.

    There are passive income tenanted motel leases for sale on 9% nett with 25 year leases, google motel brokers and check their passive investment properties. That'll be one of my retirement properties. I like their stability and ability to pay.

    Good luck.
    Cheers
    thecrest

     

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    Profile photo of Scott No MatesScott No Mates
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    mattnz wrote:
    Typically in commercial property there are no outgoings. The contract with the tenant will almost always state that they must pay for them (as long as you have a tenant of course).

    There are both gross and net leases. Matt refers to net leases (which are the figures that you must use to calculate your return when comparing different investments (ie other properties or other types of investments eg shares).

    Not all leases are net – many retailers (those generally not located in managed shopping centres) and other users are paying a 'gross' rent or possibly a 'semi-gross' rent (where some outgoings are payable. A gross rent is preferred by many tenants as they are only obliged to pay the agreed rent + services whereas  a tenant on a net lease pays an agreed proportion of outgoings (rates, landtax for single holding, water rates, insurance, management fees, maintenance costs etc.

    mattnz wrote:
    The main restrictions with commercial are …longer vacancy periods than in residential.

    Not necessarily true. I have seen some properties vacant for in excess of 12-18 months and others which have been effectively marketed by an active/effective agent leased before the previous tenant has vacated. The advantage of commercial property is that, unlike residential property, the tenant generally undertakes some fitout, reprints stationery, business goodwill etc (ie has a greater financial commitment to a location), hence the lease term is generally longer than resi, so you may have one tenant for 3-20 years with no vacancy but it may be a long one when they vacate.

    Cashflow may be a little more sporadic than residential as there are often incentives payable eg x months rent free, agency fee reflective of lease term, legal costs (dependent upon property type & deal struck). This is reflected both in the yield and the risk/return for each property and why banks will only lend 65% not 90-105% (sometimes at a premium). You will have to be a better financial manager to cover repayments whilst you have vacancies by putting aside sufficient funds to cover outgoings, interest etc.

    High returns are indicative of 'higher risk' which may be seen as properties where the tenant is on a short lease, over-rented, or the property may need extensive work. Lower risk may indicate a more stable/better investment grade property eg a suburban shop with KFC or a bank may sell on a 2-3% net yield whereas a similar shop with a 'no name' tenant on an expired lease in a country area may be paying 12% net. (the country property may not have any capital growth or prospect of a replacement tenant compared the security of a long lease  with a quality tenant).

    One other thing to mention is that GST is payable unless you are buying a 'going concern' – refer to teh ATO for specific requirements. It will pay to be GST registered as you can't raise a tax invoice & collect gst unless you are.

    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Wow! Thanks Scott. Righhhhhht!

    So yield is not the only thing to look at. You can cover the empty periods as long as you have either cash flow from other sources or part put away from rent, which you would be doing for gst/tax purposes so you would just put more away if you could.(hope that makes sense) So calculate total annual costs and start putting pennies away for the rainy day when the shop is empty.

    Low yield = low risk so in the box hill one above for instance middle yield of 6.3 middle risk? Is there lower risk opportunities for lower dollar amounts? I cant see us being able to pick up say a KFC site for under 500k. I think speculating in small towns trying to get a higher yield isn't really going to cut it (to start with anyway).

    So structure is essential don't go there unless you have a gst reg co to buy it in.

    So my next question is why. Why commercial? Why shops, why industrial buildings, why not stick to residential? I understand the passive income part. Commercial investing sounds a little more complicated and more interesting than straight residential. If there capital gains? Is there potential for growth with rent for doing little or nothing? Excuse me if I am missing the glaring obvious point of more return or something

    Is it better to go new or established? Is there depreciation on building etc same as residential?

    So I am going to ponder and fill my brain until I get a headache with this so I can understand it!

    Thank you very much Scott for answering many questions and creating a range of new ones

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Thanks thecrest,

    I will have a look at what you have suggested to see what the go is. That is good info about the lease expiry too!

    Thanks again everyone for all the really great info!

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Hey guys found a book (Roth and Lang) so I'll read that and then hopefull only have smart questions!

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of Scott No MatesScott No Mates
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    Visit the property section in your TAFE bookshop or library – great source of info.

    Depreciation – yes it is applicable. Depending upon incentives, lessor contributions to fitout etc you may be able to claim more ie over the life of the tenancy rather than building life.

    Functional obsolescence – watch out for buildings which may require massive refurbishment as they no longer suit the purpose – eg: lessor's infrastructure is outdated – phone/data, power/switchboard, essential services.

    Become acquainted with REAs, valuers, QS, lawyers etc they all play a valuable role in commercial property.

    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Thanks Scott! I've got my legal guy in place, Will hopefully have a QS for my current project (hopefully can use for commercial as well as residential) soonish, will go on the hunt for REA's who can give me help and info. Only just started reading the book so still have stacks of Q's but they can wait!

    That's interesting about the depreciation, so if you contributed to the fitout because tenant had specific requirements ie bottle shop needed wall to wall fridges then you would claim more that way rather than depreciation of shop that had removable shelving that you didn't pay for instance. Sorry just trying to understand all this in my crash course.

    Thanks Again

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of Scott No MatesScott No Mates
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    You'd want to have a deed in place to  retain ownership (of your contribution) diminishing over the term of the lease hence decreasing the risk of the tenant removing 'your' fixtures.

    Profile photo of Chris WhiteChris White
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    This previous thread might provide a few more answers for you.

    https://www.propertyinvesting.com/forums/property-investing/commercial-property/4325441?t=1260815402

    Also, the book “How Investing In Commercial Property Really Works – By Chris Lang & Martin Roth”.

    Cheers

    Chris White | Pillar Property
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    Profile photo of DWolfeDWolfe
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    Thanks Chris!

    Yeah I'm bout a 3rd the way through it so hopefully it can clear up the total haze I'm in. I think I've found some other good ref thanks to Scott but I'll have to see if I can get my hands on them.

    Thanks all

    D

    DWolfe | www.homestagers.com.au
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    Profile photo of Michael 888Michael 888
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    Chris Lang's book is good and also another I found useful by Dolf De Roos….. "Commercial Real Estate Investing"
     
    It's a little US and NZ based however has good fundamentals, principles and creativity to boot. It explains cap rates very well. The info can be applied to our commercial market here.

    Good luck

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