Your concern is very legitimate. However, you have to ask yourself a couple of thing first. Are you buying for cash flow or long term appreciation? If the numbers look good, and you’re buying for cash flow, long term appreciation is not as important. You will not have negative amortization to get positve cash flow, and you found an owner willing to carry paper, something I find rare today. In essence, don’t look a gift horse in the mouth. The building will evolve as the rest of the city will and nobody can predict the future of any given neighborhood, but if you have positive cash flow, are you happy?
Called on an ad the about a 4 plex that owner is willing to carry paper on. My concern is that all around this area is nice except for 2 streets one being of which the 4plex in question is on along with about 20 other plexes. When I spoke to the owner he referred to it as low income and his asking price is not much more than what he got it for 6 yrs ago my question is since it’s a short street and a culdesac(not the worse house in a good neighborhood but the 2 worse streets in the area) needing some tlc. The history is that the city did away with low income rentals in a central location and this is where some have ended. If that’s my only hold back should I go on head with getting started investing along with the idea of getting the other owners on the street to let’s join in together with a pride and revamp the area.