Local Investment Property Review

City (Number of Sales)
Redwood City (276)
Sunnyvale (201)
Mountain View (136)
Menlo Park (62)
Palo Alto (53)
Los Altos (10)

My Take: 
OK, so you’ve purchased a home, now what’s next?  Let’s think what you can do with any extra funds you might want to invest! Real estate investors have a tough time in the Bay area—it’s hard to break even, let alone make a profit!  After the real estate crash (or whatever you want to call it), all the low hanging fruit has been picked. It’s not really practical to purchase single family homes as an investment—the ROI locally just isn’t there.  What do folk do? They purchase duplexes, triplexes or fourplexes (1-4 units). Sure, it’s still expensive but it’s doable and many have been jumping on this bandwagon. Yes, you can purchase properties out of area but then there’s the problem of getting a good property manager. This week I’m sticking to the six cities I’m covering and showing you which ones offer the most choice when it comes to buying investment properties close by.

Just the Facts Ma’am:
By the way, this breaks downs as follows:

Duplexes sold:  420
Fourplexes sold:  214
Triplexes sold:  96
Mixed use or other Multi-Units:  8

Los Altos, Mountain View, Palo Alto, Sunnyvale, Redwood City and Menlo Park. Time frame is January 2011 to March 2016. All information taken from the Multiple Listing Service. Results calculated from 738 listings