Why Invest in Self Storage?
According to Bloomberg Markets, storage space is “… the number one alternative investment”. For many investors self-storage is an extremely appealing asset class due to its large income potential with low overhead. Storage has less construction costs than other commercial real estate asset classes, along with lower maintenance costs. Many small to mid-size facilities require only part-time management and can use automated kiosks to allow new tenants to get started.
Because tenants do not reside on the property there are less regulations for the property and construction, and very low maintenance costs as storage is afterall, a metal box on a concrete slab.
As of November 2020, the average annual revenue for the self-storage industry was was $39 billion, with 9.4% of all households renting storage space. Demand for storage will likely grow as generations transition into their next stage of life and downsize into smaller living areas.
- Resistant to Recession
- Relatively High Returns
- Opportunities for Consolidation
- Lower Breakeven Occupancy Rate
- Low Maintenance and Less Hassle
Here's What The Experts Say About Self-Storage…
“Self-storage is a unique asset class. It has a reputation of providing relatively high yields and has shown to be relatively resistant to recessions due to its lower declines and default ratios versus other asset classes.”
– David Thompson, BiggerPockets
“One of the hallmarks of a recession is the movement of consumers into less spacious accommodations. As wages stagnate, and the employment picture gets grimmer, homeowners and renters tend to downgrade the size of their homes, but they still need a place to store their stuff. Self-storage facilities benefit from this demand and can see increased rental rates during a downturn.”
– Ari Rastegar, SpareFoot
“Let’s assume you had $200,000 to invest in 1994 and put your money equally into two investments. One investment for $100,000 in a self-storage REIT and reinvested all earnings while you put another $100,000 into the S&P 500 and reinvested all dividends. By 2017, the self-storage REIT would have grown to $4,026,413 while your S&P 500 stock fund would have grown to $532,243. Self-storage outperformed the large capitalization stocks index by a whopping $3,494,170.”
– David Thompson, Bigger Pockets
“The bottom line is that if we go into a bad housing market, people have to put their stuff somewhere. When the economy is good and people buy too much stuff they have to put it in storage. You’re winning as the market goes down, and winning as the market goes up.”
– Joel Cone, US News
Want to Passively Invest in Self-Storage?
While we have many resources available give you the tools, training, and support that you need to purchase and manage a facility yourself, we realize than many don’t wish to dedicate the time and capital necessary to learn how to invest, find a property, do the underwriting and due diligence, and actually invest in a facility themselves.
That’s why we also provide you ways to invest in lucrative self-storage deals completely passively. Check out our other site, passivestorageinvesting.com to learn more and see our passive investment offerings.
- Invest as little as $50,000
- Skip the hassle of buying a facility yourself
- Completely passive cash flow
Frequently Asked Questions
First of all, it’s worth noting that self storage is sold at a discount every single day all across the country, so this isn’t a “rare” situation where this would happen. An example of why a lender would sell a facility is when a borrower stops paying on their loan. This note then becomes classified as a “Non Performing Note” (NPN) or a “Delinquent Loan”. So rather than deal with the NPN themselves, lenders will very often sell these off at big discounts just to free up their money to make a new loan. In addition, there are many reasons a private seller would want to sell their facility at a fair price: Retirement, trading up to a larger facility, tax implications, health, divorce, bankruptcy…virtually any life changing event would cause a seller to sell their facility, or just because it’s time.
The first place to start is by asking if the owner is interested in holding the note and receiving payments directly from the buyer, as in a traditional borrower/lender scenario. The tax advantages for the seller are huge, and so are his profits. If that is not a possibility, the next steps are to contact any banks in the market that you have a relationship with, and then a commercial mortgage broker that specializes in self-storage.
The reason we see so many, is that roughly 1 in 10 households rents 1 or more units in this country. It has become a commodity that many Americans can’t live without – more space! But don’t worry, with average market occupancies approaching 90% in this country, the self storage business is far from becoming saturated any time soon.
The beauty of this business is that you don’t need a significant amount of capital or credit to start. In fact, many of our students have little to no money of their own and have still gone on to successfully own and wholesale, and invest in self-storage. The fact is that there is so much money available through banks and private lenders to fund your deals that by simply deploying a few of our strategies that we teach about how to close deals will finally remove the barrier to success due to lack of money.
Can I still do this? Most of the people we train to invest are in the same position and have gone on to buy their own properties. The strategies we teach allow you to start the business in your spare time. What many people have found, or have in mind, is that as they acquire more facilities, ultimately, it would end up costing them more money to go to work due to the lost opportunity of ignoring their self-storage investing business. That’s when people make the switch to becoming a full time self-storage investors.
As with any investment, of course there are risks involved. But as a responsible investor it is up to you to get the proper education and professional guidance to reduce those risks as much as possible. Without doing the proper due diligence, you could end up making a bad acquisition and end up losing money. However, it is important to note that the same risks exist even when purchasing your own house. With the right education, you can ensure you safely invest your money so there is a significantly reduced chance that your investment isn’t as profitable as anticipated.
Now, I am not an attorney so even I don’t know all the specific laws as they pertain to real estate transactions in each state. But the good news is that I don’t need to. What I do and what I teach my students to do is to work with specific attorneys in the situations where they need to, but the key is to only work with them when you need to. Knowing how to work with your team members, like attorneys, wisely and economically is an easy skill to learn and essential to your success.
Investing in self-storage needn’t be complicated. It’s a matter of understanding the deal, knowing how to complete the due diligence properly, and obtaining the necessary funding to close the deal. Once you understand these 3 steps, you can successfully acquire self-storage facilities anywhere in the country – not just your own backyard. And the good news is that you can do this in as little as 10 hours a week or even less. Some of my most successful students have gone on to close their first deal in a matter of weeks. Like most things in life, the more time and effort people dedicate, the more successful self-storage investors they can become.
We suggest to all students to have been through The Complete Guide to Finding, Evaluating, & Purchasing Self Storage Facilities™ Home Study Course manual and training videos, PLUS the Self Storage Valuator Training before arriving to the Academy to ensure that you can follow along with all terms and training during the sessions. If you do not already possess Scott’s Home Study Course and are interested in learning more about this, please call 866-693-5999 ext.5 so that our team can assist you.
You can email your additional questions to our office at info@selfstorageinvesting.com or call our support team at 866-693-5999 ext.0. Our staff is available Monday through Friday from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm eastern time.