Yes ... and no. I say this with some caution because I don't want to sound like I'm rubbing anyone's face it anything, or supporting the commies-in-charge-at-the-moment.
You can still be very successful as a landlord, but it not for the faint of heart. You really need to understand it is a business and that you need to be educated on all facets of that business, locally and at the state level, as well as federal taxes, etc. It IS harder to get into the start up currently. It IS harder to survive when it seems like the .gov is against you. You WILL need to protect yourself against a serious profit haircut.
On the other hand rents and property values are continuing to go up and likely will for some time to come due to the tight inventory out there and the large number of people that must rent because they can't afford to/qualify to purchase their own home. Due to this, if you have held a property for a long time and have a low mortgage on it, you might not be able to sell it without causing yourself a lot of grief due to things like capital gains taxes. If that sounds like a good problem to have ... you'd make too much money ... trust me it isn't, especially if you need to sell because you want some of your time investment back due to age, health, etc. And finding a competent property manager is very difficult, it is why we formed our own property management company. But with that comes finding competent people that can work independently via a work order system and all of the other yada yada.
Going on 26 years in this business. We've been blessed and I fully acknowledge that. But we also have worked our tookus off and continue to do so. This is the type of business you can't just sit back with, manage is a verb and sometimes that verb is more than more people can handle. That doesn't mean that it isn't possible to be successful.
Kathy... this occurred to me recently, and do not interpret it as an attack or criticism in any way. We have a unique perspective as we were one of the last full-time, family dairy farms with registered cattle... Our small hometown had over 47 small (under 70 cows) family dairy farms in 1979. We were one of three left when we sold out in 2013... but there were three mega dairies, with 1500, 2250, and 6,000 cows.
This was directly and solely a result of government policies, and is clearly their desired result.
I'm seeing similar (despite the vast differences in the businesses themselves) changes in the rental business that bodes very ill for the small/medium landlords (knowing nothing about the business, I'm thinking "small" is 2-5 units, and "medium" is 6-25...?)
With the rent moratorium, allowing Blackrock to buy huge blocks of houses, huge zoning changes in California...
I think anyone currently in the business needs to either see if they gave any realistic chance (or desire) to become one of the "big dairy" equivalents, or start planning how to start exit planning, on a fairly short time line.
We were fortunate that our cattle sold at the peak of the market, and with our reputation, they did well. Cow prices haven't come near those peaks since. I had been timing the market, had proposed the milk market would next peak in 2014, and in fact, had been trying to talk hubby into thinking about dispersing the herd then. When his hip collapsed (thank You, Lord!) and forced us into selling a year "early".
But we still get industry publications, and I honestly think we were one of the very last to get anything more than beef value for 40 years of genetics. It really is going away... but a few folks did well in earlier times, and they think they'll come back.
Not happening.
I suspect, unless something drastic happens in the commie direction this country is heading, the mom and pop rental business will be the new family dairy farm.
Summerthyme
