Real Estate firms to buy properties in Palermo

[Girino]

In the past, there used to be small real estate firms that specialized in nice properties, catered toward expats or at least not listing the usual anonymous modern monoambiente or ugly apartments from the '60s. The websites I had bookmarked five years ago are down and ZonaProp/ArgenProp do not list nice properties. I tend to believe that specialized real estate firms do not publish their properties there, but first offers them on their website, only. ZonaProp/ArgenProp are a last resort.

The idea is to buy a property to put up for short term rentals to foreigners.

I am also interested in sharing experiences about this kind of arrangement. What is considered a good ROI in real estate here? All my literature is about the US short term rental market, so it is not comparable. Thanks.

 

[earlyretirement]

Try using one of the real estate portals: https://www.zonaprop.com.ar/ (Buenos Aire's closest thing to Zillow) or https://www.properati.com.ar/

Realtors mostly totally suck in Buenos Aires. There used to be a few good ones but a TON of people have left the business. I find most to be totally flaky there.

If you're buying an apartment for short-term rental just make sure the building allows it as a lot of buildings have changed the HOA rules to forbid short-term rentals. So make sure when you're making an offer you specifically check the HOA rules and that short-term rentals are accepted. Even if they are, there is no guarantee that they won't change the rules after you buy it.

ROI is all across the board here. There is a TON of competition now as a ton of people are doing short-term rentals. If you're renting to a local your ROI can be really horrible. For example, I have several friends that are in amazing properties and they are paying really low rental rates. I recently went to a friend's place in Palermo Chico that had a penthouse apartment with huge outdoor space. Super nice. That property is probably worth $375,000 US or so and he was only paying $800 US a month! I guess his rent was $1,200 before COVID but his landlord lowered it as he was struggling. His landlord would rather have someone paying something than paying nothing. It will go back up but even at the higher rate that's not much at all.

One great thing is with the high blue dollar rate, you're income is in USD if you're renting on Airbnb and your expenses are all in pesos. For example, my HOA fees in US $ terms has actually gone down over the past few years as the US$ is much higher now. It's gone up with inflation but they can't raise it too much. It's 40,000 pesos a month for the HOA expenses but now that's only around $105 US whereas before it was much more.

Property taxes and ABL are relatively inexpensive compared to other countries. But as mentioned, you have a shit ton of competition these days. Plus I assume Argentina will go the way of many other countries and start adding on IVA and income taxes on Airbnb. My rental properties in Mexico the ROI has actually gone down this past year as Airbnb is charging 19% IVA and also they are charging all owners income tax on the income. I'm sure Argentina will do that as well soon.

 

[FrankPintor]

Lots of info about ROI here: https://www.infobae.com/economia/20...-un-departamento-para-destinarlo-al-alquiler/

It puts the ROI in CABA at 4.1%. I had previously read that ROI in Montevideo or Asuncion would be around 8%, for comparison.

It also puts the ROI in North GBA at 6.7%, which corresponds with what I've heard anecdotally, that the rental market in places like Pilar, Campana, and so on is much more buoyant than in CABA. These would be houses, though, people want more space after the pandemic.

 

[earlyretirement]

Lots of info about ROI here: https://www.infobae.com/economia/20...-un-departamento-para-destinarlo-al-alquiler/

It puts the ROI in CABA at 4.1%. I had previously read that ROI in Montevideo or Asuncion would be around 8%, for comparison.

It also puts the ROI in North GBA at 6.7%, which corresponds with what I've heard anecdotally, that the rental market in places like Pilar, Campana, and so on is much more buoyant than in CABA. These would be houses, though, people want more space after the pandemic.

I'd say you have to take a grain of salt with anyone that gives specific ROI. If you're doing short-term rentals you have to account for some periods of no/low occupancy. Also, it was a complete nightmare during COVID as many, many buildings wouldn't let short-term rentals continue and it was a pain showing properties for long-term rentals as well.

I think 6.7% sounds optimistic or at least over the long term. I'd say 4%-5% range sounds about right but of course YMMV.