Self-Storage Investing
Joining us today is Kris Benson, is the Chief Investment Officer of Reliant Investments, a subsidiary of Reliant Real Estate Management and one of the top 25 commercial self-storage operators in the U.S. in 2019. Reliant has completed over $650,000,000 in self-storage acquisitions and dispositions in the past 5 years and recently completed Reliant Self-Storage Fund I, a $50,000,000 equity fund focused on self-storage acquisitions in the southeastern U.S.
Kris is part of the investment committee at Reliant and helps to develop institutional quality self-storage investment opportunities for accredited investors.
Kris’s investing goals have always been about changing the paradigm of trading time for money in order to have time for more of the things we love to do. Likewise, investing in real estate has been Kris’s steadfast path to passive income and he is passionate about inspiring others to change their mindset around investing for their future.
In this episode we’re discussing…
[2:12] How he started in sales and how he changed his mindset to start investing, and now they’re the 25th largest Self Storage Operator in the US
[8:25] Why self-storage is still a good option to invest, and now with COVID-19
[10:54] The self-storage itself trend due to demographic, and climate control building
[13:44] The 4 D’s, demand drivers of self-storage, and now more because of COVID-19
[17:24] The investments type they can offer to raise equity, and what happened with syndications
[19:11] The value-added for every asset they buy and how they manage every deal
[20:29] The real return of investments that investors can expect
[24:49] Investors have to be accredited, and the minimum amount to invest with them
Kris Benson’s Top Tip’s
“I think that's a big part of the last five years, we've seen a substantial development cycle in the market. There's been a lot of new development, reliant, our particular focus is secondary and tertiary markets”
“So, think of the smaller markets, I think with our track record, we've proved that the reads will go out and buy if you can, in those markets, if you can provide scale. So, the 14-property portfolio in March to one of the readings, and it was primarily all tertiary market, so, it's certainly something like that you have to be cognizant of, and our acquisitions team, it's one of them, the many checklists we're trying to understand is what is the market supply?
“For your listeners, if they're looking at a self-storage facility, you want to be very cognizant of what the supply is in the market. Because it's basic, you know, macroeconomics, you get a lot of supply prices to go down, if you don't prices go up. It's more than just one individual metric”
“Think about the demand drivers of self-storage, in the industry, we talked about the four D’s, death, dislocation, downsizing, and divorce, right. So usually, if one of those things is happening in your life, you're going to create some demand for self-storage. With COVID-19, unfortunately, for everyone, and probably fortunate for the industry, is probably creating a little bit of all of those”
“If you think about storage, one big difference versus residential or multifamily is that the leases are 30 days. So, we see a lot of turn of tents. And what's interesting is people are staying longer right now. Consumer behavior change because of COVID”
“Our sweet spot really is the value add play, where we're buying an asset, current cash-flowing asset, and doing some forced appreciation model, that could come in a number of formats, it could come in us build an additional building, you know, some additional square footage and getting that leased up”.
“Sometimes the operational value add is lease-up. So, we'll buy an asset where the current owner completed an expansion and we take over at 0% occupancy for that building right now our job is to get leased up. I would call it an opportunistic Self-Storage operator; we'll look at almost anything”
“The investors return is projected to be a six-year-old period, and between 12 and 15% a year, including the profits from the sale. The cash flows of current yields. We plan to pay between four and 7% a year. And then upon exit, you'll get the rest of that pop, and we expect the returns to be $100,000 in an example, we expect to return between 172 to 190,000, including your principal, so 72 to 90%, over a six-year-old”
Resources from Kris Benson
Reliant Investments | LinkedIn | Facebook | Phone | Email
ABOUT KRIS BENSON
Kris Benson is the chief investment officer for Reliant Investments, a subsidiary of Reliant Real Estate management and one of the top 25 commercial self-storage operators in the U.S. in 2019. Reliant has completed over $650,000,000 in self-storage acquisitions and dispositions in the past 5 years and recently completed Reliant Self-Storage Fund I, a $50,000,000 equity fund focused on self-storage acquisitions in the southeastern U.S. Kris is part of the investment committee at Reliant and helps to develop institutional quality self-storage investment opportunities for accredited investors.
Kris’s investing goals have always been about changing the paradigm of trading time for money in order to have time for more of the things we love to do. Likewise, investing in real estate has been Kris’s steadfast path to passive income and he is passionate about inspiring others to change their mindset around investing for their future.
Kris graduated from the State University of Binghamton and currently lives in Roswell, GA just outside of Atlanta, with his wife Jenn and two sons, Noah and Luke. He is an outdoor enthusiast with a passion for the ski mountain, the lake, and his mountain bike.
