As many of you know, Nighthawk Equity currently owns properties in five different markets spread across the southeastern United States, most particularly focusing in on Atlanta, Georgia, as well as Huntsville, Alabama.
Today, David Meilan, Director of Investor Relations, and Preside of Nighthawk, Drew Kniffin want to discuss a new region, the North Carolina markets, specifically the metro areas of Raleigh, Durham, as well as Charlotte.
Drew breaks down the positive qualities of these markets like this:
There are a lot of good things about the Carolina markets. Raleigh, Charlotte, and Durham all have good things going for them.
Raleigh is expecting a huge population boom over the next 10 years. They are an industry leader in tech jobs, ranked number one for tech jobs by Glassdoor, and rent creases have been strong there. We're seeing that influx of population work to the advantage of landlords, and yet it's still rated as one of the most affordable big cities in the US.
Charlotte is the biggest city in Carolinas, and it's also growing quickly as the fifth fastest growing city in the nation. A huge percentage of its population are young, between 20 and 39, so they're in that prime rental population that we like and look for. It's also a big banking sector, so they have a lot of banking and high paying jobs.
Durham rents are increasing quickly and their unemployment rate is below the national average. The increases for one and two bedrooms have been significantly higher in Durham than in the rest of the country on an annual basis.
So thats a good summary of some of the things happening in North Carolina – tremendous markets with a lot of opportunity for growth
Why is Nighthawk particularly well equipped to thrive in these markets? Should investors expect Nighthawk to expand into those markets anytime soon?
Well, we wouldn't be sharing these great numbers unless we thought there was potential.
At Nighthawk, we are always looking for a place that has rent growth, population growth, and job growth. North Carolina meets those metrics.
And when you have that, you have the opportunity for value add plays, where you can force the appreciation on the properties. When you already have good baseline growth, then you can layer on top of that force growth. That's a fantastic place and Carolina meets that bull's eye for us.
On top of that, the vendors that we've used, so successfully, we built good relationships with, whether it's our property managers, or our general contractors, can reach into the Carolinas: it's not too far from their headquarters in Alabama or Tennessee. North Carolina as an adjacent market. We can take that same playbook for success that we've done so many times in Huntsville and Atlanta, and layer that into Carolina, and have the reward potential for appreciation without increased risk for going into a new market, because so many of those vendors are the same.
Our last six deals or so have been in Atlanta and Huntsville, so what's the benefit to branching out to the North Carolina markets?
The answer is, we want to offer the greatest potential for good investments for our investor base. With Atlanta, you run the risk of that market being oversaturated, or prices going up to a point that no longer makes sense to our investors. If we were fully committed only to Atlanta, then we'd have to compete in that frenzy when the numbers no longer makes sense. We want to be able to go into other markets that potentially don't have that same crush of investors going into the markets.
We spoke to two investors in our latest deal, who said, “I love this deal. The numbers all make sense. I like it. I know you guys do well there, but I've already put $200,000 – $300,000 to work in the Atlanta market. And so I want to diversify. I want to have my investments in Atlanta market. But I also want to have a mini another strong growing market.”
Having Carolina in the mix might make sense for investors who don't want all of their money to be in the same city.
If you're a potential investor and you're interested in hearing more about Nighthawk's opportunities, and have not already scheduled a call with David, please feel free to do so.
This will put you on our “deal ready investor” list, which means we'll be automatically notifying you about any additional opportunities that pop up in the near future. In order to schedule a call with me please shoot me an email at David at Nighthawk equity dot com. I look forward to scheduling a call with you.
