A few ways to invest in real estate that you wouldn't have thought about

A parking space at an international airport, an old people's home, a fragment of a castle or even a tin container are just a few of the many unusual ways in which the real estate market is tempting to invest. According to companies offering such solutions, it is sometimes possible to achieve profitability in double digits. Well, here we go!

Low interest rates on bank deposits encourage the search for other ways to invest capital. However, these searches should be conducted with caution. Everyone should remember that side by side with the promises of high potential returns goes hand in hand with risk. Moreover, even in markets considered to be safe - as in the case of the real estate market - caution is needed.

It should be remembered that the real estate market is not only about apartments for rent, but also about commercial premises, offices, hotels, warehouses and land. Each of these segments has its own specificity, which needs to be known and understood in order to invest money consciously. If this is not enough, more and more new, less traditional proposals are waiting for investors. Ten of them took a look at Lion's Bank today.

Office workstation

One of the latest solutions is an investment in the office market, which allows you to own not the entire building or its single floor, but only a single workplace. This solution was proposed by an American developer from Manhattan (New York). What is more, the office is to become a coworking zone, i.e. a workplace for entrepreneurs from various fields on one surface. This idea is only just getting more and more popular in Poland, while in the USA it is a very serious segment. Estimates of the U.S. statistical office dealing with the labour market suggest that 65 million people (40% of the workforce) will soon be potential users of coworking offices in the U.S. in 2020.

Fragment of the castle

A similar mechanism - a leaseback mechanism - operates in many investment offers in the real estate market. The point is, roughly speaking, that a company running a business using real estate sells it to investors and for using it to continue running the business pays a remuneration to investors. Why are companies willing to share their profits? Simply, money from the sale of real estate - usually an important asset of the company - is allocated for further market expansion. The rooms in Taymouth Castle, converted into a Scottish hotel, are available in this model.

Self-service warehouse

Much less capital is needed if you choose the market of self-service warehouses. Entering this market in Poland requires the creation of a warehouse from scratch and dealing with the entire business "from a to z", but in the West it is possible to buy even a single warehouse stand ("box"), which is managed by a company dealing with the entire operational sphere of business. In this case, the investor should only wait for monthly or quarterly transfers after purchasing the property.

Parking space

Another low-budget solution is to invest in a parking space. However, it is not a single parking space in a garage under a block of flats, which for 200 or 300 PLN per month is rented by the owner, but at the airport parking lot. Plus is that the management and settlement of accounts with tenants is handled by an external company, and the investor is expected to wait only every month for payments.

Old people's home for investors with a thicker wallet

Another idea that is gaining in popularity is investing in retirement homes. This is because, in many European countries, national health services are unable to provide adequate care to a growing number of elderly people. This gives room for the development of companies operating in this market. This business, however, requires considerable investment in real estate. Here too, it makes sense to use the aforementioned model of returnable lease, which, in exchange for a promise of monthly rent payments, gives companies running retirement homes money for faster development of the scale of activity. The advantage for many buyers can be, in addition to the rental income, the fact that they can spend the autumn of their lives in their own room, hoping for lower care charges.

Dorm

The leaseback model also works well in the student housing segment. They are offered flats by some investors who buy houses and flats for rent. There is, however, a risk of devastation, and not all investors feel the strength to control the condition of their homes and keep an eye on students so that they do not bother their neighbours too much. For those who are looking for profits in student portfolios and at the same time expect an unmanned investment, the solution may be to buy a property in a student residence managed by the company. In Poland such solutions still do not go beyond the developers' plans, but e.g. in Great Britain you can find a whole lot of such investment offers. Thanks to them, you can become the owner of a single room or find offers for the entire dormitory, which has been operating for years. As a result, rent can be paid in a predetermined amount, be dependent on profits generated by the whole facility or the investor himself stands at the helm of the facility manager.

Container full of unknowns

Finally, there is a curiosity about a very generous promise of profits, which is not real estate, but often compared to investment in real estate. It is an unusual investment offer, which is the purchase of a tin container. It is a large metal box, which can be transported e.g. by ship or on a trailer of a truck. Why buy it? If you believe the offers posted on the Internet, companies operating on the market of maritime forwarding are willing to rent such containers, paying the owner a large part of their value every year. Details? The price of such a container may amount to 2.5 thousand GBP, but there are also more expensive offers (4.1 thousand USD). The owner's remuneration is to be paid regularly in predetermined amounts or depending on the occupancy rate. In the first case, profits may amount to 10-12%, in the second case they may reach as much as 26%. The container must be fit for use for approximately 15 years and fully insured. If that were not enough, the companies offering investments in containers also talk about a guaranteed resale price equal to the purchase price after 3 years of investment.