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An Expert Expat: Michael Koh - University of Iowa Alumni Magazine
Source:
magazine.foriowa.org
December 02, 2007
An Expert Expat: Michael Koh
By Pat Adams
Before becoming one of Buenos Aires’ biggest names in real-estate, 33-year-old Chicago native Michael Koh was co-owner of a healthcare company in Dallas, Texas. “It was a great job, I was making plenty of money,” he recalls. “But I was seeing a lot of our clients pass away just three or four years into retirement.” It made him wonder, he says. “What if it were me? What if I had three years?”
The job changed Koh’s perspective. He decided he would actually live as though his doctor had told him he had only three years left. And since he could afford to do it, Koh began to travel. He started going to the places he’d always wanted to go, seeing and doing the things he’d only ever read about in magazines.
Buenos Aires had long been at the top of Koh’s list. “I loved the culture, the people, everything,” he says. When he first arrived in 2002, Argentina was still reeling from a deep recession, and the government’s decision to devalue the peso that year led to a currency crash. In addition to losing fortunes in savings, many Argentines lost all trust in the banking system, the effects of which continue to play out today.
For a while, Koh was rotating between BA’s luxury hotels, savoring his “last days.” But with expenses accumulating, he wondered if an apartment might be a better choice. So he went searching. It was an experience, he says, he would never want to repeat. “It was a disaster. I got cheated.”
Eventually, Koh found an empty apartment, which he bought and furnished himself. In hopes of renting it out while away, he made a website called ApartmentsBA.com. “All of a sudden, there was a lot of demand for it,” he recalls. “And I thought, ‘Wow, there’s a business here.’” Six weeks later, Koh was subletting three more apartments and drafting a business plan to compete with the 5-star hotels blocks away.
Starting out as a consultant to prospective buyers, Koh quickly gained a reputation for knowing the intricacies of the Buenos Aires real-estate market inside-out. His venture capital investment company, Koh Inversiones (Koh Investments), which buys high-end property for foreign clients and then rents it out to tourists, opened for business later that year. “I haven’t met about 30 percent of my clients,” he says. “They hire me over the Internet or through a referral from a friend. Trust is key.”
Many of Koh’s clients haven’t ever seen their properties, he says. “This is just an investment for them.” So far, it’s been a very good one. Koh says last year his investors enjoyed a rise in property values of 25 percent, and made more than 10 percent on rental income. What’s the outlook for 2007? “Strong,” he says. Tourism is at an all-time high—it’s now the country’s 3rd biggest source of income--and real-estate is one of the safest investments in the city. “You have to remember that ever since the crisis, locals don’t put their money in the bank. They buy property. And now you have foreigners discovering what a great place this is.”
“Older folks, especially,” he adds. “They love it.” If it was the thought of growing old and dying in Dallas that moved Koh to travel to Buenos Aires in the first place, it’s the sight of retirees enjoying their lives here that makes him marvel at his new home. “I’ve been all over the world,” he says, “and this is one of the only cities where you can go and see senior citizens drinking espressos at three in the morning. BA’s got something for everybody. And it never even snows.”
Source:
An Expert Expat: Michael Koh
Over the past three years, Koh has bought up more property than any individual in Buenos Aires.
magazine.foriowa.org
December 02, 2007
An Expert Expat: Michael Koh
By Pat Adams
Before becoming one of Buenos Aires’ biggest names in real-estate, 33-year-old Chicago native Michael Koh was co-owner of a healthcare company in Dallas, Texas. “It was a great job, I was making plenty of money,” he recalls. “But I was seeing a lot of our clients pass away just three or four years into retirement.” It made him wonder, he says. “What if it were me? What if I had three years?”
The job changed Koh’s perspective. He decided he would actually live as though his doctor had told him he had only three years left. And since he could afford to do it, Koh began to travel. He started going to the places he’d always wanted to go, seeing and doing the things he’d only ever read about in magazines.
Buenos Aires had long been at the top of Koh’s list. “I loved the culture, the people, everything,” he says. When he first arrived in 2002, Argentina was still reeling from a deep recession, and the government’s decision to devalue the peso that year led to a currency crash. In addition to losing fortunes in savings, many Argentines lost all trust in the banking system, the effects of which continue to play out today.
For a while, Koh was rotating between BA’s luxury hotels, savoring his “last days.” But with expenses accumulating, he wondered if an apartment might be a better choice. So he went searching. It was an experience, he says, he would never want to repeat. “It was a disaster. I got cheated.”
Eventually, Koh found an empty apartment, which he bought and furnished himself. In hopes of renting it out while away, he made a website called ApartmentsBA.com. “All of a sudden, there was a lot of demand for it,” he recalls. “And I thought, ‘Wow, there’s a business here.’” Six weeks later, Koh was subletting three more apartments and drafting a business plan to compete with the 5-star hotels blocks away.
Starting out as a consultant to prospective buyers, Koh quickly gained a reputation for knowing the intricacies of the Buenos Aires real-estate market inside-out. His venture capital investment company, Koh Inversiones (Koh Investments), which buys high-end property for foreign clients and then rents it out to tourists, opened for business later that year. “I haven’t met about 30 percent of my clients,” he says. “They hire me over the Internet or through a referral from a friend. Trust is key.”
Many of Koh’s clients haven’t ever seen their properties, he says. “This is just an investment for them.” So far, it’s been a very good one. Koh says last year his investors enjoyed a rise in property values of 25 percent, and made more than 10 percent on rental income. What’s the outlook for 2007? “Strong,” he says. Tourism is at an all-time high—it’s now the country’s 3rd biggest source of income--and real-estate is one of the safest investments in the city. “You have to remember that ever since the crisis, locals don’t put their money in the bank. They buy property. And now you have foreigners discovering what a great place this is.”
“Older folks, especially,” he adds. “They love it.” If it was the thought of growing old and dying in Dallas that moved Koh to travel to Buenos Aires in the first place, it’s the sight of retirees enjoying their lives here that makes him marvel at his new home. “I’ve been all over the world,” he says, “and this is one of the only cities where you can go and see senior citizens drinking espressos at three in the morning. BA’s got something for everybody. And it never even snows.”
