Live & Flip

Why I passed on two good properties

After a long dry spell, I had a couple wholesalers call me. Both properties would cash flow, both were near my target market, yet I passed on both. They would hurt me more than help me. Its tough to be floating on the ocean surrounded by water. Wait long enough and that salty water starts looking mighty tasty. Take a drink and your demise is only a short time away. Houses are everywhere, just gotta find the ones that help you, not hurt you. These houses simply did not fit into my over...

Direct Marketing Efforts

I'm hardly the first to do this, but I have been inspired by Danny Johnson at www.flippingjunkie.com.  Btw, if you haven't checked out his blog, I highly recommend you do so.  Danny and his wife are making things happen in his area.  Want to see how marketing works 9 different ways.  His blog is the place to go, plus several other useful posts.  He already got quite the following and has only been blogging for a bit over 2 months. My marketing efforts have been limited to the MLS and abse...

Post Slacker

I have been concentrating and finding deals in the last 4 weeks and simply forgot to post on the blog. I was concentrating on the MLS. I have made 20+ bid/calls. I call them bid/calls because my Realtor will call all the prospective listing agents to see if its even worth a bid. For instance, last week I looked in a nice 3/2.5 in a decent owner occupied area. He made the call. 67 walkthrus and 28 bids in 2 days. No point even wasting my time with a property like that. I have noticed th...

Finally Closed

We closed on Wednesday on our new home. Step 2 of our plan to free and clear in a home in a few years. The house was a short sale home only 5 blocks south of where were currently at. The difference in neighborhood is night and day. So here are the numbers. Purchase of 176k. First lien payoff was 170k and 2nd lien was 6k. The sellers agent got them down from above $8500. The sellers paid half and we paid half. The house is 3900 sq ft 5/2.5. Its a monster. Its far more home than we nee...

Refocus

I had a great mastermind call with my coach last week. He could tell I had the wind knocked out of my sails a bit. I was so ready to do my first solo flip, that I almost took down a bad deal. Still, my nature absolutely hates losing. The good news is I would have lost far more had I done the deal. For you baseball fans out there, think of it as a pop fly to advance the runner. Yes I took an out, but it wasn't a double play. I am still at bat and this inning aint over. Moving forward I...

Bittersweet Symphony

Good news and bad news.  The good news is, the short sale personal property 2nd lien holder(say that 6 times fast) approved for 6k.  We are under contract and set to close on October 5th.  The 2nd will have to be paid for with cash.  Our total closing costs will be at about 10k counting that 2nd.  Not to bad for this property.  Hopefully we can get back into the property in the upcoming week and get a better repair estimate.  This should make a really nice house for us for the next 4-6 ye...

2 Properties, 1 Day

I heard back on my offer on the bank owned (formally short sale) property. They accepted the other offer. I really did think I had a great chance at the property. I set the property file aside. Normally I put the files into a collective passed property folder. I decided to keep this one out. A little voice in the back of my head said, "Keep this file together, if the other offer doesn't go through, I would likely get it." Well, the other buyer backed out and I received a counter offer tod...

Wanted:Property Manager

Property Manager wanted for the Denver area. Job requirements are simple, do your job and respond to my calls within 48 hours not 168+. If you haven't guessed I am have some serious property management issues at the moment. My pm has been pretty good up until about 1 month ago. She really started dropping the ball. I have one property that is still missing the Government portion of Sec 8 rents. The other property went vacant last weekend 4 months prior to lease being up with barely a wor...

Silly Bank Profits are for Investors

I just sent an offer out for a property in my target area. $550 above listing. So why bash the banks as wasteful? This is the same property I bid on almost exactly 1 month ago. It was in short sale back then. The bank refused to go below their asking price. Now it is bank owned and listed for 5k below my original offer. Since there is one other bid out there, I am bidding just a hair above. Still its 4.5k below my original offer. I'm sure they have a valid reason (okay maybe not), but I...

Good Networking

I finished my refi on Friday. Took about an hour. I had to sign three sets of loan documents. You can guess what my signature looked like at the end. I brought in bagels for the loan office and you would have thought I brought in lost puppies. They were a huge hit. Doesn't anyone do those type of things anymore? Over my Asiago Cheese bagel my broker and I had a great chat. We discussed purchasing properties like my first two rentals. Only this time, I'm in control of the transaction. ...