An SOS to BP. Please help us set our goals.

[Benjamin Shaw]

Thanks for taking a look at this post. If you make it through the wall of text that follows, and you have even the smallest insight to offer, I would so very much appreciate it.

My wife and I are rapidly learning the ways of wise REI through the help of the BP forums, podcast, books, as well as attending local REIA meetings, networking, market research, and driving for dollars.

We've arrived at what I feel is a major pivot point in our lives, and are struggling with the multitude of circumstances life is throwing our way, trying to figure it all out, and set some reasonable goals so that we can move forward in a clear defined direction.

I'm going to lay it all out in brutal detail in hopes that someone can make any sense of this and possibly offer some guidance.

OUR CURRENT STATUS:

I have a day job as an engineer, a freelance business on the side in which I design products for clients around the country, as well as a fading IOS app development company.

My wife has a small house cleaning business, and she takes care of all the household management, as well as just being assigned as power of attorney over her Grandfather's estate.

We have zero savings, but are on track to be completely debt free in two years on our current plan. We also both have excellent credit around

We live in one of her Grandfather's houses that has been in the family for decades and are considering purchasing it as a 50/50 split with her brother. There are paying tenants on the third floor, my mother in law lives on the second floor, we live in the first. There is also a separate rental house on the property that currently has a disabled vet who's wife left him, so he is only paying the money that the government sends him. So that is a whole can of worms to be dealt with. I'm guessing he should have been served a notice by now since it's been a few months of him paying only partial rent.

We are likely to get the property for 75% of market value, with a gift of equity as down payment. We plan on then leveraging this property to jumpstart our RE business. Due to us living in one of the units, my mother in law living in the other, the property will only just barely cash flow, unless we end up getting a getter deal than expected.

So just to be clear, we are planning to buy a property with two houses, and we have no savings for any unexpected capital expenditures, although we do have around 40K of available credit, and my brother in law has 20k in cash, and more in credit.

MORE FUN

So what I did not yet mention is that my mother in law is disabled, and makes only a small monthly government check. She has been driving my 2000 Toyota Tundra for the past few years. Last week the transmission blew, and the repairs are estimated at 4k on a $3500 truck. She needs a vehicle so that she can go care for her father multiple times per week, otherwise, my wife has to continually loan her the car, and this is preventing my wife from starting to aggressively develop our real estate business.

I have about 4k in extra cash coming in from freelance clients. We can't decide if we should fix the truck (which my wife thinks will continually break, I think it might not since it's a Tundra), or my wife is strongly considering getting a job so that she can afford to buy a new car ($300 a month payments) so that we can give her paid off 2004 Acura TL to her mom to drive.

I think getting a job and a new car is possibly a mistake, due to the fact that we are doing ok right now, and she could use the opportunity to go full time into real estate. I think that if she does get a job, it should either be in sales or real estate so that she can network and develop skills.

WHAT WE WANT(ED)

The last time we really sat down and tried to set goals, we decided that she was going to spend her time researching and following the advice in three books. The Millionaire Real Estate Investor, The book on flipping houses, and the book on estimating rehab costs. Obviously, we will need to use some no and low money down principals as well.

We agreed that we were going to study as much as possible while looking for our first flip, and eventually turned it into a business we could partially automate, doing a few flips, then buying and holding, then a few more flips, while also developing a lead generation system that we could either use for flips, or wholesale deals. At the time, the financing was going to come from her brother, since he had the 20K down, and approval for a loan. So he was the money guy, and she ran the project. 50/50 split.

WHAT WE ARE DOING RIGHT NOW

Today she is applying for a job in which she would help people relocate to other parts of the country. So very remotely having something to do with RE. I think she is doing this so that we can afford to buy a new car so her mom gets her old car. This seems a bit hasty to me, since just last week the plan was that we are starting a RE business. (which she does still want, but I know her job usually takes it all out of her)

I am listening to as many BP podcasts as I can fit in a day (currently on episode 70). I've done some driving for dollars, and just recently found 12 distressed properties. She mentioned that she would start calling about them today, but does not want to talk to owners yet due to the fact that she thinks we have nothing to really offer them. I sort of agree. I could call and take the angle of trying to help someone, as I am learning there are a lot of ways to do so, but even if I found a solution, what then?

Is the next step to draw up a contract so we could be prepared to get something under contract? We could possibly scrape up the money to have an attorney review something for us. Would this basically be an hour of their time at $250?

We also continue going to REIA meetings, open houses, and networking. We did meet a woman that just opened her own brokerage and seemed very on top of her game. She is currently waiting for use to send our criteria, but when we do, I feel we would have to keep turning her leads down due to not being ready. Maybe we could send her our unmotivated seller leads? UGH.

CONCLUSION

So if you've got this far and have any hint of advice to offer we would so much appreciate it. Feel free to ask for any needed clarifications.

I feel that last week we went from having a decent plan, but now it is kind of falling apart and we are losing our way. Thanks for listening.

Ben.