New Member Introduction

[Phyllip Hamby]

Hey everyone, 

I just wanted to get up on the forums and break the ice if you will.  My name is Phyllip Hamby and I do not have any experience in Real Estate Investing. 

I found my way to Bigger Pockets by checking reviews on another company I found through a Radio Show. The guy on the radio made everything sound AWESOME and I signed up for their free 7 day starter course, which made everything sound even more awesome; however, they didn't ever really talk about expenses in any of their scenarios, it was always 36% returns and you can do it too. So I decided to do some review checks, and although they had some good reviews, I also saw that at some point they try to get you to sign up for a $750 2 day course and if you want more you need to pay more. I also found that a lot of people kept mentioning that all of the information they were selling could be found for free on other sites, which finally got me to BiggerPockets.

After making my way to BiggerPockets, I found The Ultimate Beginner's Guide and started reading it.  There is some great information in there, thank you.  That was last Sunday night and I didn't get very far into the guide before I had to go to bed (work). The next day I got up and hopped into my car and thought, man I wish I had an audio book I could listen too.  I jumped on Audible found a book on investing with high ratings (the Book on Rental Property Investing) and started listening not realizing that the book was written by Brandon Turner at the time.  Like I said, I only started listening to the book last Monday, so I am only like 10 chapters into it so far, but the book as far as I can tell to this point (no real experience yet) is awesome.  Each deal he goes over covers expenses and he explains up front that investing in real estate is not a get rich quick scheme, but takes hard work and lots of investigative work on your part.

So I figured it was destiny that I found my way here and I have what may be a very Noobish question to start off with.  I was looking at Zillow this morning and came across what seems like a very good deal when looking at the Zestimate numbers. Have you guys found that those estimates are completely out of wack, or have you been able to look at those and determine that the house is something that you should look into further?  I know Brandon mentioned Zillow a few times in the book, but I can't remember the exact context. I need to go over it again taking better notes next time.

1. In your experiences, have you found Zillow to be accurate or off by a certain percentage? 
2. If you have found houses through Zillow, what next steps did you take after finding a house?

Again, thank you all for providing this tool to the community

Phyl