Market moving so FAST!!!

[Lee Haenschen]

This is more of a rant....just want to get this frustration off my shoulders! Me and my wife have been TRYING to get into fix and flips and a couple rentals for several years now. Have literally gone to see 1 house in 3-4 years of looking.

Back story: We both work full time ++ have two boys under 10 yrs old. I own a landscape business and work from 7AM-5PM

Once home I make dinner do kids homework and off to the office to do paper work for a couple hours until shower & bed time. This is the norm for us 6 days a week. Sunday I eat breakfast with my wife and kids then off to repair/service equipment and get ready for the next weeks work. Me and my wife need a BIG change in our work life.

So time has been VERY hard to come by for looking at homes. We've tried to work with wholesalers and 70% of their homes are either in the ghetto, needs complete gut job (over our heads for first project) and to boot most all of their leads don't look like that good of a price. Not to mention you must be able to close on all of their deals in 7-10 days!!! I haven't applied for a hard money loan so im not about to put a non refundable deposit down from a wholesaler just to find out I can't get financing in time from a hard money lender. 

I've tried to go to the county court house to bid on tax lien foreclosures in my county. I went to the court house to ask the tax office lady about how the process works. I can see online what the minimum starting bid is. Which im assuming is back taxes + legal fees. But their website says that the homes may be subject to back taxes, liens, county penalties etc... So I asked for her to clarify how I can find out what will be owed on top of my bid if I were to win. She asked me " do you know how to use google " So I left there frustrated. 

Everything on the MLS moves way to fast!! House that looks good hits the market and by day 3 they have 20+ offers and already under contract! I can't compete with the people who do this solely for a living! I can't blame them but dang I can't get my foot in the door.

Heck I don't even know how to initiate a real estate deal!!! I have called on several homes to go look at them, like an idiot I call the listing agent just to see if it's still available. They ask who is by agent.... ummm I don't have one! Do I need one ? apparently....but what kind of agent is going to want to drive around with me on a day off and look at 10-12 homes for the hopes of peanuts at the end? I'm looking at homes that are in the 40-100K range. I feel like im going to be a waste of a realtors time. I called the realtor that sold me and my wife our house and she referred me to another realtor. The second realtor that I was referred to was so new she didn't feel comfortable helping us!  

I do realize that I am going to have to find flip deals on my own with off-market deals from some of my own marketing. 

How do these people get offers on houses so quick? I do not 100% know the process, I've been reading on here for a few years. These people must be skipping all the steps and just offering money blindly? 

I'm under the assumption that you would want to have an inspector or contractor come out and do a report to find out all the damage and needed repairs. Then you have to find out how much that's going to cost and make an offer based on those figures right? What if the inspector can't come out for a week because he's booked? In my area the house would be sold by then.  Then you need to do a title search right? It could take me weeks to find the time to take off work to go do a title search. 

Very sorry for the rant!!! 

[Ned Carey]

@Lee Haenschen unfortunately when you want to start real estate when the market is hot, it is going to be very competitive. If you have been looking for 3-4 years,  that entire time prices have been rising and competition for investor deals has been going up. 

Yes some people do make offers sight unseen. They know the market so well when a property comes up they know what it is worth. 

One of the best know investor-Gurus, Dave Lindahl started as a landscaper. He would do work for banks on there REO properties. Over time that evolved into a very large multi family business.

It sounds to me that you are just not doing enough, so your learning curve is too slow. If you have a time intensive jab and two kids then maybe real estate is not for you - at least now. If you want to do this you have to do more. Go to REI meetings, network with other investors, visit lots of properties. You can go to public auctions or look at wholesalers deals without an agent. The more you do the faster you will learn.