My story up on till today Chapter 1

[Tzvi Balsam]

I am bad at this forum writing but will try the best I can.

This all takes place in crazy Brooklyn.

Roughly 2 years ago we were living in a 1 bedroom apartment 500 SQF with 2 kids we were paying $1200 monthly rent. one day the landlord approaches me that he needs the apartment for himself he would like to build up another floor and make himself a duplex and we need to move.

I had no money saved up no way to buy a house so I I was going to drag it out with my landlord as long as I can (Any other apartment in my neighborhood would cost me at least $2500).

After 7 months my wife started making me crazy to move we just ran out of breathing room in our tiny house.

Long story short I told my landlord that he will have to lend me a substantial amount towards my down payment if he wants me to move, and he agreed so now I had what to work with.

 Prices were roughly a million dollars  for a 2 Family home in this neighborhood at the time (Much higher by now) and there was no way my landlords 20K will be enough for a down payment so was looking to buy with someone as a partner I would live in half and he would live in half.

I ended up finding a 3 Family for 930K But at the last minute was outbid by a cash buyer :( (The guy that went in to contract ended up calling me that he does not want the property and wants me to buy it but told him to late)

Search continues I ended up finding a deal on zillow for 750K Called the broker a million times could not get through finally i got through he told me he already had 50 calls on the house that day and he is stressed out ....... and he can only show it to me next week, I saw that with out being aggressive i would accomplish nothing so i asked him if he can be my buyers agent and he will get double commission. this opened all doors for me and he gave me a showing for the following day.

So we went to look at it with my wife it needed allot of work but for 750K it was a bargain, I told the broker on the spot i will take it, but he tells me he will need to wait a week till everyone sees it, I wanted to avoid a bidding war so I told him i would offer him 800K if they except my offer now

Long story short a neighbor bid up till 815K so i told the broker that are deal was for 800K and i pay you a fee, but If I am taking it now there is no way I can pay you an extra fee, he understood me and told me to put his fee torwards the house and he does not need a fee from me  I ended up getting a contract for 825K

I ran around to every person that I know borrowed like crazy and came up with 200K and after 3-4 Months we closed in September 2015 with out a partner.

Then we started renovations it was a mess needed to redo the whole electric from the ground up I maxed out like 50K on Credit Cards between me and my wife to get it done Finally we moved in we got a tenant that pays $2300 and my mortgage payment with tax and insurance is like $4100 (I still spend allot monthly on maintenance because of things I am trying to spread out over time)

The house shot up in value and is worth now at least 1.1 million but I canot enjoy the equety for 2 reasons credit is shot because I Maxed out credit cards and also DTI Ratio is not good :(

This Is the end of chapter 1