Getting into New Builds

[Matt Ternullo]

I am a fairly experienced buy and hold investor with a few units and a good knowledge of creative financing strategies. An opportunity came up to buy land and develop it in a market I know very well. Most lenders for the construction portion require a lot of experience,  however, you gotta start somewhere, anyone have experience trying to break into this type of financing?

[Kevin M Finley]

I switched from flipping houses to building on city pre-developed lots in my area. The private money financing portion is very similar and it was good experience. After doing a few of those I'm about halfway through my first "development" deal that is still city parcels, but involved converting a single commercial site into 6 single family sites and connecting sewer water, etc. 

I'm working on building my own custom home of my own design on an atypical lot and it's been headache after headache. Completely different process than the easy city deals. 

I'm also working on developing an area between two subdivisions that involves redoing a lot of storm and sanitary sewer, water, bike paths, sidewalks, etc and installing a new road and light posts etc. It's a COMPLETELY different process as well and has also been a learning experience even in the design and approval stages. 

I say this because if I had tried to attempt either my own home or a true development prior to starting small with single easy builds, my chance of success would assuredly be significantly lower.