Recommendations for a hard money lender in Illinois?-New investor

[Faiz Kanash]

Hey guys,

I was hoping someone would be able to recommend me a hard money lender in Illinois(I'm in chicago). I don't have experience, and currently looking to do a fix and flip on single family homes. I'm shadowing a friend of mine who's been doing this for years, he's going to be the one that is going to be guiding me through mostly everything on my first property investment so i'm not going in blind here. I was hoping if anyone had any recommendations for a hard money lender that would work with someone with no experience? I have high credit(730+) and enough savings to cover rehab and downpayments. I'm also looking for a loan provider that preferably doesn't have any prepayment penalties. I don't have any property i'm committed to right now, wanted to ensure I could get pre-approved first before committing to sending out offers, looking to purchase a property that range anywhere between $70k- $250k. Hope this information is of use.

Thank you!

[John Warren]

@Faiz Kanash this is the conundrum that many folks run into when they are starting out in the investing world. Everyone wants you to have experience before they will do a deal with you. My advice would be to attend meetups and find a way to partner with someone with flipping experience so you can get that experience you need. 

Alternatively, you could look to use a traditional loan and then fund the rehab yourself on a smaller flip. I think a lot of folks discount the value of doing smaller projects as a way to ramp up into larger ones. Maybe flip a condo or a smaller house that just needs the cosmetics where your margins are smaller but there is less risk. 

I personally only did one flip. I flipped a home in Berwyn about five years ago, and I ended up making pretty much nothing after 14 months of work. This helped me pivot into the apartment space, and it was an incredibly valuable learning experience.