New Member Introduction: Seasoned Investor from Ventura County, California

[Tim Soto]

Hello BP, my introduction is long overdue. I stumbled upon BP around 2010, but never navigated or followed-up within this site. I hadn't suspected this site to be such a beneficial real estate education and networking platform for different level of investors throughout. I think I was still recovering from the real estate crash. It wasn’t until I started listening to the BP podcasts during my hikes that I started to realize how great this real estate networking community is.

Anyway, here's my intro: My name is Artemio "Tim" Soto. I'm from Ventura County, CA, which is a coastal suburb about an hour north of Los Angeles. I started investing in 1995, using my VA loan (while in the Marine Corps) and the seller financed the down payment. But I knew that that's what I wanted to do since the age of 16, after seeing an infomercial by a guru named Dave Del Dotto.

By 1999 I started to gain momentum, after reading Rich Dad Poor Dad. I attended lots of seminars and tried to put each strategy that was taught, into action. Even though they didn't all work for me, I did pretty well with a few, including using owner financing, VA and FHA assumable loans, new developments, and I got into commercial properties in 2004.

By 2005 and 2006, I couldn’t believe that the market hadn’t corrected itself yet. So, as fast as the market was moving, I started buying at retail prices, thinking I could turn these properties over fast enough not to get stuck in the avalanche of an impending real estate crash. So essentially, I speculated and exposed myself to become a casualty of the real estate downturn in 2008. I found myself in a position of a motivated seller and liquidated all of my assets at a discount to cover my losses, and still lost a couple of properties to foreclosure. It was a pretty dark and humbling experience, but I was able to learn valuable lessons from my mistakes that I’ll never repeat as I continue to rebuild.

Now that I’m rebuilding and in acquisition mode, the niche that I’m finding more success with is direct mail marketing to commercial property owners, who have owned their property for 15+ years and may be looking forward to retirement, tired of being a landlord, and/or their tax bases has or is about to expire. One of my investment goals for 2014 is to acquire four of these commercial properties with value-added opportunities and seller financing, or by joint venturing with equity partners. Another goal that I have, as an Investor-friendly Realtor®, is to continue to represent, teach, and help investors achieve their real estate investment goals. And thirdly, my networking goal is to stay more active and visible in the BP forums.

Thanks for the opportunity to introduce and express myself. I feel very fortunate to be part of a community like BP, where anyone can reach out to for guidance and share ideas. I look forward to connecting with everyone.