Strategies for long-distance house flipping

[Dave Vona]

Hi, I'm looking for some recommendations from people who have completed long-distance house flips and rehabs.  I live in Denver and I'm looking to do flips out of state due to the challenge of finding homes in Denver and the high price points.  I completed one flip in Kansas City earlier this year with a full-service broker.  I made some money but it didn't go as smoothly as I would've liked.  I'm trying to figure out how to estimate the rehab that will be needed, and then how to manage the project from out-of-state.  I think one option is to have a partner that is local that can help.  I've read @David Greene' s book Long-Distance Real Estate Investing and he had some good recommendations.  However, if I'm doing a flip I won't have a property manager to help, and if it's an off-market deal, I also won't have an agent/broker to help either.  That means I would need great contractor that I trust to provide the initial estimate and to manage the entire project themselves.   Does anyone have any experience in this area?  Thanks.

[Dustin Burke]

@Dave Vona certainly there are other ways, but your suggestion of acquiring a partner may be a good approach for you. We (@Daniel Burke & I) have three flips in the rehab process right now and will be closing on our 4th in two weeks. Because of the local  Wichita "partner" we have found, the process of evaluating, acquiring and rehabbing has been pretty smooth so far and we foresee our business scaling faster and more constantly then if we were on our own. 

We have had the same issue as you. Having the inability to properly evaluate the rehab cost and managing the contractors. Our "Partner" is very knowledgeable with our Wichita Kansas market, with years of flipping experience and we are fortunate to have found him. 

Often a partner is thought of as a 50/50 co-owner that would hold equitable interest in the deals engaged in. You don't have to set it up that way and may be inadvisable as your new found "partner" may be somewhat of a new acquaintance. 

Finding  people to work with you is tough as a newbie because we often feel that we have nothing to offer. That is not the case. We all have something to offer and that "something" differs with the needs of the person you are currently speaking with. Our limiting factor is; we don't know -- what we don't know. Let the other person do the talking and they will be to light what you have to offer them. All you have to do is be attentive and interested in what they have to say. Although we ourselves are somewhat new to long distance flipping, we have found that when we offer anything in a highly transparent manner, showing how everyone wins as a result of the opportunity, other RE Professionals have been interested in working with us.  This also has proved true when negotiating with potential sellers. 

We (@Daniel Burke & I) have also read @David Greene's book, LONG-DISTANCE REAL ESTATE INVESTING. For those reading that haven't read it, I highly recommend it and it can be found here https://get.biggerpockets.com/longdistancebook/ . 

David's book is what spurred us to network network network which has helped immensely in finding the right people for the right job through word of mouth, not to mention the knowledge acquired from the folks that we have crossed paths with. I guess my point is, we have found that  our "core 4" maybe different then David's core 4; and that's OK because it produces the same result; which is to build a team  that consist of the right people, for the right job, for our specific investing strategy.

Sorry for the ramble and getting off the long distance topic. I'm just so flippin' excited to be doing what I'm doing...

Blue skies always, Dustin