Need fellow locals for some moral support...

[H. Duplechain]

Hi all,

Haven't been on-line consistently or too frequently. Have been busy working and wrapping up a few projects for clients in preparation for a period I knew I'd be out of work...which is now....

I had to have surgery a little over a week ago and I won't be able to work for a couple of months (I'm a contractor). I decided that I could use this time off to work on my business (so I don't go back to working in it again) and I am hoping to also use some time to start studying the market here in New Orleans so that I can finally get into investing for myself.

I have a list of almost 200 properties that I gathered earlier this year, when I thought I would be getting started with a partner. He got distracted and decided that he didn't want to work on it so, because of my own time constraints and (perceived) need to have someone to motivate me, I also dropped everything. Now that I have nothing but time on my hands, I am starting to look up the owners of these properties and I want to start canvassing a couple of neighborhoods that I'd like to invest in. 

What I'd like is a little moral support from some others out there. I tend to over analyze things and am EXTREMELY slow at pulling the trigger on my own deals. It's funny, when I was an agent, I would be extremely assertive and creative in putting together deals for my clients - but when it is a deal for myself, I freeze up and come up with every reason under the sun why it might not work. I tell myself it's because I don't have liquid money right now, and I don't have an income because I can't work, but I have other resources - I'm good at finding deals, and I'm a licensed contractor. 

I think it would also make me feel better if I had other people that could chime in on the deals I'm looking at - to give me their opinion. I tend to questions myself sometimes - because I'm scared I might miss something. And also, even though I know if I find a good deal, that it should pretty much sell itself, it would be great to know that I already know people, or people that might know people, that I could present deals to that I definitely can't negotiate terms that would work for me.

Anyway, if anyone out there is interested in offering some moral support and/or input and/or advice then please drop me a line.

Oh, a little background - I was a real estate agent and appraiser previously. My license isn't active right now, but I'm about to go back to school to get my Broker's license. I am currently a licensed commercial builder and aspire to be a developer. I have flipped houses with a partner just before things went south around 2006/07 and when I was an agent I targeted investors, so I'm not a total novice to things. I just have never done anything for myself on my own.