How BiggerPockets helped us Flip/wholesale 27 houses in 12 months

[Sam Craven]

On October of 2011 I found Bigger Pockets and I can honestly say it was and will continue to be a major driver for the success of our business. Back then I had been a homeowner for 5 months (a lovely ex crack den) and upon signing of the contract had an AH HA! moment when I realized how much my net worth had increased by locating a distressed property in a nice area. I figured I could do it again so I started researching and reading on Bigger Pockets only to realize I how uninformed I was and how I really just got lucky with that first deal…

So between October of 2011 and March of 2012 I read every book even remotely connected to real estate and was on Bigger Pockets daily searching the new word or strategy that I knew nothing about. Right about March I started sharing my crazy plans of house flipping with my family and after some discussion my father and I decided to go into business together.

July hit and the LLC was alive! By the end of July we were marketing in newspapers and had a plan for 1000 letters a month. (shout out to @Quarles for the hand holding, and Jerry Puckett for the advice) Once we started marketing it got really hard and a bit disappointing as we were both learning a new business and the money just wasn't flowing in like we hoped. Using BP and its members as a resource we tweaked and re-tweaked and then January hit and things exploded. We purchased 3 houses in January and are up to 27 so far.

BP has helped us find:
Partners
Active buyers
Active sellers
Great friends
Excellent networking opportunities

The people and the resources available at BP are top notch, and there are just no excuses anymore for not getting started. Joshua Dorkin and his team have cultivated an awesome environment to network and exchange ideas.

In the next 12 months we will hire a few full time people to manage the acquisition in a few other Houston sub markets. The commercial arm of the business is alive and kicking and we are seeking out our first large acquisition with the private capital in place to get it done.

So thanks again BP and its members. The best way I know to give back is to continue posting and helping where I can.

[Sam Craven]

W Tomsin We started slow with direct mail and newspaper only. If you search my old started threads there will be one of a dejected me pleading for help as to why our marketing wasnt working. Ultimately the people of BP were able to help us out, get us to keep our head down and in January after ramping up our marketing things clicked into place.

Hector Perez it was either me or my Dad that you met at an apartment class. Either way hope to run into you again.

K. Marie Poe our 6mo avg so far this year is 25x return per marketing dollar. That's calculated as net per deal and does not cover overhead. And we have not kept anything for our self. We are in the process of doubling our marketing budget to expand our internet presence and expand our direct mail. Long term goal is to build a company balance sheet to attract banks and give our private lenders confidence to do the larger deals with us. So the focus is on raising internal and external capital.

Julian Lejade NONE of our deals have come from anything other than our own marketing. NO MLS deals, NO wholesale deals, one referral i will put under contract tomorrow. To get the good stuff you have to go to the source.