Our first deal!

Hello to all out there in the BP community!

I thought I would take a shot at my first blog post here on BP. In fact, this is my first blog post ever. Like, in my life. It's a little surprising that I've waited this long to blog about anything, considering how much I love to write. Even with the many passions in my life, I've never had a real burning desire to write about them.

Until now. My wife and I have been dreaming of financial freedom for some time now and she has been gently (and sometimes not-so-gently) whispering "real estate" in my ear ever since we first met 6 years ago. In fact, it was her idea to keep my condo as a rental when we purchased our current residence three years ago and it was the best financial decision I've ever made. As I finally warmed up to the idea of real estate investing (and got addicted to Beachfront Bargain Hunt) we began to dig in and do some research. I attended some meetups, listened to some interviews and found the amazing BP website resource. It's taken a lot of leg work and research but we finally pulled the trigger. We just put our earnest money check down on our very first fix and flip property!

Our feelings are ranging from scared to giddy but mostly we're just plain excited. It seems like it's been a long time coming but when I step back and put things in perspective, it really didn't take us that long to get our first deal. It's hard to believe and we've had to keep pinching ourselves to make sure we're awake. But it's really real. We're in. Game on.

So on to the details. The real key to securing our first deal was getting creative with our finances. Using a combination of a HELOC and a hard money rehab loan we were able to pick up a little 3 bed 2 bath house in the Lakewood area (suburb of Denver metro) from a local wholesaler. It's about 1000 square feet and needs a little bit of everything, including some possible foundation work. We hope to get contractors lined up and a rough rehab budget squared away this week. 

Our wholesaler has been phenomenal and we're very grateful to him all his assistance and for throwing us our first deal. Our hard money loan officer has also been incredibly responsive. Her service so far has been top notch their rates are very competitive.

Sometimes I feel like we're in over our heads and completely clueless and other times I feel ready to tackle anything. We have done a good bit of due diligence and we feel like we have enough cushion to at least get the house fixed up and sold without losing money. Hopefully I can keep up with my blogging and chronicle our first journey.

Wish us luck!