The First Flip Adventure Begins!

The adventure begins!

Flipping is something I’ve always wanted to get into. Not necessarily full-time but as an additional source of income as a way to build up the coffers faster. I bought my first rental property in Florida in 2004, ended up living in it for about a year and a half and then sold it in 2006 when I moved back to California. It was a good investment but I moved to San Diego where buying an investment property that made sense was nearly impossible. I moved again, got married and convinced my wife after many conversations, that real estate is where we should put some of our money that was just sitting.

It was 2009, after the crash and we had been looking at and making offers on properties in the Sacramento area. We would drive from Napa, where we lived, to Sacramento every few Saturdays and look at 6-7 houses with our realtor. By the way, if you ever need a recommendation for an investor friendly realtor in Sacramento let me know. We would walk into a house, spend 30 seconds and say, “Nope” and she would say, “Okay, on to the next one!” We had been putting in offers but nothing was getting accepted. Finally, one weekend we put offers in on two properties….and both got accepted! We had a decision to make. One was in a not-so-good neighborhood but was only 3 years old and was in perfect shape, just needed some very minor cosmetic work and it would be ready to go. The other was in a better neighborhood but was 24 years old, had the original shake roof, needed paint, flooring, lighting, garage door, landscaping, and few other things. After crunching the numbers we decided to buy both!

Fast forward, we’ve sold the one in “the hood” and made a decent amount on it each month as well as with the sale. We still own the older property and it’s been a good rental. We’ve bought and sold a triplex and purchased a property in the Atlanta area and two between Austin and San Antonio. They have all been good and we’re excited about adding to our portfolio of buy and hold properties.

Now back to the flipping. While living in Florida I worked for an architecture firm, but not your typical architecture firm. This was a one-stop shop. They had every department, architectural, civil, mechanical, electrical, etc. They even had a construction company. You could bring your idea to this company and they could design the whole thing and build it. Now, they only did commercial but that’s beside the point. The point is, I became very good friends with the Construction Manager who was an amazing guy. He helped me rehab the property I bought in 2004 and taught me a lot along the way. I was going through a tough time and he took me under his wing. He didn’t charge me a dime for his labor but I helped him out on other jobs to pay him back. If you ever need a reference for a solid contractor in the central/Space Coast/Gainesville areas of Florida let me know.

So late last year we started talking about looking for a flip again. We live in California so without having loads of cash, a good flip is hard to find. We own properties in Atlanta and Texas but don’t have reliable contacts there for rehabs. Then it hit me, Florida! I reached out to a few realtors and had one who responded to my email within 10 minutes. I talked with her and was up front and honest. I told her I was talking to multiple agents and would work with multiple agents but if an agent brought me a deal and it worked out, I would resell the property through the agent who brought it to me. We looked for months and months and finally things went quiet. Then, out of the blue she called me and said, “I have a short sale I’m listing that I think you should look at.” Long story short, and I’ll provide more details in another post, we went into contract this week, had the inspection and we’re on our way to our first flip!

This blog will document the process, pains and (hopefully) successes along the way to give insight and inspiration to other first-time flippers along the way. I will be providing regular updates with progress and numbers. Any feedback/criticism/suggestions are welcome and as I’ve told my wife, “As long as we don’t lose money this will be a great learning experience and I won’t have any regrets.” If we lose money, well then that’s another story. Until next time…..

Cheers!

Eric