All Forum Posts by: Aaron Millis

@Daniel S.

I wrote the jist of all my issues in a response to someone earlier in this thread. I’m not trying to be rude but it took a while to type so if you just look ^ you’ll find it!

@Victor S. Thanks man. And to answer your question, Yes/sort of.

The appraisal was done before any repairs were actually completed or even started. It's called a subject too appraisal I think. The appraiser basically pretended all the work was done already and appraised the house accordingly. So the house is still has issues but the hole in the ceiling was fixed, the HVAC and water heater were replaced with new ones, the fixed all the cut copper wires/water lines, and they replaced the crappy sliding back doors with french doors. So all that cost me $12,700 on top of my purchase of $70,500 for a total of $83,200. Then it appraised for 124K. 

And I only actually put down 5% of that $83,200 which is pretty cool. That left me with a large monthly payment + PMI ... but I think it's worth the equity added. Plus I can always refinance down the line because I already qualify for the PMI to go away.

@Austin R. Olds

Honestly man I was good at saving money just because it fits my personality. I didn't ever really know why/what I was saving for I just knew I didn't want to blow money like most enlisted guys do. And in theory you can save up as much as you want. Your health care will be covered and you'll be on a meal plan so if you really wanted to save every dollar you could.

My recommendations would be: Don't buy some shmancy expensive car/ or a brand new car ie: Mustang, Charger, Jeep, etc-- don't go out to the bars every weekend-- when you do go to the bars don't spend money on girls. Actually I think my #1 suggestion to young men that want to get ahead financially is to not spend your money on random girls. I've never bought a girl at the bar a drink, or spent any money on any girl/or guy I don't know. Maybe that makes me cheap.. I think it makes me smart. The list goes on.. but if you want to save money you're going to. 

Also keep in mind that in addition to saving money you can always find ways to make more. For a while there when I was in the military I was making more money from selling things on ebay and doing my own personal UBER thing than I was from my actual paycheck. (That was before there was an actual UBER- they ruined that business haha). 

Just keep focused on what you really want and don't get sucked into anything that will lead you astray!

@Chris Maurice Yes my other property is in Auburn.

@Peter Hanson Thanks man! And wow those numbers are kind of depressing! Good thing you've got beautiful beaches, beautiful women, and beautiful weather to cheer you up over there haha. 

All we have here is Nick Saban and incest haha

@Dallas H. Thanks man! And you're absolutely right. Those are just a couple pics and the 13K is just what I had the contractors do. It's still going to need a good bit of work, but I'm going to do the "Live-in-flip" thing. The current appraisal is not what the ARV will be. So more money will go in, but more should be coming out as well.

I tried to keep the post shortish.. my last one was so long that few people bothered to read it hahaha

@Ethan S. I just wrote a novel on my issues somewhere in here haha. As far as your LLC question no I do not have an LLC or anything like that for either of my properties.

That doesn't mean getting one is a bad idea.. honestly I could not give you any advice on that because I know pretty little about it. I just decided to open an umbrella policy after getting my tenants in my first property. Its wayyy less expensive than I expected it to be, and It follows me wherever I go and I can raise or decrease the limit whenever. That doesn't mean that I wont eventually get an LLC but this is my thought process.

I've seen people on here/ met people that have business cards/LLC's/ and all that other fancy stuff- but they haven't actually done any deals. Obviously there are perks or reasons to get all that stuff and I'm not saying its pointless- but I think taking action should be the most important thing on your mind. After all what good is an LLC if you don't have a property or anything to put in it?

I'm big into basketball so I like to make basketball analogies for real estate related things ha.

Don't be the guy that walks into the gym decked out with a headband, shooting sleeve on both arms, doubled up highlighter Nike socks, A tank top that says "Ball is life", compression leggings, and a $400 pair of Air Yeezy's- shooting air balls all day.

Be the dude in the T shirt and shorts schooling everyone!

@Austin S. Pogue Thanks man!

I'll try to give you the quick(ish) rundown on all headaches I've had from this, hopefully it will help for your future endeavors!

Agent Issues: Basically the agent I was using flew out of town when I found this house and wanted to make an offer. I'm a veryyy impatient person so rather than looking around vetting realtors to see who seemed like they would be a good fit- I just called some random broker and he assigned me a realtor.  I had already found the home so I figured who the agent was didn't really matter because I didn't need him to do much for me... Well for starters he tried to lean me away from pursuing this house, though he didn't really have much reason. He just saw cracks in the wall and a missing ceiling and kind of wrote it off. Also he had 0 experience with fannie mae forclosures so he really didn't know any more than I did about anything. He assured me that I would have 15 days for my inspection period.. he ASSURED me - come to find out when I read the agreement I have 10 days not 15. And when I told him "hey its only 10 days" he was like "Okay sounds good" and acted like he never told me otherwise...

All of that is pretty minor - the huge thing was when he told me that I was in a bidding war with some other person and that my offer had been denied and that I was out of luck because that was my last day to bid...... I was pretty pissed after that and I was just sulking telling my gf that the deal fell apart. But after like 30 minutes of feeling bad for myself I decided to call the listing agent to see wtf had happened. He informed me that I still had until the end of the day to put in my final offer (There probably never was another bidder). So I called my realtor and told him he was wrong again- then he put in my offer- then I got it. So I'm not saying the lesson here is to not trust your realtor- but after that I will forever verify everything for myself because he almost cost me an amazing buy because he's misinformed. - this actually made me decide to get my license, which I'm in the process of now!

Contractor Issues: I had a contractor that I was initially going to do the work for me but he was realllllly bad at communicating. Like I would have to email or text him 5 times to get a response. Eventually he just stopped responding altogether which left me scrambling to find a contractor (2K of earnest money on the line- that I definitely don't want to lose). I found another contractor that seemed decent. Until he took me to a house he was working on. Seemed like he was pretty good because everything looked great as far as I could tell..... Then one of his worked lit up a cigarette right in the middle of the freshly remodeled kitchen that they worked on for an out of state investor! That was enough for me to walk away. After that I literally called over 100 people trying to find a contractor. I eventually found one though, his price was $4,000 higher than my initial guy but he seemed like he was an actual legitimate trustworthy guy. So I went with him, and it worked out great.

Lender Issues: My initial lender didn't have a clue how the construction loan worked. Pretty much every question I asked him he didn't really know the answer to and that just made things difficult to get going. Eventually I just called up the same bank (Renasant Bank) but one town over and asked for someone that knew what the hell they were doing haha. I found a guy who claimed he could help me, and he did. He was a tool to me at first though. I think its because he could tell I'm young.. or maybe that's just how he is I'm not sure. Either way it was very aggravating working with him and on one phone call I kind of snapped on him and told him to stop talking to me like I have no clue what I'm doing. After that things eased up a little but I could tell he was expecting the deal to fall apart due to me being incompetent or something. This one has a happy ending though because he was the one that called me to tell me what the house appraised for ($40K more than I paid). He was stunned on the phone because I think in that moment he finally realized I'm making a nice chunk of change.

The end

@Tuan Pham Thanks man. I would definitely recommend finding a structural engineer in your area to do an inspection on any property that you are considering buying. I know nothing about foundation issues ( or really most home issues at this point) so I didn't bother trying to make my own opinion. And I imagine that's what most people did. The house looked scary so they walked... I paid an expert $425 and he told me that it was all cosmetic and that it wouldn't need any repairs because the foundation hasn't shifted in a long time and likely wont again. Best $425 I ever spent.

Today I looked at another property and paid the $425 and found that the house is going to need significant repairs. Maybe more than its worth, so I may have just thrown that money away. But to me its worth knowing for sure. Don't just not buy a house because its been on the market forever, there are a lot of lazy investors out there! 

@J Scott You're the man. Thanks!