All Forum Posts by: Aaron Phillips

Hello BP,

I’m still looking into property investment & development and had a couple questions to ask.

Q1.) When I have a home built. I was told the house foundation has to have a year to settle in before a basement can be built. Is this true? What happens if the basement is built during initial construction?

Q2.) If I were to have an apartment building built from the ground up (4+ units) would the land it’s being built on need to be zoned commercial or residential?

Looking forward to your responses.

I just recently was financed for a home, and was looking for info on when I can get financed for another? One property I am going to reside in for the time being, the other I am going to use as a rental. Potentially a multifamily. I just want to know what the standard guidelines are for financing another property after the first loan? 

 Hey Justin, 

Thanks for the reply. The main thing that is keeping me from investing is the capital at the moment, and finding the right time to invest. My plans for when that time comes around, I'm going to call some of the local Wholesalers and see what they have. My Cleaning Service provides a nice side income that can go into savings to fund my future deals. On top of it being an extra source of income, it provides me the right tools to network with people who are actively involved in Real Estate who might be interested in partnering up on deals, giving me advice on the best way to jump into it, and I've even serviced properties that I considered buying. I feel as if there is endless opportunities in the line of business i'm in that could help open up a lot of doors. I just need some advice on how to find the keys to them doors, and which keys will be the most effective. 

Hey how's it going BP community. 

I've been on here and talked about this a little bit, but I am the owner of a Cleaning Service located in the Mid-Ohio Valley. We are are Licensed company who focuses on Residential & Commercial clients. For those who have followed my posts in the past you know that Real Estate has been a primary focus of mine for the past few years. Studying, reading any and every book on Real Estate there is, and listening to podcasts.

Through my Cleaning Service I have met a good deal of Real Estate Investors, Landlords, and other Property Owners. I've also met a few people who own their own construction businesses and what not who has given me their contact info for when I have the capital to invest into my own Fix & Flips. I try to take on as many Construction Cleanup, Move Outs, and Turnovers as much as I can for the sole purpose of networking with other like-minded individuals who are currently doing what I want to be doing within the next couple years.  

My question for the BP community is.. Do you all have any suggestions for me where I can utilize my business platform to help me excel towards my Real Estate goals quicker?  I'm open to suggestions that will help me build better business relationships with local REI's, Realtors, Brokers, Wholesalers, etc.. My current strategy is to go into local Realtor offices, send out emails to individual Realtors, Wholesalers, and making phone calls. The problem is most of them see it as "Just someone trying to sell me something." and ignore/write me off. What can I do to help them see that I'm trying to build a business relationship with them? I can help them and they can provide me with RE knowledge that books and podcasts can't.   

Any and all advice is much appreciated! 

Hello BP, 

I have been doing some studying of my area looking for my first property to invest in and stumbled across a Handyman Special Duplex, and the seller said it's a clean title $5,000. The reasoning for selling so cheap is because they had someone on a land contract who couldn't keep insurance on it and didn't pay the taxes. They said they don't have the time to fix it up or the money to put into it right now. 

I asked a few questions such as; Is there any known foundation issues? Is there any known plumbing issues? Is there any known electrical issues? Just trying to figure out if the place is going to be a money pit or a good potential money maker as advertised by the seller. 

I've always been taught a good rule of thumb is "If it's too good to be true, then it probably is." but when it comes to real estate, wholesalers seem to find these properties by the dozen. 

I have a showing to go to on Sunday. Do you all have any suggestions for me before I go to the showing? I don't want to walk into anything that could turn up a disaster later. Do you all think this might be too good to be true? They were previously renting both sides for $650 /mo a piece. One side is supposed to be renter ready, and the other side is going to require "some fixes."

Any advice on how I should approach this is helpful!

Hello BP,

I have been actively speaking with a guy regarding Real Estate Investing, Fix & Flip to be more accurate. There is a few road blocks that is preventing this partnership from happening and I was hoping someone with the same experience can point me in the right direction.

1. I have never had the opportunity to partner up with someone before. For the past couple years I’ve been focusing on gaining as much Real Estate knowledge as I can while I financially prepare myself to start investing myself.

The guy who wants to partner with me basically wants to use my knowledge while he uses his funding. He brings the capital I bring what I’ve been studying up on. While this can open a lot of doors for me, how would I discuss the terms of this partnership?

2. This said partner has the slightest REI knowledge. He isn't someone who has spent time into learning how to actively invest in deals. Ultimately he wants to sit back and just be an investor in it. Is this someone worth partnering up with since essentially the only thing he brings to the table is the funding part?

From my understanding I am the one who has to handle ultimately everything and he just wants to see what type of profits he can make per flip.

How exactly should I set the terms of this partnership & how can I make this fair for both parties?

First off, I'd like to personally thank everyone for their responses. My biggest problem is getting discouraged when it feels as if hope is lost. I try my best not to by continuously coming to BP, and reading others stories who come from similar situations and some from even worse situations. I don't seek pity, I come to BP for Advice & Guidance and so far you all have given that to me. So once again, Thank you! 

I would also like to mention I am actively looking for ways to cut my current spending habits down to where maybe I can put more money back into savings each month towards my RE goal, and I'm also going to start looking into Credit Counselling or something of the sort. I have already filed a police report, and put a fraud alert on all 3 bureaus, all I need to do now is figure out ways to increase my score and show good payment history. 

I did a little digging here on the BP forums, and found something from I think 9 years ago. Someone had suggested;
1. Opening up a savings account, and put $1,000 in it. 
2. Pull a loan out for $1,000 and use the $1,000 in the savings as collateral. 
3. Taking the $1,000 from the loan and repeating the process at a couple other banks. 
 - Then just repaying them loans back on time to show a good payment history. 

Is this something any one of you has done before? Is there a catch to this that I'm not understanding? 

I've also considered getting a Secured Credit Card ($200) and spending minimal each month to keep Credit Utilization down, and making a bit higher than the monthly payment each month to keep my Payment History up. 

I currently have a Credit Card with a limit of $600.00 on it. I spend around $50 on it each month, I pay a month before bill is due, and I pay $10 more than what my minimum payment is. 

I know this is going a bit off the rails, but if there is any sort of Credit Building technique you guys used to help boost your credit to get you home buyer ready I'd appreciate the advice. 

Thanks in advance! 

 I started saving a little bit each month to go towards my Real Estate passion, and right now I have about $3,000 in savings. 

Hey BP,

It's me again and there is so many questions I have that I know I could probably find here on the BP forums, but I find myself in the same rut. Money & Credit.

I myself come from a very poverty stricken area in Cincinnati, OH. Recently relocated for my business to Parkersburg, WV. I currently run a cleaning service but I am not rich by any means. It's just a locally owned cleaning company.

A little about myself is I am 21 years old, and I have had a passion for Real Estate Investing for as long as I can remember. At first it just seemed like a gateway for me to earn the financial success that I've always dreamt about so that me nor my family would ever have to struggle again. However, within the past year I've become obsessed with it. I've read books, I get on BP religiously, I have been studying different ways to get into REI with little to no money because essentially that's my biggest downfall is no capital. Due to identity theft issues, which I won't get too far into, my credit score is sitting pretty low right now which is terrible. Banks will literally laugh me out of their offices.

Since coming to BP, I stumbled across Wholesaling. I know Wholesaling is for individuals who lack the funding to be a cash buyer themselves, or lack the credit to get a HLOC. I was going to try my hand in it, but I had more people telling me that it was flirting with illegal issues than people telling me to go for it. Not to mention I just didn't feel comfortable doing it.

As of right now I make around $2,000 a month after I cover all my overhead for the business, and that $2,000 has towards my monthly bills (Rent, Gas, Electric, Water, Food, etc..) So I am on a pretty tight budget. It's when I do these number crunching that I start to get discouraged because I feel so far off from being able to do what I want to do with REI which is building my own rental portfolio. My goal is to one day have 100+ rental properties of my own, and right now I feel like i'm just walking in a circle.

Do you have any suggestions for me? I have low credit, though I am working on it daily -- and I have minimal money. Any advice helps, and I appreciate you taking the time to read my post.

I look forward to hearing from you all!