All Forum Posts by: Mark B

Thanks for posting this Bryan. I'm looking to refi a commercial building, and was wondering how my rental income is counted. Nice to learn that 75% is counted. I feared none would count for some reason.
thanks.

Kim mentioned "renting" the house to her husband, but crazy idea aside, rents don't count toward your income do they? The reason I ask is that I have a high DTI and want to refi an office building, but am worried about my DTI. If rents count as income, I'm gold. I don't want to highjack this thread, so I'll point you over here if you have any advice.

I'm in new territory here. Would love some advice on my next move. Here's the stats:

I purchased a $300,000 office building about 3 years ago with owner financing. The interest rate is fixed at 7% and has a call in about 7 years. I put 30k down and probably have about 250k left on the note.

With the low rates, I'd like to get a conventional refi. I have rehabbed the building some and I bought it pretty good. Let's say it appraises for $400,000, my new LTV would be about 63%.

Are conventional lenders doing this kind of refi with nothing down? Seems like if I have this amount of equity in the building that it would be a safe bet for them. The building has 3 tenants and is cashflowing well right now. (But one of the tenant's is my co.) But I do not occupy 50% of the space which I know is a watermark of some kind. Are there any issues the banks will have with this?

Any ideas or bits of advice on this?

Thanks, Mark

I use the system for two of my sites, my tennis partners site and also for my albuquerque architect site. Neither are REI, but I can tell you that they definitely generate clicks. Be careful to track your budget at the beginning because it can be shocking how fast you can reach a hundred bucks.

A key is to have your link title in your ad REALLY match the search phrase that you marry it to. The closer this is, the more relevance and Google like relevance.

The system is big and takes some time to master (still doing it myself), but just dive in and learn as you go.

Hi. Welcome to the site. You said "looking to sell". So, are planning on actually purchasing the properties and then reselling to the investor? Most bird dogs I know find the good deal and just point the investor to it for a fee. What are your fees by the way?

The obvious answer is to go to an RE club and stand up and introduce yourself and tell people what you want to do. You should get some cards from this.

I'd also look through CL and look for the "we buy ugly houses" posts and call them and tell them that you'd like to birddog for them and ask them what they want you to look for.

Well, now that it is winter, are these guys back inside? Time to sell!

Just wondering what happened here. Update?

I agree NOT to offer them money to be quiet, that can only backfire in so many ways. I think Bill had a great idea to get them involved in the sell by offering them the finders fee. Even if they have no leads, it gives you the opportunity to talk about what potential buyers are looking for and makes them more aware that you need their help.

Most cities have a rule about cars on lawns or quantity in the front yard. I'd definitely go to the zoning department and explain the situation there to get advice.

Looking forward to hearing the update.

I might be wrong but I think the 50% rule normally accounts for a 10% vacancy.

A large photo would help. True divided lite windows would look OK, but the fake kind with the plastic grid between the glass - that is on the way out. I would not bother. With real large windows like this, I'll often install a large picture window with an operable side panel. I'm a fan of casement windows because they do not have a horizontal bar in the sightline. There are a lot of affordable but well made vinyl casements available these days. Go with white.

Now about the trim color, I feel you could do a warmer color to bring out the warmth that is in the stone. The front door could be a strong but deepish red.

I agree a picket fence could work if you could picture it in the neighborhood.

This house is lacking any porch. I'm not sure how big your budget is, but adding a porch with columns and a new roof element would make it sing.

Check out sketchup, owned by Google - I think it does 2d and does great 3d!

It seems like there would probably be some kind of way to launder the drug money into remodels paid with cash. It would be all upside because they'd be buying in an area most of us wouldn't touch, then could turn it around and not have to worry much about bad/ deadbeat renters!

But like you said, this is ALL too reasonable.