Originally posted by @Marcus Auerbach:
@Alexandra Wenzel real estate is a fantastic tool to create wealth, when I first started buying rental properties over a decade ago I thought it was too good to be true. I was looking for the catch and I could not find it. Why is not everybody doing this, I was thinking.
Many deals later I retired from my corporate job in 2016 and I have a little better perspective. It takes sustained effort over a long period of time. And it takes many doors before you can retire. Brandon Turner says somehwere on average 7 to 8 years - that's what I am seeing as well.
Creative financing and off market deals sounds great on paper. The low interest rate environment has pretty much killed creative financing, as it has taken the incentive for both buyers and sellers. It was different in the 80s when interets rates were in the 15% range and a 10% seller financed deal made good sense to both parties. Today no seller wants to make a deal with you at 2% and why would you pay someone 8% when you can do it for half with a bank?
Off market deals is also one of those things. Sounds great until you try it. A lot of sellers will be wasting your time, are not really interested to sell, have absurd ideas about price etc. The time it takes you to look at 10 off market deals you can look at 1000 MLS deals that are ready to sign. I think you can be succesful at both, you wil find deals where you look enough!
Hi Marcus! Thank you for the welcome. I see what you're saying about lending vs creative financing, from what I understand, you feel that due to low interest rates from banks that bank financing is both less expensive and more accessible and that I would be better off with traditional financing and MLS listings. Let me know if this is not a correct understanding. I appreciate you taking the time to respond, but for me personally, I disagree largely due to recent market changes. And certainly my strategy is not everyone else's best strategy, everyone should go out and do what works best for them.
No one really knows how Covid-19 will affect the economy, but I would imagine that banks will be tightening up even though the fed has dropped rates. I can't imagine that in the near future bank financing will be easier to secure given the current financial crisis. When a market crashes, lending typically tightens up. I remember it in '08. With the amount of medical knowledge I have concerning viruses and infections, I don't see this ending soon. I could be wrong, and I hope I am, but I don't believe the world will financially go back to how it was Jan 2020 even when businesses open up again. I personally believe that it will take many years. For the best explanation on how markets work, I really like Ray Dalio's "How the Economic Machine Works" youtube video.
As far as sellers not wanting to consider seller financing, as with anything, I think it's all in how you frame the conversation. The worst thing that can happen in discussing seller financing is that they say "no". If it doesn't work, I'll change up my methods, if that doesn't work, I'll try something else. I really don't see a reason to give up on this without even trying it as there is little downside and a large possible upside.
As far as off market deals, they are attractive to me for a few reasons. Firstly, I do have experience in direct mail marketing and social media marketing for my practice as well as a 6 month sabbatical I took working for a digital marketing agency. To me, marketing is exciting and I personally love numbers and metrics. Second, I come from a lower middle class family and have that kind of attitude with my money. I know people think dentists have lots of money to throw around at everything, but the hard truth is that they don't (minus perhaps a small handful of exceptions). Most of them just don't know. If I can get something accomplished with more effort and less money, I am personally at the best time in my life to do it. Dentists in most markets work 4 days/wk and I don't have kids right now. Personally, I don't want to pay more for a property if I can just work a little more to find it. I also believe that with the internet and virtual assistants there are ways to weed out people who are not serious at scale.
I don't have any grand illusions that I'm going to quit my day job in a year, and even when I replace my income perhaps I won't want to quit my day job... That is for future me to decide but it is up to present me to give myself the choice.
Again, I appreciate your time and your welcome, Go Badgers!