All Forum Posts by: Bobby Nilsen

@Kent McDaniel The house, with no mortgage, is an asset. The taxes, insurance, utilities, etc. are liabilities. If the house had a mortgage it’d be a liability.

Stacy La Pineda If I was just starting and knew what I know now I would stick solely to the Bay Area. The SF Bay Area is probably the hottest market in the world right now. That makes it that much tougher to get deals but when they’re had they’re good as gold. You may not be able to find your best buy and hold here right out the gate but if you take on a few different angles in real estate, maybe wholesaling and flipping, you will build the bank account and then most likely come across an off market multi family and have your buy and hold. There is nothing better than being able to drive to your property if need be. Pm me and I wouldn’t mind chatting more.

Mike Williams Hey Mike, hope you had a great 2017, and looks like your 2018 will be fun filled getting involved with real estate. Being new to real estate I would not recommend investing out of state, just my two cents. I believe you have enough diversity down in the LA area where you could find something. One idea, this is what I did with 150k in my pocket, is partner up with a good friend and started flipping properties to grow the money to then put into multifamilies. We started with a 315k property in the Bay Area and have grown to much larger projects. We now pick and choose what if any we want to hold, and as of now we only have one holding. We realized that we can make the money grow a little better flipping rather than buying and holding. If you are dead set on a buy and hold you could probably spend some money on marketing to find an off market property and pick and choose what you want to keep and sell what you don’t. Just an idea, if you want to chat pm me.

Christopher Benjamin Christopher, congrats on finding a property on your own, especially if it’s a deal. How you cut your agent in is completely up to you? I know many people say you should be loyal but the fact is you did the key job the agent was supposed to do, find the property. Most agency Like others have said the best is to be open with him and see how they would like to move forward with you. I read someone comparing this to a valet and I can see the comparison but let’s frame it a little differently. Let’s say you ask the valet to go find your car for you and they can’t, you go look and find it, are you going to tip them? I know this can be torn apart but hopefully you get the picture. Using them to do the paperwork and other grunt work items, meeting appraiser at the house, setting up inspections, drafting contract, negotiating, etc. could be valuable to you depending on your time. You know your agent the best and like others said will they be able to earn their keep. I do this professionally, so take this with a grain of salt, but I would do everything myself as I find involving agents puts one more line of communication into the equation which typically muddies things up more. That’s not always the case but that’s for you to decide as you know your agent and how that person can add value or not. Realize though that since you don’t do this for a living there is a chance that you may miss something key, but that’s on you and you can then only blame yourself. Hopefully that made your decision as clear as mud. If nothing else if you don’t cut your agent in at least let them know how you found the property to help them with their career.

Josh Dillingham Josh I would definitely provide comps and a list of items that were done to upgrade the home. Like Christopher said, build rapport with the appraiser, that is probably more key than the comps. I live in the SF Bay Area and things are going up, up, and up, so getting the properties to appraise is getting tougher and tougher. One thing we always do when coordinating with the appraiser is build rapport and then let them know we have some great comps if they would like us to share. We spout off a couple of addresses and we have only had one property not appraiser, got a different appraiser and it appraised $150k more than the last one. A lot depends on the appraiser and how that appraiser is managed, at least here in the Bay Area the appraisers are to some extent the gate keepers. But always send them the list of updates, because there are some key things that they may not notice that will add value. How that helps.

I typically use the CAR. I have a couple that I’ve built but most sellers feel most comfortable with what is institutional and doesn’t look homemade. Not to say the homemade ones can’t be used but you can typically put whatever is needed into the CAR that you can in your own. I guess the main benefit of using your own is you can cut it down to a page or two.

It’s all about what you pull from the person. You can find plenty of people willing to share information for free. I once went to a meetup, cost $10, the gentleman that spoke was a product of gurus and did well for himself. My partner and I have never spent a cent on gurus. We connected with the gentleman who spoke and using some of the things he spoke about we made a lot of money. Gurus can help but ultimately it comes down to how motivated you are. We spent about a year spinning our wheels, and then it snowballed.

@Gerald Barron I would flip houses. This will give you the greatest access to cash to buy your buy and holds and will also allow you to find the Best Buy and holds. Doing this marketing will be key. Be the best marketer to find your properties and you will be very successful. Pm me if you would like to chat more. 

@William Lu Hey William, 

There is a lot that can go into this question. If your looking to flip or wholesale you can get away with having horrid financials. For wholesaling you need essentially no track record just the ability to write a contract. If your flipping you'd most likely just have to find the property and then take the back seat and let the person with the track record be the lead. This will help you build your relationship with your hard money guy and soon enough you wouldn't need the partner. This all depends on how solid you are financially, if youre solid you could find someone to lend you money no problem. For buy and holds you need to have great financials, just like @Aaron K. and @Christine Grimley mentioned. I know this didn't really answer your questions but I guess what I am getting at is if you don't have a solid track record with your financials, i.e. credit isn't built, no liquidity, no assets, high DTI, don't let that discourage you as there are still a lot of options available to you to in real estate. The hustle just gets a little harder. Any questions let me know.

Lisa V. Hey Lisa, hope you had a nice Holiday. Being a marketer you have a huge head start. I’ve found that I’m not in the real estate business but the marketing business and real estate is the product. I started flipping houses while working a full time job. I was always behind the computer so I was doing most of the computer work while my partner was running around doing the boots on the ground work. Once we had about 5 projects going on at once I left the 9-5 grind. With that said I am now on the phone a lot and analyzing deals that come in. So whether it’s analyzing a deal behind the computer or on my phone I’m on one of those two quite a bit throughout the day. When I’m not doing that my partner and I are looking at the select few properties meeting with agents and setting up marketing. We had no goals or anything like that when we started and had no processes, no website, barely even business cards. There was definitely minimal structure. Did that hurt us or benefit us, I’d say the latter. Going with the flow and not having the set schedule is key for us. We mainly just had things that needed to get done and started knocking away at them. We have things we need to do and get them done. Be friendly, network, know how to analyze a deal and pull the trigger and you should be good.Any other questions ask away? Have an awesome New Years!