All Forum Posts by: Bob Okenwa

@Marcel B.

1. Lenders will use the Equifax Beacon 5 score, TransUnion Risk Score Classic 04, and Experian Risk Model v2.

2. You will need to supply more specific information as to why your score is where it is. Credit card utilization ratio, judgments, missed payments, short sale, bankruptcy, collections, etc.

Here are two sites that will help you better understand your score and how to fix it. Follow the information here and you can help yourself out. I did and raised my mortgage score over 80 points and my wife's score over 100 points in about 5 months. As was mentioned ahead of me, you're going to need determination and patience as this process usually requires a lot of letters and phone calls.

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Rebuilding-Your-Cr...

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Understanding-FICO...

I can only speak for myself, but when looking online, I try to determine if the list price and recent comps/ARV create a decent enough spread for a profit. I'll also look for the general condition of the home and take mental notes of any glaring issues. Picture estimating gives a very general ballpark figure but this can help you determine if the deal is even worth following any further. You can get a rough idea of what will need to be repaired/replaced if there are enough quality pictures in the listing, but nothing compares to physically walking the property. I have a decent eye for estimating costs on my own, but would only get a GC to take a look once I got the property under contract. Everyone has their own method but I don't want to spend a ton of hours doing every step of my due diligence if I don't even expect to make an offer.

But yes, you're going to want to look at as many properties as you can each day and get a feel for what needs to be replaced and about how much it'll roughly cost. You can never get a precise estimate by looking at pictures alone but you'll get in the ballpark if you know how much labor and materials tend to run in your area.

That's just my 2 cents and I'm sure other people do it differently. The thing with GC's is that some of them may charge for their time and you don't want to be paying guys $50-$100 for walkthroughs on properties that don't fit your criteria. But then again, you can consider that the cost of education to help build your estimating skills as well.

@James Sanders

Hi James,

I'd start by reading up on books and learning the general rehab costs beforehand. Then when you're ready to pull the trigger on a property, get a GC to do a walkthrough and follow him/her around and take notes on what they tell you.  A good book to read is the Book on Estimating Rehab Costs. Gives you the general cost of labor and materials. Of course things will vary based on your region and contractors.

40k in California would be a good amount to get started if you house hack. You should look into an FHA 203k rehab loan or Fannie Mae HomeStyle renovation loan. They'll allow you to roll the rehab costs into the mortgage.

@Monica Johnson

The best way to get accurate rehab numbers is to get bids from a contractor who knows what they're doing. The best way to estimate rehab costs on your own is to take notes when the GC is walking the property. Outside of that, J Scott has a pretty good book on estimating rehab costs that gives you a pretty thorough explanation of how to estimate costs on your own. All in all, it will take some reading and ultimately real life experience before you get good at it. Estimating simply by square feet can be dangerous as no two properties or contractors are the same. 

The Agreeable Gray (or basically any light gray color) will pick up the lighting from the house so it will look a little more on the beige side if you have yellowish lights and will be more on the gray side if you have white lights. I have white lights throughout my home and it really makes the gray pop. 

I've painted my primary residence in Agreeable Gray and it really works for me. I plan to paint my fix and flips the same color.

I read an article either on BP or somewhere else about a guy who said he printed a map and with a highlighter, physically plotted his course. Very low-tech I know, but it got the job done for him. As for digital, I'm sure there is some GPS location-traveled app available to let  you know where you've been. 

@Sean Harris

If that's the case, you may need to network and find some private money investors or hit up friends and family and see how that goes. HELOC would've been my suggestion as well but there is also wholesaling to get started as well.

@Monique Carrillo Hi Monique. First and foremost, you've come to the right place. I don't know what your strategy is, but you can get started by listening to the podcasts here and there are tons of books published by BP that have been helpful for many people, myself included. I've read the Book on Flipping Houses by J Scott, How to Estimate Rehab Costs by J Scott, and Brandon Turner's books as well. You can also go to Amazon and type in "real estate investing" and you'll get a ton of results. Starting point should be on education and from there you can refine your plan to something very specific and take action from there. Best of luck!

@David Marsceau Excel is probably the go-to for many people but I can only speak for myself. I am yet to get out and drive through neighborhoods but have recently made an effort to be prepared to track this information. I saw a video on YouTube and did some other reading and ended up creating a spreadsheet to track properties visited. I would check out YouTube for some advice or I can PM you what I have and you can tweak it or use it outright or use it as a template to create your own spreadsheet. Let me know.