All Forum Posts by: Bonnie Low

Wow - I'm really glad you did your due diligence and this worked out for you. It's a great reminder that people ARE out there who will try to scam you. We've invested out of state and have almost (!) always physically viewed a property before closing. We've had enough close calls now to insist on a personal walk through during our due diligence period because people do some CRAZY stuff to their homes. Case in point: great 3/2 in Boise Idaho, which is a very hot market. They had their biggest snowfall on record the week we visited for inspection. The access to the crawl space was buried under about 3ft of iced over snow, but we dug it out and boy were we glad we did! Someone, at some point, had hand excavated all the soil out from underneath the house to a depth of about 5'. It was standing on "pillars" that looked like termite mounds with a few bricks and 2x4's randomly placed for good measure. There was only one way in and one way out so they must have used a pick axe, shovel and bucket to do it (why? we'll never know). Our Realtor hadn't spotted it when we did a face time walk through with her. And the house inspector didn't mention it on the inspection so we can only assume he didn't go down there. We didn't know what the heck to do with it so we just walked away from it. In retrospect we might have had a foundation expert take a look and give us a repair estimate, but it was our first deal and that probably would have been overly ambitious. So crisis averted, but we learned a valuable lesson. For the price of a plane ticket or a tank full of gas, it is always always always worth it - in my opinion - to get  your own eyes on a property before you close!

@Mitch Jacobs welcome! Good for you for getting started early in life. That's the one piece of advice I think all investors agree on: you can't get started too soon. Here are some thoughts based on your scenario. Start talking to a lender right now. I highly recommend @Jason Wray from the Federal Savings Bank, you'll find him here on BP or @Joe DeVera, also here on BP. I have worked with both of them and Joe knows the tri-cities area several people have mentioned. Since you're willing to put in some sweat equity, you might consider a 203k loan. Not a lot of people use it, but it will pay for your purchase of a distressed property (which most conventional loans will not) and will also fund your rehab costs. Changing jobs might affect your credit worthiness, but that's a question for a lender so just another reason to start talking to a lender so you know your options. I think most of us make the mistake that we have to know exactly what we're looking for when it comes to financing. But asking banks and lenders what they offer or what they can do is a great strategy because we can't possibly know all the products that are out there and, unfortunately with a lot of lenders, if we don't ask exactly the right question we won't get exactly the right answer. This is challenging for newbies because we want to sound informed, but getting too specific might inadvertently narrow our choices. A good lender will hear you out and try to find something to fit you. But just like Realtors, they're not all great. So work with someone who will really work for you!

How has this situation changed for you, if at all, now that the Trump administration and CDC have further extended the eviction moratorium through the end of the year? In other words, has it shifted from a state action to a federal action and therefore you'd have to fight it at that level?

Where we live contractors are very, very booked up. If you don't already have relationships, start making phone calls and lining them up now. If you're in contract and the property you are buying is vacant, you might be able to get the selling agent to let you in to the property to get your contractors to look at it to provide you a quote and get you on their schedule. 

So far, real estate doesn't seem to be slowing down. We're finishing a BRRRR and then will be looking for a B-, C+ buy and hold which I think will always be in demand. But waiting to take on another flip to see if market prices hold steady, continue to rise or drop. I don't want to get in a situation where we can't get our money back out of it.

I want to second what @Jon Crosby said about amenities and reviews. Full disclosure: I don't currently own an Air b&b, but I DO stay in air b&b homes often. I travel a lot for work and do a fair amount of vacation travel and always rent a place through air b&b. I haven't stayed in a hotel in years. I 100% rely on reviews and amenities. I will pay more for a little bit nicer house, but if it has poor reviews, forget it. I will read reviews over the last year or two because often someone will post a complaint, but the owner will have taken care of the issue and it's no longer reflected in current reviews. But if there's an ongoing mention of something problematic (not clean, smells, amenities not working or complaints not responded to quickly), I won't rent it no matter how nice it looks or how cheap it may be comparatively speaking.

@Juan Correia my thoughts are that this is a terrible situation. I'm so sorry this is happening to you and your wife! Unfortunately, I have no banking or investing advice for you on this. But as a Nutritional Therapist, you peaked my interest with the word 'diabetes' in your post. I have never worked with anyone with MODY, but I do work with Type 2 Diabetics. Even thought T2D is talked about as a "chronic progressive" disease (in other words, it's going to get worse and there's nothing you an do about it), an astonishing number of Type 2 Diabetics have reversed their Diabetes to the point they are no longer considered diabetic simply by changing what they eat. Primarily, a low carbohydrate diet is what works and has, in fact, even had success with T1 diabetes. I don't know if this would work for someone with MODY, but it's worth looking into. In the States, doctors who treat diabetics are woefully uninformed about nutrition. That may be the case in Portugal, too, so I just thought I should mention this to you. Overturning the disease could solve multiple problems for you, most importantly her health! I wish you all the best.

@Matthew Malen investors will thank you if you show up at local REIA meetings! This is a great place for networking and EVERYONE is looking for a reliable contractor. It's a great way to get referrals, too. Don't be afraid to bring a portfolio with photos of some of your work!

BP publishes a book on estimating repair costs. This is absolutely essential because it gives you a pretty comprehensive list of all the things you might need to replace when you're doing a flip and how to estimate the cost. It might be a little dated now, but you should look up prices in your own area anyway because labor rates can really vary. 

@Zane Paul there was a recent podcast - I think it was the Real Estate Rookie podcast - where the guy being interviewed mentioned this same tactic. Basically, he asked for a line of credit and his bank said no. So he said 'if I give you the $20k I have saved up, what can you do for me?' They said if he put it in an 18-month CD they'd given him a $35,000 line of credit. So he basically turned $20k into $35k and will earn some measly interest on his $20k in the CD. That may or may not work for you, but my takeaway was that rather than just accepting their initial 'no' answer, he asked them 'well, what CAN you do.' I thought that was brilliant and is definitely something I'll do in the future. We don't know what creative financing vehicles lenders have and we don't necessarily need to know them all. But we should at least ask open ended questions. Good luck!