All Forum Posts by: Brett Lee

@Kendal Lamb

So tempting to want to head that way!

I only know the name Kalispell from hearing about it on Fresh Life Church and it sounds amazing :-)

In Washington state like many other states we are going back to phase 1 which is pretty much a lockdown other than essential workers.

Many people have not recovered from the first shut down especially people without the ability to work from home. Tech workers and government workers have been fine working from home but many blue collar workers arent so lucky.

I hate to sound like a doomsday kind of guy that says "the sky is falling"... But things look like they will get very tough for many people.

Banks have not started foreclosing on people behind on payments from the Spring at this point. Also some landlords in areas like Seattle have tenants that have chosen to stop paying (because they can muss payments) or simply they cannot pay. There are also many people leaving cities like Seattle because of high crime, homeless camps everywhere etc. My thoughts are people out of work and feeling unsafe will be taking off from major cities if they can.

I am blessed to be in a good spot so far. However, I am concerned about people that are struggling and now being out if work for the next month or so. Once Biden gets in it looks like he will shut down the country on a large scale until vaccines are ready. Where will our economy be bt summer?

Not trying to be super negative but I am concerned and wondering if others are concerned? I mostly see tons of optimism on bigger pockets but wonder if others are concerned? Maybe I am just a negative nelly... I HOPE i am wrong!!

@Karl Dela Cruz

No i would do vinyl throughout. Or maybe do tile in bathroom. I had similar dilemma at rental house 2 months ago and went with vinyl throughout. Looks great and its nice not having a bunch of different floors.

@Mark Faustrum

Totally agree with your thoughts! Vinyl is durable for renters especially if they have pets. Always by excess product (box or 2 or minimum 5% extra) for IF/When damage occurs. Putting vinyl over wood floor will actually protect wood for when you decide to sell down the road. However, if you refinish floors now the 1st person with a dog will trash floors and possibly prevent you from refinishing again down road since floors can only be refinished a couple times.

I have wood floors in my primary house that we refinished about a year ago. Even without dogs my kids have already done some wear and tear on floors. My experience is most renters are pretty hard on rentals since it isn't their house.

@Nikki Closser

Love your strategies and creative thinking. Sometimes when owners say no... What they really mean is ask me another way. You asked another way and he said yes. Both sides "win" but you will win way more in the long term.

I am in the middle of a similar scenario to yours right now. However the landlord has locked up tenants on very low rents for the next 3 years. Long term cash flow should be great but the next 3 years nor so much. I am offering 100k down and trying to have owner carry contract for 10 years with starting payments in 3 years when his terrible leases are up. I am hopeful... But willing to walk away if needed

@Brayan Palacios

Totally agree with staying home if possible. Save work through college and take the cheapest college options to get a degree in a needed career. Consider western governors university or similar. Likely you student debt will be minimal and if you stay at home save save save.. With roth ira of course.

Buy a house cheap. House Hack. Move back with parents once house is rented and save more and more. Basic starter houses are fine just buy in safe areas.

Learn from parents or others you know that are successful. Consider choose FI podcast and look into FIRE movement.

Work hard and enjoy money but dont make money your idol. Value others around you more than money. It isnt worth having all the money in the world but not having friends or family.

@Sannibel Carter

My couple thoughts are:

1. Character and integrity are huge. Focus on building yourself up as being a person of integrity which will help you in all areas of life including business. The longer I live the more important qualities such as honesty and persistence are huge assets for a person.

2. You are 15 with big dreams but likely not a ton of money. I recommend starting a small company to increase your overall knowledge as well as hard work. Start a small landscape company, buy and sell small items on ebay for profit etc. Start anywhere to make some money and save. Radical Personal Finance is a podcast that at times bounces around various income streams and jobs that you might not think of

3. Open a Roth IRA. I wish i had done this when i was your age. $ will grow tax free and be worth a ton by the time you are 50 or 60. Seems like way off... But trust me life goes by very quick!!

4. Learn from failures and mistakes. We all make them. The key is learning from them and having the rigor and persistence to push past difficulties. You will make mistakes... Learn from them and dont give up.

5. Education is huge! Work hard at school and learn what you can. Get out of high school and college early and take running start classes. Find a career that makes money whether economy is good or bad. Keep college costs low and consider online college. Banks will wsnt to see reliable income source of job before lending... So focus on this.

@Mario Garcia

I totally agree about staying off listing on zillow. I tried this route a couple years ago and was bombarded non-stop by agents. I even had agents coming to my house for a "pre showing" for their clients that might be interested and then actually just try to get me to list with them. Personally I would recommend negotiating you are a with a quality agent and not dealing with it. In my situation I actually just sold that house by putting a for sale by owner sign down at the road and that ended up finding the buyer as opposed to Zillow.

In my opinion all Zillow is good for just getting people excited that their houses are worth a lot more than they actually are LOL.

@Joseph ODonovan

I haven't dealt with cap rate before but am now in the middle of my first commercial deal. Cap rate is one of the main things that lenders ask and I had to do some googling and asking around to figure that out (well somewhat ;-). If my offer is accepted, I actually am going to evaluate the property on the 1% and will be paying mostly cash with the balance being owner contract... So luckily i wont have to jump through all the lender hoops and cap rates around commercial properties.

1% rule is easy math for me... Just going to stick with that for now regardless of what i am buying.

@Bryan S.

I have learned that anyone regardless of profession can trash a house. Down the road from us were 2 lawyers who let chickens and rabbits run free in the house they rented. Trashed the place!

However maybe I should have expected that from lawyers ;-)