All Forum Posts by: Jon H.

Garry Trammell with HomeSafe Inspections. This guy goes through a house with a fine tooth comb. He's great if your purchasing a house. www.homesafeinspections.us

Hey Jamie,
I just wanted to give you a shout. I'm also here in Birmingham and wanted to say welcome!

Hello,
I wanted to help out everyone trying to access the MLS. My investing teacher advised me to join a site. The site is CRSdata.com I've researched this site and it provides MLS data and can provide investors with mailing lists and sales comps. It gives investors access to the MLS data while providing many more amenities. Also if you call they have a special offer for investors that are members of their local AIA. (I'm not yet a member of the AIA but they are giving me the deal). Its $900 per year for 6 counties. Or you can do a monthly deal for around $90 per month. Google: Court Retrieval System and this site should pop up. Be sure to search what areas they cover in your state. I hope this helps out everyone that isn't a realtor or has a realtor friend that allows them access to their MLS. I've searched for awhile now for MLS access and am so grateful to now have access.

Hey Chris,
I sure will. Also i found a MLS database site that gives investors and non-realtors access to the MLS and lists. The site is crsdata.com . I'll try and post a forum for this because before i was introduced to this site i searched forever trying to find an MLS site and had no luck. Its Pricy for the year but if you call and let them know you are a member of your local AIA then they'll give you a huge discount.

Hey Kimberly,
Its a year long course through CreativeRealEstateMentor.com
Walter and His wife Peggy live here in Birmingham and teach a year long class that covers everything a real estate investor would need to know on all different subjects. He provides on site training as well. They also partner with you on your first 4 deals so you don't mess up. If you go to his site look for the Coaching Student Program. It will tell you all about it.
I was skeptical at first but I had a friend take the course last year and he's already made twice my salary working part-time. I also found everytime i would look at a property i would call him and get his and Walters advise. Finally my wife and I decided instead of jumping into a property we would take Walters Class and make sure we started our business off right. Good luck in your ventures.

After reading your question I would like to provide you with some advise:
1. Make sure you have access to MLS or another website that you can check houses recently sold etc.
2. Any house you buy make sure you're buying it at 65%. Meaning that after you've bought the house, fixed it up and accounted for all your variable cost you are in it 65% of the actual retail value.
3. Time is money. I wouldn't fix the house yourself unless you are a contractor and you have plenty of time on your hands. I would hire it out while you look for the next deal.
4. Finding the deal. Make sure you find a market preferrably with houses in the 85K-150K retail range. These are the houses that sell fast. There are tons of people looking to buy these houses. When you get over 200K your market goes down b/c most people can't afford over 200K. I would find a working class nice neighborhood. Drive around and see if there are any vacant houses. Also you could search for mailing lists in your specific market. Put Bandit signs in these areas. Make sure you have a specific questionaire for people when they call. You'll want to be able to weed out the people that can't do the deal or the deals just not profitable. Once You find the deal at the price point you're comfortable with go for it.
As for Hud homes/foreclosures you can sometimes get a deal but you're bidding with all the other newby investors who don't market themselves and they drive the price up. Sometimes so much that if anything goes wrong you're not profitable. The key is to find the market where you want to be. Market that area like crazy. exp: Bandit signs, mailers, door to door , flyers, Anything that will get your phone ringing with potential deals in your target area. It might take you several months and several phone calls with misses before you land a great deal. But at the end of the day that one deal if you get it at 65% total will pay for the year. I stress the 65% b/c at that price you pretty much have evaporated all your risk. If you did your research on prices in the area and take all rehab factors into account before you make your offer you will find it difficult to lose any money this way.
**FOLLOW UP IS KEY** If you speak with sellers and they aren't willing to pay you what your offering. Ask them if you can follow up with them in 3 months. Even if they say no follow up anyway. You'd be suprised how many people will come around to accepting your offer after they're property has sat on the market for 3 months.
TO MAKE IT EASY
You can automate your phone service. You can hire a service to take these calls for you with a specific script of questions you provide. they will type these answers and email you a list of all your calls everyday. This makes it easy for you to quickly sort through the potential and not so potential deals. This costs $1 per min and the typical phone call last 3 mins. So thats $3 per lead. That may sound like alot but in the end the prize outweights the amount you pay in the beginning.

War Eagle Everyone!!! I've been looking in the Centerpoint, Pension and Clay Co areas myself. Good advise Jimmy. Our goal is to flip 2-3 this year and hopefully buy 3-4 rentals. I'm taking a year long class first before we pull the trigger on anything. Looking forward to our first deal.

Emmauel,
My wife and I are about to embark on this very subject. We are about to take a year long class in our town with a local pro. He advises you network at local investors meetings etc. You will likely meet several hard money lenders or people with money to lend. You let them know casually what you are doing. In our case we discuss the class. We discuss how the deal will be structured and that we will take care of all the leg work. Here is a sample proposal:
1. We put the home we intend to purchase in the investors name. We buy these homes with 40-50% equity. We handle the whole buying process and title. We put the title in the investors name to guarentee them collateral on there investment.
2. We structure payments for repairs/improvements. Once a stage is completed we email pictures of the progress to the investor and we request the next installment.
3. Once the work is finished we market the home and sell for a profit.
4. Once sold we give the Investor his money back plus the Percentage agreed upon when we borrowered the money in the 1st place.
Many Private money lenders are out their waiting to lend money to qualified investors. However they expect the person they lend money to to be educated, efficient and have a plan.
By dicussing what you are doing while you network you usually can get the lenders interest in what you are doing and most of the time they will ask you how they can get involved.
Thats when you let them know you are always looking for investors and you tell them about your structured process and assure them that you will handle everything. You make it easy for them and they will want to continue to do business with you.
Since its your first one i would meet as many folks as possible and get their emails. Continue to make a contact list. Find a wholesale property and pay cash. Then email it to your ever growing list of investors. Do that a few times to help you gain the funds for your first deal. Then pay cash and get private money for the repairs. That way the lender will be more inclined b/c you have skin in the game and if you fail they get the property and the potential profit.

Another way. And this is probably the way my wife and i are going to do it is fix and flip our first deal. Use hard money to purchase and fix the flip. Then out of the profit made us that money to pay cash for our first rental.

You might need to partner with an experienced investor on your first flip so that you can get hard money financing. My wife and I are taking a class with an experienced investor that will partner with us on our first 4 deals.
Good Luck and Please let us know your progress.

Here are a few ways:
1. If you have equity in your home then you can open a Home Equity line of Credit on your home which will provide you with a % of your equity for personal use at a fairly low interest rate.
2. If you currently rent then you can do a first time homebuyers program and pay little to no down payment.
3. Save what you plan on paying as a mortgage on this investment property every month. (this will let you see how and if you can afford this extra payment and will allow you to save a few thousand dollars a year) By the end of the year ex: $350 X 12 = $4200.
4. Owner financing. If you can buy a property through owner finaning this would be a great option if they give you a decent payment. Then you can turn around and rent the property out for more than the payment you have to make every month.

WARNING:
I Feel like i need to warn you however. You and your husband need to have an emergency fund. You need to make sure that you have enough money in the bank that can pay the mortgage/loan on the property for at least 6 months and cover any repairs. So 6-months payments and a couple grand for emergency repairs.