All Forum Posts by: Alex Chin

@Mike R. - Thanks for the recommendation on buying the warranty, you've had good cause to use it regularly?

@Nghi Le - sorry for being so late with my thanks, I'll definitely take a look next time I'm in the area.

@Catherine German - That was the direction I ended up going in. 5% off on the credit card and made delivery/install pretty painless. I'll give TV Time Appliances a quick look as well, next time I'm in the area.

I will definitely defer to @Albert Bui's expertise in this area. If he's seeing mostly the mid-to-high 4%s, that's probably where the market has gone.

My quote on NOO at 4.125% was about 3-4 months back, so things could have easily shifted by now.

What @Chris T. said is correct. If a HML won't fund it, you might wanna double check all your numbers and look for a hidden worm in the apple.

Now they tend to be a bit conservative with their money, so it still might be a deal, they just feel that for one reason or another, there is more risk in the deal than they want to deal with.

EDIT: Also, Tarl and @Nathan Robbins have both invited other investors to walk their flips and ask questions, they're great people and very open about their business as well as being open to partnerships.

@Brady Winder - I would guess that since this will be new construction, he is building into calculations that expenses will be minimal for the foreseeable future, at the very least, you're reasonably looking at siding/roof/flooring/etc. that won't need to be replaced for a decade or so.

I have been quoted 4.125% for NOO 30-yr. financing on a 4-plex in Tacoma, so I would say that 4% might be a little optimistic, but not unreasonable.

@Allison Medina - one of the better resources you can try accessing is to run the deal by a hard-money lender. If they believe it would pencil, then they'll likely approve a 70%LTV loan, and then you're looking for a private money lender to bridge the last 30% (assuming you don't have that coin lying around).

Veristone has a decent reputation, I've never used them but a number of successful flippers/developers that I've met will vouch for them.

@Tarl Yarber has done a number of flips in the area, he would likely be interested if you truly have a deal on your hands, and has contractor resources to pull from to potentially lower the renovation costs.

@Catherine German - Tell me about it. When I put a Hilltop unit up for rent last month, I decided to start at what I thought was the high-end of what I could get in rents and work my way down.

Got 12 responses within 4hrs., 3 of which met all the qualifications I wanted, (3x rent, 680 credit score, minimum 12-months at same work place, 2 solid former landlord recommendations, $1000 security deposit, etc.) and had it leased out within 7 days.

To be honest, I probably should have pulled the ad and pushed the price up, but whatever, I'll just remember that for the next unit I open up.

@Ronald Sims - welcome to the site and the Puget Sound BP Community. If you're looking for a couple simple, actionable steps before you make a major commitment of some kind, see below for a few suggestions that will only require you to invest a bit of your personal time:

1. Start getting familiar with home prices. One of the most critical skills for any wholesaler is to know what is selling for how much in a given area. You can start by spending a few hours ever week on Zillow, Redfin, or some other MLS mirror and browsing the last 3 months of "sold" inventory.

2. Visit Home Depot, Lowes, and appliance stores. Start getting a feel for material, appliance, and labor pricing. If you're want to be good at wholesaling, being able to ballpark renovations is part and parcel and being where a lot of that stuff gets sold is a good first step. homewyse is also a good website for getting that kind of info for the King/Pierce areas.

@Prasad J. - sounds good, really hope it works out well for you. If the refi closes successfully, I hope that you wouldn't mind mentioning that I referred you? Thanks, have a great 4th of July!

John Nguyen at Procura Mortgage was able to do 4.125% on a non-owner occupied, pretty sure he'd easily be able to get down to the 3.5% range for owner-occupied.

Wonder if you could possibly turn it into one of those kinda "man-cave" or "woman-cave" sheds out back? Don't rip out the pool, instead make it kinda a hideaway bunker of sorts?

Pool in Seattle for a $500K> house is a real tough sell, but also really expensive to tear it out and fill in.