All Forum Posts by: Philip Rowe

laurenbeth,

I am glad I finally stated getting a response on this post. I didn't check it for a few days and appreciate your feedback. I think I have a pretty good idea on how to start doing BPO's but I don't want to ask questions or look like a total rookie. If you would be so kind to send me a BPO you have done I would like to look at the format and check out the info you supplied. Is it simply you give the bank/asset manager a Price and thats it? Do you supply comps in the area? How long is your report? 1 sentence, 1 paragragh, 1 page, several pages?

When I put packages together for my investors on a particular property it is usually about 10 pages. It shows, The listing, Pictures, Tax Records, Comps on the area, The comps mapped, listing history, and sometimes listings of the comps. I find a lot of properties that need rehabbing and I have been to enough inspections, and have friends who are general contractors to get a pretty good estimate of repair costs as well. I am very thorough at what I do. And when I do something I like to do it right, THE FIRST TIME. ...Hence the original post...

Again, if you could send me an example of a BPO it would be very grateful, my e-mail (hope this is okay? moderator) is [email protected]

However, I am sure that everyone else, would love to see it as well so if you could post the example on this forum, EVERYONE would be most appreciative.

Thanks for your comments. I love feedback, too. (bad or good)

How unfortunate. You can look at this like a $4000 lesson. You learned the #1 rule in Business...DONT TRUST ANYONE!!! I have attended seminars and people ask you to become a member and pay. To me it just never added up. I would like to know if anyone out there has benefited from one of these Coaches. To me it was a red flag because I thought they are making there money on COACHING not in actual real estate deals. $4000 is a lot of money.
But On my first deal I put up $4000, and my mentor put up $4000 as well. The property sold in 7 days, and we doubled our money. I learned how to do the deal and he got $4000 profit by showing me the ropes. I found the deal so he had the benefit, and I had the reassurance that he was in the deal too.

If anyone has benefited from the COACHING program, I would like to hear about it! Did this coaching do anything for you? Did they hold your hand and help you through a deal like they promise? I'm Curious, and not being sarcastic. I would expect them to hold your hand for $7000.

Caught wind of a deal today buying paper from Millennium Bank. The deal was AWESOME which shoulda been a red flag. When I contacted my Mentor, she laughed at me and told me to do my homework. Anyone wanna comment about them. I already got an idea of what I was dealing with, but I'd lick to hear some feedback if anyone has anything to offer.

:oops:

I want to learn more about Corporate Property Management.

That is Mid to High rise buidings. If anyone could offer a good book or good website to check out that is worth reading I would be very appricative. Facility Managment would be another term. I checked my local library and there are no copies of the books about this but in the area there are about 30 books. I can't read them all, so advise would be great. I know the basics about property management and have a handful of properties that I manage now, but understanding the corporate entity is the most important information I am looking for.

Hope someone can help!

I would suggest working with a Private Hard Equity Lender, Sometimes you can get up to 12% ROI. maybe even more. Its tricky though, you might end up with the property if they default and then you are back to having to "SELL BUILDINGS"

Good Luck, where are the buildings you want to sell?

College Grad
Built a Party Planning Business - but wasn't an owner and got nothing when it was sold to Vegas.com
VP of Operations for Yacht Blinds International - Mainly just a sales Manager and oversaw factory work. - stopped that because as much as I grew the company the owner drove it into the ground. they still put out a great product.
Bartender/Resturaunt Manager for Outback Steakhouse - great job for income while you build a business! hours are in the evening.
Have been a Realtor for 2 years - Project Manager for a Developer for 1 year.

I am 29 and have finally realized that I keep building others company's so now it is time to build my own. I wouldn't trade any of that for where I am at now, all of it was a GREAT learning process. However, I just wish I would have started earlier in Real Estate. I could have made a ton of money helping my friends with Rentals when I was in college.

Real Estate is a great job to learn about how Businesses work.

I met a guy at the gym, and through a friend, who knew I was about to become a Realtor. He was building a Hard Equity company and said if there was a case for foreclosures he would need a good Realtor to market the properties. If I got in early at his company he would teach me everything about Real Estate and would help me get my feet wet closing deals.
He talked about all the things he was a part of so I liked the experience he brought to the table. He knows a lot about different businesses and I consider myself an entrepenuar so I liked the other avenues we could explore outside of Real Estate. I had a customer whom I had a 5 year relationship that wanted to buy a $10 million house on Golden Beach. Since I discussed EVERYTHING with my mentor I told him about the deal. He offered to come when I showed the houses and I told him it wasn't necessary since the guy was an old friend. Then he told me that if the guy needed financing he wanted to be there to answer those questions so unsuspectingly I brought him along. Before I even had a contract on the house He had told my Broker that he wanted 1/3 of my commission. Thats $100 K, and I thought it was rediculous, not to mention Illegal in FL to share commissions with someone who is not a licensed Realtor. My customer had other business ventures to look at and after the disagreement with my "Mentor" about how much money he thought he "deserved" there was a lot of turmoil between us.

After a 2 year relationship as Mentor/Apprentice there wasn't a whole lot that he had done for me other than help me understand how to analyze a deal. He ended up doing business behind my back with my customer, and somehow managed to Kill my Sale on top of that. Mainly out of Spite he talked the guy out of buying the house saying "now is not the Time". Now I am upset with my customer for not being Loyal and dispise my EX-Mentor for Stabbing me in the back. He is doing $250 K a month in transactions as a Factoring company for this guy and is receiveing 5% per transaction. This guy has paid most everyone who has brought him a deal and I would have at least expected a "finders Fee", or being able to invest in the Factoring because the ROI is so nice. He took it all for himself and thus we have no relationship anymore.

Now I can credit him for teaching me the single most important lesson I have learned in this business...DON'T TRUST ANYONE. And Put Everything on PAPER.

I have been reading the Bigger Pockets Forum for a few days straight and have found that the best way for me to get my "foot in the door" with REO's is to start doing BPO's.
Give me the address, and I can give you comps and a price range in all areas of my City. I understand that a BPO is a Broker Price OPINION. Thats the part where my question comes (Opinion)! I see that relationships are everything in this business and if I am offered to do a BPO I don't want to screw it up. Also, when I approach Asset Managers I don't want to sound like a total newbie so...here I am.

Can someone who has experience doing BPO's give me a brief rundown of the process. I imagine it is a lot like doing comps?
When I have a buyer for a particular property I always have a PRICE that I state it should be bought for. I can take my CMA's to the seller and use those FACTS to negotiate to the right price.
That being said... in todays market, asking prices still seem a little inflated in most homes that are listed on the MLS. Any experienced agent knows that Asking Price does not reflect Market Price, instead its the CLOSED SALES, and EXPIRED LISTINGS that are more of an indicator.

Does the bank like the BPO to reflect the TRUE Market Value, or are they looking for more of an "inflated price"? I saw on 1 post that the bank usually offers the Listing to whomever has a higher BPO, but I would rather be Accurate, as opposed to complient.

Any discussion on this issue would be greatly appreciated!

I signed up for Realty Trac and actually paid the $200 to be the listed agent for my specific zip code. I was recieving 2-5 leads a day for buyers of foreclosure properties. I am familiar with the rule of 10 on leads and after literally 100's of phone calls calling leads, finding the properties they are looking for and, trying to transact the deal, I found it to be a BIG waist of Time and Money.
In the several months I was the "Prefered Agent" in my area, only 1 person called me directly. They shopped what I gave them and didn't end up buying anything. Of the several hundred other leads I would say 1% are qualified buyers. I am a good agent, and very knowledgable in my area, and have closed several deals on my own; I was new and willing to pay for leads or do whatever would grow my business; but in the end it was a big dissappointment. I always seem to learn the hard way? But I can atleast LEARN from my mistakes and offer this so no one else will make the same mistake. County Tax records and the lists from the courthouse are much more accurate for lis pendins. However, I was small time so I never was able to match or beat what the "power investors" were doing at the auctions. And with only "knowledge" and no "experience" I wasn't able to attract unique buyers. After much discouragement, I gave up and decided to try a different route.
I've been trying to tap into this business for over a year, and finally found 1 investor who was inpressed with everything I knew of this foreclosure business and is giving me the experience of Short Sales and buying REO's all within the last few months.

This website has been the single most effective tool in my research and I have just started to use it over the last few weeks. Thank you biggerpockets, and especially oklahoma1 for all the knowledge that he offers in his posts. I have 1000's of questions still but have spent most of my time reading the forum to "catch up" before I start asking repetative questions.

What is birddogging?

I'm not familiar with that term?