All Forum Posts by: David Hodge

Any bank recommendations in Colorado for a HELOC? Are big banks typically competitive with smaller banks or credit unions?

David Faulkner I am not affiliated with any turnkey company but I believe there are compelling reasons for some people to buy through a turnkey provider. If it's going to take an investor 200 hours of work to find a good below market deal that that they can get for a $20,000 discount, but they could alternatively spend that 200 hours putting extra time into their job that will earn them $40,000, it makes sense for them to buy a turnkey property, at retail prices and just continue plugging away at their job. Most people obviously don't make this much per hour and therefore would benefit from putting time into buying properties themselves at below fmv, if they desire. Turnkey is a fine option for some people even though the upside is limited. Regarding season investors buying from turnkey companies... that might be true. After all, experienced investors have more money and can therefore buy more. BUT I don't think a majority of seasoned investors buy turnkey. There is a difference.

It depends on what your goals are. Do you have a high paying job and just need somewhere to put your money that will slowly grow over time? If you're making enough at your job and aren't interested in putting a bunch of time into learning the ins and outs of RE then consider the turnkey route. Stick enough money into good solid rentals with good management and you'll become wealthy eventually. You're not necessarily becoming wealthy FROM the rentals. Your job is doing most of the work and the rentals are giving it a little boost. What if you DON'T have a job that provides you with a ton of left over money at the end of the day? Then you're going to have to get a little more hands on and build your wealth outside of your job. Turnkey isn't usually a big wealth builder. It should provide you with some good cash flow if you buy in a good area but to build significant wealth, you either need to buy below FMV, buy something you can ADD value to, or buy in a highly appreciating market. Typically TK fails to offer these wealth building benefits. I think TK can be great if you do it right and have the right expectations, but don't expect the kinds of returns investors are getting who really study and know how to get amazing deals. It's a much slower wealth building process, but if you're making $500k/year at your day job, I recommend staying focused on your day job.

I moved here with my family from Southern California almost a year. We love it! If you enjoy the outdoors, mountains, hiking, skiing, 4 seasons, being close to a very accessible, clean city, a all around healthy living, you'll love it! At least for us, the main draw was the mountains and cheaper living than where we came from. I'm new to investing in Denver but from what I can tell, finding deals can be tough, but once you find them, selling is typically pretty easy. Of course that will change as we go through different market cycles.

Bill S. and Allen Fletcher thank you for the responses. I'm going to give this a shot but will probably not be my bread and butter since there doesn't seem to be an efficient way to get a solid list. If I don't ever post about this again it's either because it didn't work out well, or it worked out too well. :) Thanks again!

My wife and I are trying to brainstorm creative list ideas to generate leads to wholesale and hold as rentals.  We are in the Denver market which is very difficult to break into.  We are trying to think of some ways to target people who need to sell, but don't have the obvious characteristics that most investors target (run down exteriors, pre-foreclosures, etc).  Has anyone ever targeted people looking for a job?  I was thinking of searching for job seekers in my area using LinkedIn or one of the other job sites, and cross referencing that with home owners in my market.  I figure people looking for jobs might need to sell fast, but won't necessarily show up on any of the other lists, thereby decreasing, or eliminating, my competition.  Has anyone done this?  Is this something you recommend I look further into, or is there a major obstacle here that I'm missing? 

Bill S. I'm still researching this area but there seems to be a good amount of tri-levels. I'm looking in south Aurora. Good to know they are generally less desirable. I'll make sure to only use other tri-levels as comps. Appreciate the feedback!

@Micki M. thank you for the detailed response!  I feel much more comfortable with how to account for the first level now.  We haven't met yet but I heard great things about you from Dan Mackin. Hope to meet you at a meet-up soon!

There are a lot of tri-level houses in the area I'm targeting and I'm not quite sure how to calculate the ARV on these. The bottom level is basically the basement but they often don't feel like basements. They are garden level, have no door at the top or bottom of the stairs and just feel like an extension of the main floor. Some of these houses only have one bedroom upstairs and 2 down at the first level (basement). Would you account for the square footage and rooms like you would for a normal basement (i.e. worth less than above grade) or, since it feels like the above grade rooms, would you account for this as if it were above grade? I feel like if I give it the same worth as above grade sq ft, I might be over valuing, but if I give it the reduced basement value, I'm under valuing the property.

Eddie Wright read J Scotts book The Book on Estimating Rehab Costs. It won't instantly make you an expert, but it will give you a foundation to build off of. It gives you ranges for costs but then it's up to you to contact different contractors in your area and figure out an estimate in your market for each component. It also helps you not sound like such a rookie when talking to contractors and other investors.