All Forum Posts by: Elena Jobson

Short sales are few and far between but they DO still exist. My colleague has one right now. That being said, short sales can take months, even years to close if ever at all. Good luck witheverything! Please feel to reach out to me :-)

I have never bought a property on auction.com and i could be wrong and it could also differ by state. But I thought that you didn't really get a title policy with auction.com, that the buyer tends to assume liens against the property. That might just be Colorado where I am from, but that was my understanding. I would HIGHLY recommend getting O&Es before even thinking about buying at auction. An O&E (ownership and encumbrance) report shows any liens, judgments, etc against the property. Title companies can typically pull these reports for you for a nominal fee (in Colorado it's $5). Keep in mind, there is still risk even if a property shows clear title on an O&E, consider water bills (if your state liens water, mine does), unpaid taxes, and the potential of mechanics liens that could fall out AFTER you have already purchased the property. Without title insurance, you would be liable to pay for all of that.

I just want to put in my 2 cents being that I grew up in Boulder and lived there for most of my life. As far as a starting out, I agree boulder is a tough market unless you have a lot of capital, and even then it may not be lucrative as a buy hold town. Many people are saying that the Boulder Market has been heavily affected by the recent influx of transplants. My opinion is that it has been affected to some degree, but not as much as metro Denver and northern Colorado. Let me explain: Boulder has ALWAYS been expensive. I know, because I grew up there. When I was in college 7 years ago, you would be hard pressed to find a SFH for rent under $1500 per month. Although the prices have gone up since then I do not think they have gone up at the same rate as metro Denver for example. When the market crashed back in 08, the Boulder housing market was not really affected, and there are a lot of reasons for that. My parents owned a house in university hill (the college campus area), they sold it in 1987 for under 200K, today that home is worth close to a million dollars. I have to echo what others are saying in that if your interest is sin the college niche; you would be better off investing in Greeley or Fort Collins or even Colorado Springs. Denver has gotten ridiculously expensive in the last few years. But there are people who will say Denver is still a good investment market because the prices will continue to appreciate and the rent have gone up significantly. 6 years ago I rented my first studio apartment in the capital hill neighborhood of Denver for $450 per month. Today that same apartment (small, not updated, etc etc) rents for $900 per month.

I don't know about the laws regarding bed bugs However my understanding is that it would be the landlord's responsibility not the tenants. For all anyone knows they got the bed bugs from the property and not the other way around. Of course they may have brought the bed bugs there too! No way to tell. The main thing is that this is your property and your problem. I once lived in an apartment, everything was fine for a few months until I started noticing bites. I talked with a bunch of neighbors who told me that they had had bed bugs for a long time living there. What tends to happen with bed bugs is that when you fumigate one apartment, they just migrate over to the next one. Bed bugs are awful and almost impossible to get rid of. Sometimes they can even get into the insulation of a building. They made my life a miserable hell for a few months: I had to throw away A lot of my furniture and had to pay a lot of money to salvage my things. I would say you need to get professional people out there, I would not trust an at home kit. These things can survive for up to 18 months with no food. They can live through extreme cold and heat, they would probably survive a nuclear holocaust. For the benefit of yourself and your tenants: call a professional. I will say the one thing that does kill them based on my research is extremely hot water. I hope this helps! Good luck dealing with your issue and I'm really sorry you have to deal with it at all!

Hi Ian. I am a licensed escrow officer in the Denver Metro area. I am just starting out on my real estate investment journey but let me know how I can help. IE title questions or whatever it may be!

I am just starting out and it seems NO ONE believes in me, except of course myself. You are not alone in getting the discouraging reactions from seemingly everyone. If the group you are with is not interested, maybe talk less about it. That being said, you SHOULD, despite popular opinion, continue to talk about it because you might just mention it in front of someone who does give you encouragement or has experience or connections that could be useful to you.

This is likely going to be an "up and coming" area... Eventually. Who knows how long that could be though. aside from the possible "contamination" I worry about the crime, the smell, yes the smell, since this area is very close to industrial factories (including a cat food factory which smells awful and could affect the property value) and the close proximity to I-70 (pollution issues.) Hopefully some day, they will tear down all those factories, if that happens, the value of properties in the area could skyrocket (being that it is very close to downtown) but that is pure speculation.

Based on my research, North Dakota and Alaska will be the hardest hit by the lack of US oil production.  It is true I am interested in more diversified markets,  although more diverse, places like Houston (based on my research) still do rely heavily on O&G based jobs, what I found indicated around 30% which is significant.  I spent some time in Southern Louisiana recently and it seemed the housing prices were low, and many people I know who work offshore were getting pay cuts if not laid off.  To me it seemed like a no-brainer to invest in a low market, but when you take into account the lack of population and job growth, it may not be as much of a no-brainer as I initially thought.  After all, who knows if oil prices will ever go back up to where they were.  I agree with @Jerry W.that this is all yet to hit rock bottom, and these types of things don't happen overnight, I think there will be foreclosure fallout from the lack of employment in oil production, beginning mid summer 2016.  Based on research I have done, it take about 2 years from a significant drop in the price of oil for it to fully affect a market.  Then again I read something yesterday saying the price of oil jumped up the largest percentage it has in months and that certain countries (I think it was Iran but I don't remember) are likely to slow their oil production in the near future.  Thoughts anyone?   @Brian Lacey@Logan Turner@Fred HellerThank you for your input ALL I do appreciate your ideas and opinions.

@Fred Hellerare you talking Houston Metro specifically?

Do you think it is wise to invest in real estate markets where there is a high dependency on oil production? The housing market may be down, making homes more affordable, however unemployment may be going up due to layoffs (possibly creating tenancy issues and lack of job growth). What are your thoughts on investing in these markets? For example Houston, Pensacola, Baton Rouge etc.