All Forum Posts by: E J

Thanks for the response. I understand that it is not as quality of space as the main floor, but it is sure a lot better than being unfinished. If you had to guess, what % less valuable is the basement than the main floor?

Who customarily provides the title insurance varies from state to state and even locally within states. Where I'm from near Chicago, the seller is expected to pay for it.

From what I've read, it seems like finishing a basement will not add very much value to a home unless it is a walk-out. In some cases, it won't even count towards the square footage of the home. I really don't understand why this is so. If you live in a ranch, finishing the basement should nearly double your living space, and in a 2 story, increase it by 50%. I don't see why being below-grade diminishes its value so greatly. It is still perfectly livable space which you can enjoy yourself or with guests, or store stuff in. Personally, I wouldn't buy a house without a finished basement because it just feels so much smaller. Unless it's finished, I'm sure as hell never hanging out down there. Can someone explain to me why no one values finished basements???

Thanks guys. I put out 20 signs to start off with Friday night. 18 of them remained by Sunday. They also survived a big storm so I was happy about that. I left 5 of the signs out on major intersections to test out how long they will last during the week with sign police

Finance, let's not forget that we are (hopefully) dealing with very motivated sellers. Sure it may be easy for you to smile and return the contract, but if you were about to lose your house to the bank or needed to sell for other financial or health related reasons, I don't think there would be anything to smile about. Also, as you mentioned, a large part of it is presentation. Ideally, an amateur should be able to mask his inexperience by exuding confidence and becoming educated on how to carry out the transaction. Sure, you are an expert and I'm sure you could see right through potential buyers, but most likely we are not going to be dealing with experts or they probably would have already come up with a better solution to their problem. Regardless, I do like your strategy of almost playing dumb. I love to do the same thing in poker and check when I hit a big hand so my opponents become overly aggressive

Well, the nature of wholesaling is that you do not intend to close yourself, whether you are tying their property up with an option OR a purchase contract. Either way, you should be honest to the seller about your intentions to find a third party buyer. However, in my opinion, being able to see an exact closing date and already filling out a complete purchase contract would give the seller much higher expectations of a closing than if an option was used. Hopefully we can get a wholesaler who uses options with sellers to chime in and share his/her experiences because what I am saying is based only on my personal reasoning and brief memories of other posts I've read on the issue

Also a side note my attorney has confirmed there's no need to worry about the copyright issue here in Illinois with using the realtor's contract

As far as the contract, I've heard great points on both sides of the coin. Sure it may be nuts in a legal sense, but from a business perspective I really don't see how I could disagree with Vikram's post. I'm not saying the short contract will increase the bottom line, because I wouldn't know without having tried it, but from those who do say they are using the contract, it does seem to be working... which is probably why they use them. I will probably start off with the standard one then make the decision later on if I would be better off by switching.

Bob,
You will definitely want to get advice from people who actually know what they're talking about, but first off I want to clarify what you are saying. At first you say your attorney gave you a purchase contract and then later on you say he gave you an option to purchase contract. It sounds like your attorney wants you to first put an option on the property to tie it up, then use a full purchase contract if you find a buyer and decide to exercise the option.

Assuming that is the case, I believe that using an option rather than a straight PSA might show that you are less serious about the deal in the eyes of the seller. With the purchase contract, the seller is expecting their property to be sold at the end of the contract period so long as contingencies don't become an issue. With an option, there's no knowing whether or not you will exercise it, so the seller may want more earnest money or else they may think you're wasting their time. For $10, I think it would be crazy to let someone control your property for 30+ days which at the end of, they can simply say they're not interested. At least if you sign a purchase contract, the seller will think that you have fully committed to them and may be willing to accept $10 because they will assume you intend to close. Also, as I've said earlier, I think that at the end of the day the purchase contract really isn't much more than an option in disguise, in favor of the buyer. With so many different contingencies or weasel clauses that could be used, a purchase contract can basically guarantee a buyer an out if they so choose. This way, the seller THINKS you are fully obligated, when in reality, you aren't much more committed than you were with the option (unless you've waived the contingencies in the PSA)

Ok, so I'm trying to figure out what I'm going to say to homeowners after they give me their property information. It seems as though the level of equity in their property has a big impact on what the seller's options will be. I want to narrow this down to a specific process that I will repeat with every seller. So far I have:

Equity > 35%, make cash offer
Equity < 0%, offer to negotiate short sale
0% < Equity < 35%, not enough room to make a cash offer, what do you do?

Also, do you guys do anything like negotiate mortgage modification, forbearance agreements, and deeds in lieu or is short sale what you recommend when someone is upside down?

I was actually a bit worried about that J. What should I do to avoid copyright infringement?