All Forum Posts by: Erik Larson

Hello, I am looking to connect with a local agent to help find and purchase a second home / AIR B&B property in the islands area of the Sound. Looking for something with a great view that would be fairly easy to rent out 35-50% of the time, some rehab/updating is expected. 3bd or 2bd, not mobile homes though. We are also looking for information on taxes, areas etc. I'll be spending some time in the area forums trying to answer as many of my own questions as possible.

Some of those good deals will be cash only as they probably won't appraise at the ask value too. Gilbert jumped on the 'ask $10k more than you would have last month' wagon as well it appears.

Originally posted by @Francisco Garcia Jr:

"The typical starter home which is selling for $180-220k in AZ right now" That's not in Scottsdale, where the builders have taking over, the market is screwy here at the moment.

Yep I saw this as well, but I don't know of any SFR's in Scottsdale for sub $250k unless they are 2BD. Tempe appears to be another developer take over with the buy (2bd), rehab/expand(to 3bd) sell model. Making it tougher to get ahold of private flip-able assets down here.

I second this monster appt complexes. All around Chandler even what I thought was going to be a nicer housing new build is actually a big condo/appt build. All new construction I'm seeing in Chandler appears to be complexes. In Gilbert they're building $400k+ houses with 150 sq ft back yards and you can slap the neighbors house from your 2nd story bathroom window.

I drive around and wonder where the starter homes are? In my area I think we're slightly over valued with 1100sq ft 3bd's hitting the $220+ mark and they were built in the early 70's.

My pool fence was $2k for a straight shot of 22 ft. 'Top of the line'. Mazz Gino sounds like a good area, I expect you to fetch your price.

Kaiser has "construction" quality tile, which is actually about 10 different wood tiles. Made by Moda tile but rebranded for Kaiser, about $2.50-$3.50 (12x24) a foot a lot of it on hand in the warehouse. Floor and Decor does have it for sub $2 a foot (usually 6x24), limited supplies of some. HD is good as well as Stone stated.

Oh about the pool, it's hit and miss. Consensus is usually 50/50 unless the family looking has kids, then then tend to lean towards the pool. Thing is buyers want all new pool stuff usually. Pump, filters etc can add up to $5k (new and installed), redoing the pool in pebble tec is about another $4k-$6k, redoing cool deck another $1500-$4k. "Added" value might be $10-$15k. My REA only loves pools on the sale of the REO because they can down the appraisal by $10k-$15k on a totally messed up pool, which could cost $4k-$10k to fix. Do you have a HOA, with a comm. pool in this flip? Or a near by park with a splash pad (market this if you have a family with kids and no pool).

Originally posted by @Justin Fox:

Let the grass get too tall along the fence line, in the back yard.

 This, this is just unspeakable! :)

Originally posted by :

What do you think about a 3Br 2 Ba in Chandler at 175k?

This is doable. Certain areas are nicer than others but if you can find one listed for sub $200 that needs something you could get to a $175 range 3bd  or very very close.

85226 zip is hot, the houses you'd be looking at usually wouldn't have garages for $175k (that's south of me) there are a few. But the crime is pretty much non existent. Sans the odd gunman at the mall (only happened twice, nothing to freak out about haha) but seriously the area is great. There is a lot of areas in Chandler that are quite good. Find something that looks good on MLS or Zillow, pull up the address in Trulia to see the crime map. You'll notice Chandler and a lot of Gilbert don't have enough crime to register. zoom out a bit and you get the big picture of a big city (compared to Tucson this place is "nuts") I used to live in Marana once they annexed part of Tucson.

How soon are you looking to move / buy? And which plant were you going to be at?

If the furniture is nice enough might be able to reuse it for staging.

Congrats on picking up in Chandler. As for flooring I can't really help, but if you are going to have tile removed use a dustless removal crew. I toasted my hepa filter in my brand new A/C unit when demoing only a small portion of my kitchen which too me and my tile guy several hours. I had Jack King come in @7am and blow out almost 1500 ft of terrible tile, they were cleaned up and gone by 9:30, but it cost $3k to remove that. Very very little dust left. My tile guy was a GC, cost was great but reliability was terrible, it was my house so no problem it took 2 weeks to tile, in a flip no way. Also check with Frank at Kaiser Tile, he turned me on to my GC, depending on price and time it might not be bad. I'd also proudly display his work on my place if you'd like to talk about him. I did make him lay 3x4 foot industrial tile though, he wasn't happy haha.

Source your tile direct from that place up on Elliot and 10, pick up something cheap, but normal. You'd probably save a good portion of material that way, I also got my thinset from lowes (I bought and carried it, Mapei) and the grout I picked up from Big D's tile over off Elliot. They had a pretty good list of installers last I saw, might want to drop in there.

How long have you been in Chandler? BTW I might be able to help out with somethings if needed or liked, or even just to talk, I'm right at Ray and the 101 and work for myself so my schedule is pretty open. 

Erik

Very good feedback from all of you. I did pass, the other investor picked it up for $10k less. Money and commitment talks I figure :) Since this I have found a pair of wholesalers that have better spreads and better places from the looks. To really nail it I do see I have to go after the direct approach.