All Forum Posts by: John S.

Whatever is cheaper. Paypal takes a fee, if the title Co will deposit 100% of the funds do it that way.

Take my advice and stay out of the hood. Your tenants won't be housebroken, collections will be difficult, and you're likely not going to change the demographics of an entire city region just by picking up a few junky properties.

Look for stronger markets if you want to make money with good hardworking tenants who pay on time and respect the units.

You're asking for trouble going into very low income areas. You want to help, but likely no one wants your help there. And the caliber of individual you will deal with is so low you'll wish you never started. They are hard on the rentals, not to mention waiting for +40 years for an investment payout on a nickel and dime bet on housing in a very poor area is not a good investment strategy. Make a few more posts and have BP help you fine tune that thinking.

If you are bent on low income try picking up bigger buildings and section 8ing them for the cash flow because there will likely be no gains on the sale of that real estate.

If you are letting the RE agent sway you on a deal, you might as well quit now. A RE agent is out for themselves, not their client or you. The big difference is brokers get paid on having two parties reach an agreement, while investors get paid buy buying low and selling high. A broker does care how dirty a deal is as long as it closes.

Any competent investor knows their numbers and what they can spend to make money. The other party's broker is paid to run interference and distractions to take you off the ball. Think the broker is lying? Lower your highest and best and hope he wasn't.

Fax in your offer, don't give any broker a chance to get info out of you, 10% of them are skilled at that.

And do yourself a favor and don't fall in love with the building. There are likely tons just like it around and available.

Cut the agent out if you can, I recommend consult the listing agreement and an attorney first. But here are some options

Try having the seller quit claiming the property to an LLC and then buying the property from a company. If the agent wants to sue the seller's LLC, there will be nothing to take. Do some background on the agent, they might not have the firepower (aka $$) to hire a lawyer to sue and weather the bills. If lawyer costs > commission or outcome from case they will not sue.

I assume the offer is cash? Make a contract for $1000 on it and give the owner the other $59000 on a side payment for his appliances or something. This will effectively cut out the broker.

Buy an option on the property for $1000 now to purchase it the day after the contract expires. Just make sure you get it recorded.

Bring your own broker in for a small payment to save half the commission. Be sure to negotiate this with your broker/agent just before signing. There are tons of broke brokers out there who will put there name on a contract they had no business with for a couple fast dollars.

These are just the few I can think of before hopping my flight home. I'm working on deal now where I called the agent to setup a showing and she didn't even show up to the showings and lied to her client about attempting to contact me afterwards. The result? I squeezed seller for their lowest possible price, and signed them up on a contract with my favorite terms dated two weeks after the agents listing agreement expiration.

The only brokers who make it have, protect their commissions (by showing up for example) or have a solid base of good deals to shop to buyers or a solid base of sucker buyers for the properties they sell.

10% of brokers are solid and good business people and have a good network/know what they are doing/will protect their commission.

The other 90% are disposable.