All Forum Posts by: Jack Bobeck

@Account Closed - Why would you say that?

@David Franza - With the Lease Option, get what you can, the price of the house is a starting point, but most people want to move into a home, with you as the bank since their credit is terrible. You can set the price at $200,000 if you like, but what will really separate the people will be the down payment. If the place is nice, I would not settle for less than 10% down. Question is, can you find someone who has $20,000 to put down on a house that will option out in 5 years? What is the plan then?

@Hans Restuccia I have a real problem with sending people to a 3rd party website. Why not contact Joshua Dorkin or Brandon Turner, the founders of Bigger Pockets and ask them if they can post your information for all to see? Why should any of us have to go to a 3rd party website for information that is readily available on BP, when all you need to do is search for it, or listen to a podcast or read one of the available books? The whole point of BP is to create an open area for investors to learn and share information.

Since you have an attorney involved already, I'd follow their advice.

Now you know, never sublet a property to another tenant without checking their background first and accepting them. The guy's lease is null and void if he sublet, as it sounds, to the girls.

Check the county property appraiser site. If the property does not exist in Cyberspace, it surely exists at the appraiser site. If you think about it, we all just rent our property back from the county anyway, since we have to pay property taxes, they allow us to live there, even if we own free and clear, and yet, we still have to pay property taxes each year. Check their site, I am sure it is there.

@Marcie Mertz You can use Meetup.com or Craigslist to advertise your group. I am planning to meet prospects at my buy/fix/flip properties, to show them what I have done. My business partner will show them his properties on our 2nd meeting. Keep the group simple, start with Rich Dad/Poor Dad quadrant thinking, ask why people got into real estate, what people are working on, what are their problems. Keep it an informal learning group.

No Gurus! You have all the gurus you need here at BP!

@Steven Hamilton II My CPA is a Real Estate Investor himself, I'll ask him about Family Limited Partnerships. Been using him for a couple of years, he has not mentioned this as a need, and he does a lot of couples who are Realtors / Investors. We shall see....

@Marcie Mertz Ditto what Wes said, about everything! Welcome aboard!

@Darryl Smith You can look up agents on Neighborcity dot com and see their rankings based on the number of listings, solds, and average Days on Market. It is the best site I have seen to find agents based on their sales. This is free and open to the public.

Another way is to find an agency office in the area you are selling the property and interview agents from the broker, on who has sold a property like your own. Investor property or a rental. If you can get access to the MLS, you can get a list of all the agents that have listed and sold properties in your zip code, which would give you an idea of who to interview. Check the local RE section of your paper as well, to see if there are agents you can call and interview. Most who spend money to advertise, have some experience in selling properties. But no system is fool proof, so understand that most agents will want a 6-month agreement and few are willing to market and maintain the property for less than 2.5-3 percent commission. If you get someone willing to sell the property for 1%, ask them what kind of marketing they will do, open houses, what are you getting for a rock bottom commission rate.

I disagree with the assessments that MOST Realtors who list are only there to put the property in the MLS. That was the case in 2005, when all you needed was a heartbeat and fog on a mirror to practice Real Estate. The game has changed now, with 94% of buyers searching the web before buying. Make sure your house has a great web presence for those people looking online. Ask to see examples from other houses that were listed and sold, see the DOM Days on Market data for each agent and their sales. You can quickly figure out who is worth your house.

@Arjun K. You can go back to your Realtor, the Seller's Realtor and the Inspector, they all carry insurance and you can work out a solution. You can also speak with an attorney and see if you want to pursue this at a higher level. I would see if you can work this out with your Realtor and see if they can assist you with the inspector/seller's Realtor.

@Abhay K. I bought my first foreclosure from Auction.com, probably not what I should have done, as they only gave me a special warranty deed, not the clean deed I really wanted. So I had my title agency run a title search for me, as I loved the property, the price, and I knew it was a GREAT deal. I should have run the title search before I bid on the property, but I had done some basic info searches, nothing showed up there. Alls well that ended well.