All Forum Posts by: Jason Howell

 Dang, Caleb. Awesome tip right there, thank you for the heads up. I wish guides like this existed for all the markets I'm researching at the moment!

 Incredibly helpful!! And more than that, makes perfect sense. It's like I understood this process, but having it spelled out like this sets my mind at ease a bit more. I'll make this part of my workflow so I can master it over these next few months.

Man, I love learning this stuff. THANK YOU.

We got ours through a local credit union. Keep in mind that a HELOC has a variable rate so it likely will change over time, so you have to make sure you still cash flow on a deal considering it would be 100 percent financed at that point. I'm not knowledgable on non-owner occupied HELOC tbh.

Incredibly helpful! If I'm understanding, analyze based on cash flow first. That tells you whether it meets your requirements there and whether its worth your time diving deeper on the ARV to THEN see if it makes sense from a cash out refinance perspective. If so, PURSUE. :)

Thank you!!

It's pretty common practice to use a HELOC drawn from the equity in one's home to serve as the down payment for investment real estate... yet I haven't found any calculators that will allow me to add that into the equation when it comes to deal analysis. Instead, I have to rely on the Monthly Cashflow figure and then determine what the monthly outlay will be for the HELOC draw that paid for the down payment and subtract that from the Cashflow figure manually.

I'd love to see this as an option in the BP calculators. So maybe this is part feature request...

But I'm sure some of you have experienced this before. How do you factor this variable into your equations when analyzing deals?

While I can understand the "analysis paralysis" point... My hope is to, like you say, convert certain pieces of the process from exercise to actual knowledge and understanding at a deeper level. I know for me, that only comes via repetition. Had you already picked a location prior to starting your 30 days? I find I'm jumping between markets, both out of curiousity and in an attempt to be exposed to the norms of many different areas.

I already have four properties in Indianapolis and in the end, might simply opt to stay in that market since I know it at least marginally better than other random markets I'm researching. But it's all for education. There will be an action point, this will prep me for that.

Thank you!!

This speaks volumes to me, thank you. I'll definitely remind myself that at this stage, I shouldn't be killing myself trying to find just the right number to drop in for ARV. Maybe in the beginning, I match the ARV to whatever the acquisition cost is and if it passes the test there, then dive deeper on a true ARV calculation. Saves time that way for sure. It's easy to get into the weeds when I overthink it. And then it takes way longer than the 15 minute target.

But I'm learning a ton! Its my early morning ritual at the moment (thanks to Miracle Morning).

 Awesome information, really appreciate you taking the time to spell this out for me! I'm definitely understanding that I should probably be a bit looser on this detail in the early stages... and open up to more detailed analysis once I know it passes the first level of tests.

But I will say that doing this deal analysis each morning has been SUPER educational. I'm starting to really get a nice point by point comparison of what each number means in a contextual sense. I understood in broad strokes before. Now I'm starting to have an immediate reaction when a deal might be ok or not at all. I suppose that's the goal of this exercise!

I'm in the midst of @Brandon Turner's 90 day challenge where I have committed to analyzing at least one property every day for 90 days. So far, I've really learned a lot about the many facets of deal analysis and in particular, the components within the Bigger Pockets calculators that I can safely assume on... But ARV gets me every single time.

On one hand, I'm supposed to find a property to analyze, punch the numbers in and move on, learning what I can along the way. (per the challenge)

On the other hand, After Repair Value isn't something you can just guess on. In order to do it right, you either have to rope an agent into the mix (who has the means with which to do the CMA appropriately) or spend far more than the 15 minutes that I'm expected to spend on analyzing deals every morning.

I feel like at this stage, I'm analyzing deals and more or less guessing on ARV but that's a HUGELY important figure to get right, so my deal analysis is rather moot if I'm just guessing ARV...

Does anyone have any processes to share that make calculating ARV a bit more streamlined? What am I missing?

No contractor background. I've met serious investors who are licensed and who don't actively sell as an agent. Why would they have this license if its not of any extra use in this process? I suppose this is something I should ask them directly.

Thank you!