All Forum Posts by: Jason Roberts

Hello BP,

My name is Nicole and I am currently a freshman college student (full time) in Massachusetts but I reside in Connecticut (during the summer). I am very interested in pursuing real estate as my career path in order for me to be able to serve others and build wealth along the way. I have spent hours watching YouTube videos, reading, listening to podcasts, and researching. I have certainly had the urge to just buy a membership to one those "gurus" real estate investing courses but I have never done it because I've always been skeptical about them. Being on Bigger Pockets has truly given me the opportunity to educate myself even further.

My ultimate goal is to earn $20,000 of passive income each month through buy and hold properties and to do a few fix and flips each year.

And with Real Estate one definitely needs capital to get started. I am fortunate enough to be on the path to graduate college debt free which is a very good thing. But I must admit that I am getting very antsy because all I want to do is get the ball rolling and get started. But I have realized that I do not have the capital, the experience, or the right connections to do so. Which takes me to a couple of my many questions:

1) I need money to get started. Would wholesaling be a good strategy to start with in order to build capital for my long term goals? if not, any other suggestions?

2) Should I attend both REI clubs in MA and CT? Even though I attend school here in MA.

I am truly just seeking for some guidance and any advice would be greatly appreciated. I am willing to listen, learn, and follow before I can get on my own two feet. I strongly look forward to any comments.

Thank you,

Nicole

Hey @Jason Roberts, it sounds like you're close to Daytona Beach? I flipped a house there last year. Still a good area... ;-)

Aloha @Jason Roberts,

Florida is my 2nd favorite state to invest in - I own 48 cash-flowing houses in Jax. I'll be traveling to FL again in March. 

Where is Palm Coast?

~Michael

 Aloha Jason,

(I'm describing the island of Oahu, aka the Honolulu metro - the market dynamics on the neighbor islands can be different.) 

House flips are typically all 6-figure deals out here. Inventory is somewhat low, while demand for housing is high. Hey, its paradise, and the demand for real estate in Hawaii is global. That said, many of the houses I buy are abandoned, so I renovate them and throw them back into circulation. On Friday I'm listing a house for $850,000. I bought it about 5 months ago for $410,000, and renovated it for $130,000. Not sure if I'll get $850k for it, but as you can see, I'm 'all in' for $540k, so I've got some room to play. I like to push the envelope in this market. ;-)

A savvy, well funded RE Investor can net $1,000,000 a year in this market. If I were to stop taking down new deals, and just finish up the ones I have in progress now, we will net $2.4m this year. 

The weather and the surf are not the only things that are sweet out here, LOL!

Seize the day, Jason!
~Michael

Hey Bigger Pockets!

Once again, I'm being horrible at posting on BP and its getting harder and harder to sit down and write anything on the forums.  Just know that I am investing a ton, and I post when I can.

As for this house! Lesson here, buy when everyone else is on vacation or taking time off.  I have always found deals during the holidays.  This gem snuck onto the MLS the Friday before labor day weekend, and by Monday (labor day), I had already submitted my offer, and Tuesday I had it tied up before anyone else bothered to compete (not technically true, one other offer went in that fast).  In my market of Seattle, a house on the MLS that is priced right for a rehab gets LITERALLY 15 plus offers on it in the first week, and almost always goes to the bidder with the least experience, meaning they paid way too much because they cant calculate rehab and are hoping the market will save them later when they sell.

The Deal:

I had to submit an aggressive offer in order to get accepted.  It was a home owner going through a divorce and listed on the MLS.  In this area, there are very few flips.  Its a hot area, with a lot of home owner to home owner sales, leaving little room for house flippers.  I got lucky on this one (Sammamish house for all the Seattle folks out there).  This house was mainly cosmetic for me, but we did have to open up all of the upper level in order to give it that large Grand awe experience.  This required adding the railing that you see in the pic above (was a solid wall), and adding that 10ft island in the kitchen (was a solid wall separating the kitchen and living room).  In addition to those items, we fully updated the baths, all the flooring, rebuild the backyard deck (no pic), sheetrocked over the wood ceilings, tile everything else, etc.  There were no surprises for us on the rehab, all straight forward and best of all, ON BUDGET!

NUMBERS:

Purchase: $405,000 (cash)

Rehab: $68,000 (budget was 70k)

Staging: $2000

Holding costs: $3000 ish

Selling costs (commission, WA excise 1.78% tax, escrow etc): $48,000

Sale Price: $600,000

Total Net Profit: $73,191

This was a very easy flip for us, and it went very well and so smoothly.  We closed on the Re-Sale today, starting the new year off right.  Big lesson on this house for me is that it was on the MLS.  I ended 2015 with over 40 acquisitions, and THIS house was the ONLY house I even bothered with that was on the MLS.  I have it in my head that there is nothing worth looking at on the MLS here in Seattle, and I still believe im mostly right on this, but when no one else was looking, I got lucky on labor day weekend.  I now believe that since the market is so hot, and everyone and their mother is an "investor" right now, I need to start diving into the MLS more again and aggressively pursue every deal if I want to keep my volume up. Happy 2016 everyone, and good luck to all out there!  Email me your deals!