All Forum Posts by: Joe M.

I admit to being a complete novice to real estate investing so take this advice for what it's worth.

I think your intuition is serving you well if you are feeling "anxious" about financing. Some of these deals I read about on here make me cringe at the amount and type of financing that is done. If you lack any cash reserves (and no I wouldn't count your 401(k) as a cash reserve) I wouldn't do the deal.

In the interest of full disclosure I am one of those wacky debt free Dave Ramsey fanatics.

Tom:

Both of these properties are actually in the canton area, not akron.

As far as dealing with issues when I'm out of town, I'm usually only gone 3-4 days at a stretch, unless I'm traveling oversees.

At any rate, I'm investigating some options to handle any major issues while I'm out of town. Any suggestions?

Hi Lisa:

I was in the same spot you're in regarding how to estimate rehab costs. Fortunately I was able to locate two different realtors who had several years of experience rehabbing/flipping/renting homes. I use them as my realtor when I want to go look at a potential property and they are generally able to provide me with their opinion on a "ball park" rehab cost.

Deal 1

HUD Property
Listed at 18K
Offered 15K Accepted
Needs 5K in rehad
Hold and rent at $550/Mo

Deal Two
Wells Fargo
Originally Listed at 38K
On Market 30 days dropped to 32.7K
Offered 22K
Counterd at 30K
I countered at 25K
They countered back at 27K I accepted.
Needs about 2K in rehab
Hold and rent for $750/mo.

I'm seeing this tactic here in Ohio as well.

Recently put a bid in on a home 3/1 SFR that was priced crazy low at $13K. The house ened up selling for 68K.

Thanks for the analysis Jon, much appreciated.

I am however very adverse to financing anything (I don't even own a credit card). I do recognize I could probably grow the business more quickly using leverage but I just don't have the appetite to go down that path.

Greetings everyone!

My name is Joe Marshall and I just got started in real estate investing late last year. I have however been very interested in real estate for many years.

My current "full time" job has me traveling quite a bit all over the world and as glamorous as that may sound it's really no fun when what you really want to do is to be able to go to your kids soccer game.

I may be a bit "unconventional" in my real estate investing plan as I live by what some may consider "unorthodox" standards. My wife and I are completely debt free and my real estate investing business will function debt free as well. Certainly I understand leverage and how it works but I'll strive never to leverage any deal.

I have my first two deals under contract presently (both all cash deals). My long term goal is to acquire 2-3 property's per year for the next five years. At year five I'll do an analysis to determine if I want to go bigger, stay as is or wind the business down.

You can check out my website at [LINK REMOVED].

Joe

Hey guys here are my first two deals that are set to close at the end of this month.

Deal 1: HUD property (2/1 SFR) purchased for $14K. Rehab estimate is $7.5K. Should rent for $550/mo. Home sold in 2006 for $49K.

Deal 2: REO (3bed 3 full bath) purchased for $27K. Rehab cost is about $1,500 (seriously only needs paint and maybe carpet). Should rent for $750/mo. Comps in the area put the house value around $70K.

I'm closing both deals with cash. I feel like I got a really good deal on both of them. I had home inspections done on both of them as well as pest inspections just for my own peace of mind and neither turned up any surprises.

So did I get a good deal?