All Forum Posts by: Abraham Anderson

I'm trying my best to respond to all the questions here, if I missed yours, feel free to message me and I will get back to you ASAP. Thank you all for the feedback!

I went through the last 3 pages & tried to answer all the questions, here we go:

@Cole Burroughs It was a combination of a few things: 1. High income 2. Assets (cash and equity) 3. Good credit (720+ at the time) 4. A good deal

@Faye Omar I put 10% down in cash and 10% down in the form of a lien on an office building I own.

@Mindy Zimmerman Exactly :) I'm not trying to impress anyone. I could probably survive on $1K/month; I have very low expenses & as long as I have ramen noddles & wifi, I'm happy, but $3K is nicer than $1K ;).

@Richard Coyne Loan amount was $1.17M. My down payment was 10% cash & a lien on a $180K office building I own. Loan terms were 25 year amortization, 7 year term, 4.99% interest.

@David Thomas having no social life was one of the keys in my situation, but unless you are naturally introverted like myself, it can be tough to do without social interactions.

@Ryan Johnston I've never had a W2 job, I've always been on straight commission & I love it, your income is based on how hard/smart you work.

@Dave Lee Thank you Dave, though my income wasn't that high (yet!). I have earned between $100-200K since I started selling back in 2013.

@David Markey I sell health & life & focus on the Medicare market (65+). Insurance is just as massive as real estate in terms of variety, so it makes sense to specialize.

@Nathan Ackerman Thanks Nathan! I have clients in Oak Ridge :).

@Scott B. I was shooting for owner financing, but on this particular deal, the owner did not agree; it was OK in the end because the deal still made sense without it.

@Brian Danielson I got it at an 8.29% cap rate, which is good for my market. It was turnkey and 19/20 units were rented. The previous owner has not raised the rents in many years, so that is going to be a big value add; as an example, the only vacant unit was just rented out for $150 more than it was previously.

@Angel Gutierrez Thank you for this advice! One of my goals is 100 units total. I did end up hiring a PM to manage these. I did this so I can go back to focusing 100% on insurance and staying on the lookout for the next deal.

@Lurline Henriques You're welcome! Feel free to message me on here.

@Tim Sabo Initially I planned on self-managing, but I ended up hiring a PM on a 6 month agreement, hopefully they will work out. I did this so I can focus on insurance, and also to avoid the tenants-from-hell that you described ;). I will definitely post an update in a few years.

@Chuck McEvoy in my analysis of the property, I factored in a 3% vacany. My county is at 99% occupancy and nothing stays vacant for more than 1-2 weeks max.

 Hi Doug, I'm trying to answer all the questions that are posted, which ones did I miss?

Thanks everyone for the well wishes, have a great weekend.

Thank you for the kind words. Whenever I approached a lender, I used a "credibility book" (I got the idea from the book Wheelbarrow Profits). In it I had a copy of the paid off loan statement from the town homes I sold last year, I had a copy of my tax returns, a copy of sales awards from insurance companies, a bank statement showing the down payment, a financial analysis of the property I was looking at & my business plan for increasing the NOI. I went to 4 banks, the first two wanted a co-signer, the next 2 of them were interested and I ultimately got a pre-approval letter from the one that offered the best terms. I then took that pre approval letter with me whenever I talked to a realtor and that showed them I was serious.

Another thing I did that I've heard is overlooked by some is, dress sharp & wear a tie. No matter who you are, no bank is going to give you a loan if you look like you just crawled out of bed.

Yes. Late 2014 for the town homes and late 2015 for the office building.

Someone posted one of the addresses earlier, it won't hurt my feelings if you look up the deed.

Between my trust fund, inheritance and parents getting me started, that comes to a grand total of: zero dollars and zero cents.

My first year in insurance, I earned over $100K. The second year it was closer to $200K, and it's been between $100-200K the past four years. When I was 18 I put down 56K for the land, and I got a construction loan for the material & labor on the town homes. I purchased the office building in 2015 for less than it's worth now, and a combination of improvements and appreciation raises its value. Last year I sold the town homes, paying off the construction loan & with the remaining equity I used for my down payment on the 20 units, along with the equity in my office.

I earned 100% of what I own; I wasn't given any money, only knowledge from teachers and the internet, which I've applied. If you don't believe it, that's okay, I'll take it as a compliment.

 Thank you. I suppose you're correct in that the deal itself isn't very impressive, but what made it possible. 

The simple answer is, I learned a system for selling insurance that worked, and I did it over and over, improving my skills along the way. There's so much free information out there on what the most successful sales people do, there's no reason to reinvent the wheel, just learn what the best people in your field do, & do it over and over until you get the same results.

The 2nd part was being frugal & careful with my money. Both of those choices made it possible to save a large amount of capital in a short period of time.

With insurance & real estate, to me it's about listening, finding their problem & proposing an amicable solution. For insurance that translates to presenting the right policy to meet their specific needs, and with real estate it can be any number of things (the right purchase price, closing quickly, etc).

With both businesses, you have to be persistent & talk to lots of people in order to achieve success.

 I made a mistake here using the word "retired" as a synonym for "financially free". If you read the end of my original post, you'll see that I don't intend to stop selling insurance (or stop buying real estate, for that matter). Cheers