All Forum Posts by: Mariano Santana

These are all great opinions. I'm a Realtor and Real Estate Investor here in AZ. I, too, plan to invest in upcoming cities like Casa Grande and Coolidge, maybe even Florence. I wish I had invested sooner in Casa Grande. Lots of new companies and jobs opening up there over the last few years and upcoming as well. @Matthew Koller , if you're currently not working with a Realtor here, please connect with me and we can chat about setting you up for a search on the MLS or some mailers for off-market opportunities. :) Either way, I wish you the best on your move to Arizona!

Minna, you are correct in that reverse mortgages are backed by HUD. However, I'm not sure what you mean by "you must meet 95% of appraised value". As heirs, we were informed we could either pay 95% of the appraised value, if that value is lower than the mortgage balance. As non-heir individuals (investors), we could take the short sale route (with the mortgage borrower's agreement to buy the home from them) and submit a payoff offer to the mortgage lender (obviously lower than the mortgage balance), who would then send it to HUD for approval, if it's within their "allowable limits" for a short sale. There's way more to our experience, but I'm working on the recap so I include everything.

If anyone comes across a deal/opportunity where the homeowner has a reverse mortgage on the home, I might be able to help answer questions or point you in the right direction. It could be anywhere in the U.S. and it takes a similar path as a short sale, but can be done "off-market".  I just went through this process and we’re getting an awesome value-add deal. Recap of how our experience took place is in the works.

@Olivia Radziszewski  Thank you! Wishing you best of luck on your first deal! 

Investment Info:

Single-family residence buy & hold investment in Merced.

Purchase price: $67,000

Our first deal. Rehabbed and added full bathroom making it a 3-bd/3-ba. Used for house hacking and Airbnb.

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

This deal was too good to pass up and we wanted to get our feet wet in real estate investing. It was the perfect property for long-term buy and hold, plus we had good insight that it would appreciate and cash flow well.

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

Found it on the MLS. Negotiated the deal with the help of our Realtor.

How did you finance this deal?

Conventional financing.

How did you add value to the deal?

Rehabbed it and added a full bathroom later down the road.

What was the outcome?

Have used it for house hacking and Airbnb. Also, pulled equity from it to finance another deal.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

Great learning opportunity on financing as well as rehabbing. No major challenges.

Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

Yes, investor-friendly Realtor, Sarah Rodriguez. Highly recommend her. Message me for her contact info or look her up on Century21.

Hello! Please keep me posted on the next meetup. My investor partner lives in Merced so he can attend in person.  We're looking to network with other investors as well as build a team there to add more investment rentals to our portfolio.  We already have an investor-friendly Realtor in the area. Anyone know or have contact info for wholesalers in and around Merced?  Thanks! 

Hi Shiloh, if I can’t make it to the event in person, how can I watch via Zoom? Will you be sending out a link? 

@Philip Claessens Welcome and good luck to you! I'm also still new to REI and I have one cash-flowing buy & hold rental property in central California. I'm on the hunt for a couple more this year.

@Wayne Yahnke I purchased a rental property in CA (central valley) about 14 months ago with a cash out refi from another property in CA. There was already a tenant in the home so there weren't any upfront rehab costs and I was cash flowing approximately $100 monthly, even with including the cash-out refi loan, insurance and taxes. However, when the tenant moved out 8 months later, I had quite a bit of clean up and rehab work which ate into pretty much all my cash-flow savings.  The silver lining was after the rehab and some rent comparisons, I was able to get a new tenant within about 6 week's time at a significantly higher rent and now I'm cash flowing about 5x as much as before. Also, the purchase price of the investment home was such a good deal, the property already has approximately $60K in equity (according to Zillow's Zestimate :)). Now I'm looking to do another cash-out refi from that investment property to purchase another investment property in the same area. Not sure what part of CA you're in or where you're looking to make a purchase, but there are still some hidden gems in there. Good luck!