All Forum Posts by: Marilyn A.

I got a call today from one of the park owners I sent a letter to yesterday. He asked me if I was trying to do Lonnie Deals and what was my operation like. I was honest with him, but it was embarassing to admit that I'm looking for my first home.
He told me that it was going to be virtually impossible to find something for $2000. And he didn't have anything to sell me.
He did say there was good money in doing Lonnie Deals.

yeah, Terry, I agree with Rachel. It's only been a short while ago you were doing your first deal. Now you're practically an expert. It was neat how you were willing to share it all with us. I probably won't tell about my first deal til it's over and sold! I may not tell about it then, might be embarrassing. :D
But seriously, I haven't found anything remotely close to $1000 or $1500. That's looking in all the papers, Craigslist, variouis online sites, and my own ad.
But I'm about to get to work looking in the parks. They're just not very close to me, so I have to drive about 45 minutes to go to them, plus I have my 2 kids with me. But I will muddle through anyway. I sent out 12 letters to parks today. Don't know if letters work or not, but seems like it's worth a try.
I've got pages and pages of more parks to work on. I'm starting with the closest ones.
I have 2 homes to go see in parks tomorrow that were advertised. One is for sale by the park for $3500 and one by individual for $5000.

So should I be expecting to make many offers and just a few of them be accepted? Or do you get a lot of acceptances?

Thanks for the input, Rachel. I AM learning so much by going out and actually seeing the homes and talking to the owners. I'm hoping that the more owners I talk to, the better I'll get at it, and lose some of the shyness about making offers. :D
I'm amazed at some of the homes I've seen, though. The owners are trying to sell them while they're packed with clutter or dirty, like they put no effort in trying to get them ready to sell at all. I suppose that's good for me, though. It might scare off the other buyers.

Ha Ha, Terry! That's the thing, I don't know what to offer. I usually have one thing in mind before I go, then when I see it, I feel uncertain, since I see all the repairs it needs. So then I feel like I need to go home and mull it over. But then it's scary to make an offer later. It does seem like it would be easier to make the offer on the spot.

Thank you, Jonathan. I hadn't thought about that.
It seems like it would be similar to the repossion process for cars. They can go on private property to retrieve cars, can't they? Obviously, I would need to get some legal advice before I did a deal like that.
That will be a big issue investing in my town, since there are only a couple of tiny parks. Almost all the MHs are on land. I may need to focus on the larger towns nearby that have more parks.
After giving it more thought, I've decided this would be too big a project for me to tackle right now, or maybe ever. Will keep looking for a simple deal that doesn't require moving.

Maybe this isn't something I should even consider, since I haven't even done a deal at all yet, but would love opinions. Plus I have only $2000 to work with.

I had my first ad come out in the local paper (I live in a very small town about 40 miles from Houston) Tuesday. I've been contacted by three people so far.

One of them was a man wanting to sell his 95 16 x 76 with 3 BR 2BA for $10,000 and it has to be moved. Not too great, I know. But I went out to see it anyway. it was okay, but does need some work. I didn't make an offer, since I had no idea how much I should offer, plus I only have the aforementioned $2,000.

A couple hours after I got home, I got a call from a lady wanting to know if I would be interested in taking her 2 BR MH as a down payment on a newer 3 BR MH. I told her I would be interested, but that I don't have a 3 BR at the moment. But I had just looked at one that she might like. She wants to put the new home on the land she owns (where rhe old home is). Both of these homes are in the same tiny town right next to my town.

So, I was thinking maybe I could sell her home with the buyer paying to move it themselves. I could then use that money to buy the 3 BR and have it moved to her land. I would then mark up the 3 BR quite a bit and take my profit in payments. She said she wanted to keep her payments under $500. Yeah, I think I could manage that.

Maybe that's too complicated for me to pull off. What do you think? And of course, it depends on whether her home is decent or a piece of crud. I'm going to see it tomorrow.

Marc,
What type/age/conditon home are you getting for 4-5k? I would be interested to compare it to what seems to be available around here.

Thanks!

Thank you for the good answers. I need all the help I can get!
Actually making an offer is making me nervous. I've only made one so far and it wasn't so bad.

I was wondering how you go about making your offers. What I mean is, when you first go out to see a home, do you make an offer on the spot? Or do you go home and think about it and call them back with an offer?
Do you ever make offers on the phone or strictly in person?
Do you mention on the phone or by email when you're setting up your appointment that you're an investor and your offer may be low?
Would love to hear any words of wisdom on this as I'm considering making several offers this weekend. Well, I mean I have several homes I'm considering making offers on. If one is accepted, I will probably finish that deal before making more offers, since I have a very small amount of cash.