All Forum Posts by: Michael Ramos

Hi @Trina P. ,  I hear ya on the rent side. I was never a big fan of renting either. I don't know much about seller financing in the area. You'd be surprised on the types of loan programs out there that might meet your needs. We were able to save for a small down payment for a condo in Placentia. We later sold and bought a bigger house in YL from the equity built from our condo (similar to @Kiersten Vance 's example). But the market was a whole lot different back in 2012 when we first purchased. Looking back I may have kept it, refinanced and rented it out but I didn't know anything about REI at the time. Best of luck!

Wow... congratulations on these projects and beautiful work! Very clean and crisp designs. Looking forward to your future success stories. 

@Jacqueline Coombs: 
Here is some legalities education on the topic if you're using conventional financing (directly from fanniemae). You may qualify for the delayed financing if you paid with for property with cash and you want to refi prior to 6 months. Good luck!
https://www.fanniemae.com/content/guide/selling/b2...

Question to those using HELOCs: I'm wondering how HELOC usage effects your overall credit score if balances are shooting up and being paid off within a short time period, over and over again. Has anyone experienced negative effects to your overall credit with this type usage if it's tied to you personally?

First off, sorry to "troll" on your post @Chris Porter. Shame on me for doing that. But welcome to BP! I'm on a learning path as well. I was leaning towards flipping initiallly as well but realized I wanted to be a bit more semi-passive based with my approach considering my situation. In my opinion, the more you act the more you start to find clear paths based on your goals and situation. 

@James Letchford- thanks for the clear responses and advice! That all makes perfect sense. I also came across a delayed financing method which may not require seasoning period but I believe you need all cash for purchase and rehab based on my initial research. There are some other restrictions as well. And yes, please keep me posted on how it works out for you. I'll send you a PM. 

@James Letchford - I'm looking into BRRRR strategy myself. I have a few questions regarding this strategy.

1. Do you hold the property under your name or LLC before the refi?
2. Do you hold the property under your name or LLC after the refi?
3. Why wait 6-8 mo....Does your lender require this seasoning period?
4. Have you ever been denied a refi on your property after reno, if so why?

@Andrey Y., @David Faulkner.  Got it and I hate speculating but one just can't ignore the market when starting out! If I put all my eggs in one basket in a SF or MF and the market dips next year, where does that leave me? How can I scale from here? It took around 7-8 years to get back to these levels and I'm probably just close to breaking even with the property.  Maybe another reason why I'm noticing many flippers in the market.   

@David Faulkner, Im new to this as well and curious why you advise new investors to always look in state for buy/hold at this point in the market. We are well beyond 2008 sales prices and many are foreseeing a correction on the horizon. I admit that I benefitted well with appreciation but that was 2012 and this is now. What's your "secret" CA buy-hold advice? I'm sure you're not playing for standard COC returns at this point.

I'm not from NC but you won't know until you test it. I doubt someone that's successful will tell what's working from them. They are your competition! It's up to you to continually optimize your campaigns. Always keep an eye of leads/conversions as that'll give you a frame work to eliminate or down bid on keywords that aren't bringing in the relevant traffic/leads to maximize your ROI. Also don't forget to evaluate your search terms and add keywords to your negative keyword lists. Those are just a few tips but a simple google search or youtube search might help provide more detail.

@Peter Amour, @Aaron H., Realty Mogul, Groundfloor are a few others I don't believe you don't have to be accredited to get started. You won't get all the benefits as owning a physical asset but something worth looking into if you just want to beat the stock market.