All Forum Posts by: Mike Jury

@Paul Winka

Thank you for your service.  

One bit of advice, though you didn't ask for it, is take a little time to decompress and get used to the civilian world.  After hiring a bunch of career military guys, we found they adapted to our culture about a year to a year and 1/2 after they left the service.  So unless you are going to get into a military type environment, you might want some time for acclimation.

Now you are a an interesting position, but the outcome of your next decision is driven by several factors I think are important.  1st, what is your big reason for investing in real estate?  What are you ultimately trying to accomplish? Is it to create passive or active income, create a life style, or create wealth?  As I see it flipping houses is one method to get there.  So where is there?

After answering those questions, I think you can tackle the others like location etc,

There are lots of great markets, so go visit your top their selections and then make a decision.  For example, Texas is not one market, there are DFW, Houston, Austin, San Antonio, El Paso and on and on.  Florida and TN are the same way, 

Hope this helps some in your thought process

@James Wise

Congratulations on writing 10K posts.  I don't think I have read 10K in posts since asking that question.  

Well to be consistent what are your restated goals, and for which milestones.

Oh and congrats on all the other accomplishments!

Being a Texan, I wish you all would keep the people in California.  Not that Texas is hostile to people migrating from other states.  And we welcome a lot of corporate headquarters from other states.  Its just that after moving to this great state, people start trying to change Texas to be like "home".  And quite frankly Texas doesn't need changing. 

Just refinish the hardwood

@Ben Leybovich

Great topic, and great discussion!

I would start out by saying, as you have so eloquently stated "Buyer Beware." Whether it is a university degree or a GURU course, either can be exceedingly valuable or a waste of time and money. The first thing a buyer has to determine is what is the purpose for making the investment. Some have discussed becoming a well rounded person, gaining critical problem solving and thinking skills, other suggest it is to get a better job or be successful. So why are you going to make the investment. So for each of these “goals” what is the best investment to achieve your stated goal. It might be a college education, it might be a technical education, it might be a guru seminar or it might be something else. Just like in Real Estate there is no one correct answer for everyone. Any of these investments should be about exchanging money for time. As a buyer you should be willing to spend money to shorten the experiential curve of learning, whether that be a technical skill, knowledge or relationship.

The challenge in my mind is the lack of critical thinking by the buyer before investing. Most of us did not have the opportunity to step back and evaluate some of the choices we were going to make because of advertising, parental pressure, social pressure, or other demands. So for most of us we were funneled down a tract for college, no matter what. And if you want to go to work for a business, it might not be a bad decision. On the other hand, not everyone is cut out of the cloth of being a good employee. Since we are on BP, a number of us are probably not good employees.

The piece we leave out of this discussion is the personal ambition of the buyer. There are those with no formal education, training or "advantage" that will be successful in their chosen endeavor, regardless of circumstances. Then there are those with all education, training and advantage that will never succeed in any endeavor, as they sit on the couch expecting someone to hand them success.

I see all of the things we are discussing as product offerings, colleges, trade schools, seminars, guru courses, web sites (paid and unpaid). The questions for everyone to answer individually are; will this product offering move me closer to my goals, is it worth the price for the value, will it shorten my learning cycle. If the answers are yes go for it, if no. don’t. 

"The only thing that likes change is a wet baby"

That said, I like the new forum layout, on my computer, haven't played on the cell phone (I guess the correct term is mobile device) yet.  

Part of the difficulty in reading for me is the color contrast, the bright white background makes reading the posts a little tougher.  On the other extreme the contrast on the tool bar is much too subtle.  Gray on gray for us partially colorblind folks is tough.  And yes I have played with the contrast on my monitor. 

So keep tweaking the stuff and keep us informed.  Thanks for all the hard work.

Congratulations

Taking action is the answer, and you proved it!

For all of those out of Texas, just a bit of information about foundations.  All most all houses have some sort of foundation problem, from a little to a lot.  The pictures above are in the middle of the range.  Texas has a unique feature (one among many) called expansive soil.  The nature of our landscape is as the moisture changes the soil expands and contracts, thus playing havoc with foundations, whether they are slabs or pier and beam.  We don't have basements because of this soil condition.  The only subterranean structures are built to industrial standards.   

 If you google foundation repair companies in San Antonio or Dallas you will get pages and pages of companies. 

Just one of those unique issues to investing in Texas.

 Yup

First in this price range.  What an adventure!

Yup

Happy Birthday