All Forum Posts by: Michael Marrero

Hey everyone,

Anyone have any tips (or even a referral) on finding a good attorney that understand the business of investing in RE?

I am working on starting a business venture with a partner centered around RE investing and every attorney we’ve spoken to doesn’t seem to understand our goals. They all seem to be feeding us high level general info and no real specifics on structuring the business entities in the best manner possible for our goals.

I know the best method is a referral from someone you know doing what you would like to be doing, except, I don’t know anyone that falls into that category. So I’m turning to the internet!

Thanks in advance.

@Steven Ocampo . I am also from NY and looking in Philadelphia right now. I would say your best bet right now is to continue to learn as much as you can about how the deals get structured when it comes to financing as well as what you should be looking for in regards to estimating rehab costs and ARV etc. You are going to want to make relationships with some local contractors as well as a realtor. For financing you are going to need to bring more to the table when working with a HML or using a commercial loan. You will likely need 20-25% of the purchase price upfront, plus closing costs, plus your first construction draw (the money paid to the contractor to get the work started), plus you should have your debt service covered. What this all means even if you picked up that house for 350k, your down payment will likely be around 70k, plus another 10k or so in closing costs/fees, plus another 5-10k for construction draw, plus some debt service/reserves. So you should liekly have 100k+ on hand to do that deal. You can find a private lender to fund that portion and use two loans, but as a beginner I would focus on saving up some more funds and learning as much as you can about the local market and real estate investing in general. Good Luck!

@Mario Gonzalez same boat... started looking in Philly a few ago for the same reason. North NJ is so difficult because of the high taxes.

@Alex Uman absolutely, not giving up.

@Alex Uman My partner and I have been looking a lot into those areas but have yet to find anything that the numbers work. Perhaps we’re being to conservative 🤷🏻‍♂️. Taking another trip out there next weekend to learn the areas a bit more. It’s so block to block all over the city it’s hard to nail down ARVs

@Matsa Sundara

Thanks for the recommendation. I’m coming from nyc so it’s tough with scheduling. Most seem to be virtual with the current events so that’s helpful.

@Matsa Sundara

Great story! Currently shopping the philly market and finding a contractor is certainly Tough! Any recommendations for REI meetups?

Following. Just came down to philly last weekend to start touring areas/properties. Plan on making the trip some more with my partner 

Looking for GC contacts in the Philadelphia area for full rehabs

Anyone have General contractor referrals in Philadelphia for gut rehab.