All Forum Posts by: Oskar Czeladko

@Jonathan Camacho

I am in a similar situation (San Diego, VA loan, looking to buy my first property) and there are some insights that may be of use after looking for a home for about a year and a half.

1. Renting at the moment is cheaper almost everywhere than buying. Due to the unique situation at the moment of high rates and high prices, jumping into a property may be significantly more expensive. As many landlords have locked in comparatively lower rates to those of today, thus their costs are much lower so the threshold for profit is lower. Meaning that even with profits from renting considered they can offer rents that are lower then mortgage at the current rate levels.

2. Inventory: Since many folks refinanced at extremely low rates rarely anyone is willing to sell at the moment as they would have to repurchase at much higher rates, lowering the inventory causing prices to maintain high. Therefore once rates lower it may cause some small growth in price due to folk being able to afford more, however we will likely see a return to somewhat normal inventory levels driving prices down.

3. Loans: Since the structure of amortization has one paying significantly more interest at the start than principal (within the ratio of payments) at the start many loan types seldom give you any equity in the first couple of years. Therefore, you do not really own much of the property you are paying for at the start of the mortgage. Thus, it may pay off to wait for more favorable pricing situation, as you do not have much ownership anyways.

4. Inventory Timeline: Since when buying you are competing real time with several offers at the same time, buying a property can be significantly faster than that of selling. This is due to many sellers listing a property and waiting for an attractive offer, sometimes waiting for months until one comes along they are willing to accept. As a result, price increases are faster than price decreases.

Overall, I am seeing that it may be best to sit on the sidelines for a bit until inventory increases and concurrently rates slowly decrease. We are seeing slow inventory growth at the moment and when conditions are more acceptable for sellers, they will begin to liquidate. As a result I think that there will be more affordability in the coming months. We are also seeing consumer debt growing quickly (likely due to increases in cost of living) and increases in foreclosures at the moment, potentially leading to another source of inventory growth. 

P.S. Please keep me in the loop on what you are seeing. We have similar situations and some more insights may be beneficial.

Good afternoon,

I would say that age does not really matter in terms of if a child will be able to understand the message. As I have seen 8 year olds that are not able to read and those that can read at a middle school level through a tutoring side business I had in college. It really depends on if they can firstly understand words and thereafter if they can understand the message.

An experiment you can do is the Marshmallow Experiment. In which you offer a single marshmallow or two marshmallows in 5 minutes. In doing so you can grasp a child's maturity in for strategic thinking, thus understanding if they are ready for a business lessons.

Oddly enough I first started understanding business through Roblox tycoons games and monopoly. The premise of them allows one to see how a business expands and the competitors alongside them. Through several playthroughs of monopoly one can show differing strategies and the realities of losses. 

Overall, nowadays with the iPad generation of children it seems that books may not be stimulating enough. Therefore, one might need to use more engaging tools and afterwords delve into books. Even adults nowadays seldom can stay focused during reading, therefore it may be difficult to capture a child's attention and focus with mature books. 

Good morning,

Thank you for all the responses, I now see that there are several creative ways that can be exercised for getting a yes from a seller. 

I really appreciate the engagement!

@Michael Dumler I am running in to the issue of many of the properties that I am interested in being tenant occupied. I cannot inspect them until there is permission from the tenant. Therefore, that contingency would need to be in place as to mitigate risk.

@Carlos Ptriawan It seems like this arrangement would be outside of a formal offer. Could one just add this as a offer extension?

@Michael Dumler I agree with the waiving of contingencies, as they make it much easier on the seller to sell. I had minimized all the contingencies and submitted a high earnest deposit. Though I am not willing to waive the inspection since I am looking for a property that needs significant renovation. It would be far to risky for me to write a blind offer with no protections, since I am a first time buyer. 

I am projecting an economic downturn from my personal research due to the high interest rates that impact businesses. Since business loans tend to be variable and much borrowing occurred during COVID and the low rate aftermath with terms spanning several years, many businesses are now stuck paying much higher interest. We are already seeing hiring freezes and layoffs, along with job creation metrics that are below expectations. On top of that, decreased consumer spending exemplified by Black Friday is showing that folks are saving money for essentials. It seems as though most people are somewhat already subconsciously in gradual downturn mode.

@Steve Meyers I had tried that as well and I made sure that the offer was quick and fully underwritten. After the offer, it seems like one can refinance with any other organization as to possibly get better loan terms.

@Carlos Ptriawan Thank you for that strategy, that is some outside of the box thinking. Would the same apply for a hotel stay or whatnot?

Good evening,

I was trying to buy with traditional loan, however I was undercut with a cash offer at less than the list price that I was offering. The cash purchase will give you an upperhand when competing with other buyers. With the housing prices at the high prices at the moment and the high rates, it might be better to just accumulate more cash for the purchase. Unless the rates drop back down in the near future it might seem cash would be the only way to realistically be able to make a positive return monthly.  

Good evening,

I had made a post earlier about the prospect of getting a list of SFH that are not on the MLS. Unfortunately, I have had no luck on being able to locate anything that is not cash only. I am in the San Diego area and the housing market is notoriously expensive here.

With housing prices that are quite high at the moment, is there a way that one can make a traditional loan in a manner that would be appealing to a seller as compared to cash? I have heard that it may not make a difference since the seller will still be getting the value of the loan amount from the bank. 

Is there anything that would potentially make an offer look more appealing? Also it seems the economy might be heading to a downturn, does anyone have any insight on that?

Thank you! Hope your holidays are going well so far!