All Forum Posts by: Patrick Bartlett

In my market I believe that the short term effects wont be much. Long term I think will be interesting to see. My thought is if you tell a seller "I can list your home for X% and half of that goes to whomever brings a buyer" and they say I wont pay a buyer agent, my response will be "that's fine, I am still charging you the same, but expect your home to sit on the market longer." It comes down to how agents explain it to sellers and buyers. To the seller - Do you want one person shopping for your buyer or do you want thousands of agents looking for a buyer. If just one than I have to do more than twice the work, and have twice the liability so I wont lower my fee. To the buyer- We always attempt to have the seller pay our commission and I have yet to have a buyer have to pay me. In the event that a seller is not willing to offer a compensation to a buyers agent, we can not look at that home, we can ask for closing costs to cover my fee etc.. 

I do anticipate that there will be buyers that ghost their agents because of this, and I will be guarding my time more carefully now. My sellers that I have spoken with regarding this have opted to continue to advertise a BAC. If / when it becomes common for sellers to not pay then buyers will be bent over the barrel and I foresee more lawsuits regarding representation or implied agency ahead.  

Hey there Michael! I am also located in Longview. I am a Realtor® with Summers Cook & Co. Good for you for starting so young! Keep pushing and keep saving and you will definitely get there. 

Getting a good property off the MLS to flip has been difficult, we are wrapping up a flip now, it is under contract and closes next month, but it wasn't listed when we bought it. Hopefully that starts to change with the market slowing down, but the best piece of advice I can give you is talk with as many people as you can.

Outside of that I am down to 1 rental and am starting to look for more, as well as different strategies.

Good luck on your journey and feel free to reach out if you have any questions or want to grab a bite to eat. 

Has anyone ever used The Cabinet Door Store  cabinetdoor.store for replacement doors and drawer fronts? Their website seems decent and their prices seem good but I am having trouble finding reviews on them. They have good reviews on cusrev.com but I haven't seen that site before and that is the only one I can find The Cabinet Door Store on. I am having a hard time with local cabinet makers coming out.

Thanks!

Welcome and hello! I am also a Realtor in Longview. 

Thanks! We just closed on our first flip today and I had forgot about this.  

Is this still up to date?

Thank you for the info!

Hi Marcus. Are you using a TREC contract or did you find an off market property? I would get an inspection done if you don't know what you are looking at. An inspection is not fool proof, they don't go deep into anything but they touch everything. If you don't have experience in rehabbing a home I would also bring the contractor you intend to use over to take a look at it and let give you an idea of what it is going to cost. Even if you don't have an option period I would do this, I would rather lose a couple grand by breaking the contract than possibly 10's of thousands by purchasing a money pit. If you do not have a good idea of the ARV than I would reach out to a local Realtor so that they can give you an idea of what you should do and what the value will be on once you are done.

Congrats on the first step. The first is the hardest.

You can get a big boost by being added as an authorized user to someone's credit card, so long as that account is old and has a good history. There are loan programs that you can get into with zero down or conventional can go as low as 5% down. Locally our zero down programs don't come with PMI so that is the route I would go if putting little down is a priority for you. If I had to do it over again I would look for a duplex so that I could rent one side out and maybe even get a roommate.

Interesting thread. I was speaking with an atty of a local title company about tax deed properties the other week. This is what he told me - not my opinion or knowledge.  He only knows of 1 company that will issue a title policy on a property acquired from a tax sale and their requirements are that it be held for 4 years, regardless of redemption period. You will need a title policy if you mortgage the property. His opinion was that you really don't know if the 1 company that offers the needed product will have changed its policies within that time frame so good luck. I was discussing this with him because a client had a property that he purchased from a tax sale and he wanted to unload it. The lawyer basically said that if he wants to sell it than it needs to be either a cash transaction or owner financed. Seems strange to me that there wouldnt be a way around this or that it would be so difficult to unload but... 

Are they common in your area? Will it comp to a normal house? Will you finish it out yourself or have it contracted out? From the research I did on them having them built isn't much cheaper than having a house built. I seen you said that your family puts the structures up so you may have some savings there. I would just make sure you run the numbers and have an accurate ARV in mind. You may think about reaching out to a local Realtor and seeing what to expect in your local market.