All Forum Posts by: Mike B.

Drew Heilig I'm glad you asked this question because it's something I have been wondering about myself. I feel like as a newbie looking for a steal I must be my RE agent's worst nightmare. My RE agent has already written 7 offers for me, used a ton of time and gas to show me 15 different cheap dumps, answered a bunch of my dumb questions, and he hasn't earned a dime. He's been very nice the whole time and hasn't complained once. He's known from the start that I'm a clueless first time home buyer and that I'm looking for a cheap house to rehab, but I still feel bad for the guy.

My advice would just be to communicate up front what your intentions are and make it clear that you're an investor so the RE agent will have a good idea of what kind of client they are taking on. I hope someone will correct me if I'm wrong but maybe making it clear what kind of expectations you have to the agent can save a lot of time and prevent future resentment.

Thanks guys, I really appreciate all the advice.

To update, I'm getting a little discouraged because I can't seem to get an offer accepted (out of 7 offers only) or even a counter offer from the banks. I'm not sure if people are overpaying for the ones I'm bidding on or if I'm making mistakes estimating ARV, or trying to make too much profit.

Most of my offers are in multiple bid situations and I haven't been able to win one yet. The last REO I bid on I was a 3bd/1.5ba ranch with a list price of $56K. I found 12 good comps for it and came up with an ARV of $109K. It needed a ton of work, but nothing major that I couldn't do myself. I estimated rehab costs of $23K, not including unforeseen costs. So I had my RE agent offer $65K cash and no inspection contingency. Seem reasonable? In retrospect I'm thinking that I should've offered $6,500 EM instead of $1K, and also maybe I should've not used my RE agent and gone directly to the listing agent. This learning curve is getting expensive lol.

I just get paranoid that I'm making bad mistakes when I offer 15% over list price, cash, and no inspection, and still don't get accepted. I'm thinking that maybe some of my competitors have strong relationships with the listing agents and asset managers and will always be able to win these multiple bid situations unless I'm willing to overpay. But it's still very early in the game I guess.

You must've missed my first post in this thread. I'm arguing, along with many others on the left, that we protect ourselves from the bad guys by banning guns.

I'm sorry about your uncle. What about using a taser or rubber bullets to protect your home instead of a lethal weapon?

Your sample size is ridiculously low. Can't we use tasers or rubber bullets or 911 or security systems, etc. to defend our homes and businesses from burglars instead of lethal weapons?

I'm not sure how to go about enforcing a ban, but I think a good start would be to make it illegal to produce rounds and have harsher penalties for anyone caught possessing a gun. Maybe also provide cash incentives to anyone who turns in guns (stimulus ftw). There's lots of possibilities, and I'm sure if we think hard enough about it we can figure it out and see a lot less gun violence along the way.

Karen M. you're just repeating yourself. I understand your concerns about citizens fighting the governmental army with our guns, but I disagree with the plausibility of some of your statements. In order for us to productively continue the discussion I need you or someone to explain to me how to fight a government that can blow up the world with the push of a button.

The line is a zero round magazine. It only takes one round to cause serious damage to others, even death sometimes.

That's my point Karen M. Times have changed and protecting ourselves from the government isn't plausible anymore now that we have all the weapons technology. The US government can use drones to destroy the entire planet 7 times with nuclear weapons. We don't stand a chance against the government even if all 350 million of us are carrying machine guns (and motivated to kill).

I guess he could've bought a ticket and propped the door open before getting into his gear. He seemed to have planned this carefully.

Edit: Bill replies much quicker (and better) than me :)

This makes a lot of sense to me.

And Mark is right, the only way to keep guns out of the hands of unstable people is to outlaw them completely (with a few exceptions, of course). That seems like the best solution to me because there's really very few reasons for people to own guns (especially cops who basically have a license to kill) and a ton of reasons to outlaw them.