All Forum Posts by: Richard Low

Welcome to BP! I'm in pretty much the same spot as you, learning to wholesale in order to buy and hold long term. I warn you - if you do what Brandon Turner (I still dont know how to do that @name thing) suggests and turn on keywords, BP becomes more addictive and every time you open your inbox there's going to be 5-10 posts you want to read. The hot thread right now in wholesaling is 'Trying to Understand "Wholesaling."'

Hey Shawn, welcome to Phoenix. I'm also in the process of starting to wholesale here in the valley - and I think you're right, the market is pretty crowded. But there's always deals to be had if you're determined. Have you been to the AZREIA? I'm going to the one next monday night.

I just finished Marty Boardman's new book, "Fixing and Flipping Real Estate: Strategies for the Post-Boom Era." It was fantastic, everyone flipping on BP should pick it up.

Here's my Amazon Review (because I'm lazy):

"I found this book from Marty Boardman's articles on BiggerPockets.com. I enjoyed his stories, humor, and real world knowledge. If you're new to real estate, you should check out biggerpockets and Marty's blog. Some of his posts there are in this book, so it's a good way to know if you'll enjoy the book.

Marty breaks Rehabbing into four boxes, or categories: Acquisition, Rehab, Sales, and Raising Capital. Each of these categories has examples, stories, mistakes, and the nitty-gritty details you need to succeed in rehabbing. He doesn't hold anything back or try to sell you a $400 course or coaching seminar at the end like so many others in this industry.

I now feel confident that I understand the process and steps it takes to rehab a property in this post-boom market. To be honest it's a lot of hard work and this book takes the glamour out of it. If you're looking for the sexiness of fixing and flipping, stick to reality TV and keep telling yourself "that looks easy, I could do that." It's not, and this book helps you understand upfront exactly what you're getting yourself into."

It was a great read and now there's a Kindle edition for those of you with e-readers and iPads.

I didn't mean to cause a stir, but I'm glad I learned the rules! I updated my signature and I'll keep the deals in the marketplace.

Thanks Brandon, I love Marty's blog articles and I actually just bought his book. I'll have to see if I can find him some properties.

Thanks Brian, I will!

Hello Biggerpockets! I think forums are one of the best professional resources in the world, and I'm just grateful to learn through everyone's experience!

I'm a full time dental student in Phoenix, Arizona and I want to start learning real estate now. Since I'm obviously poor, my plan is to learn by wholesaling. I've knocked doors in sales positions before, and I'm not afraid to get out there and make things happen. My plan is to complete my first deal through obtaining a list of pre-forclosures and knocking until I find a deal. Then I've got to find some buyers and create a good list of investors. After the first deal or two I plan to invest the profits in marketing through yellow letters, a website, and google adwords. My goal is to have my first deal done by the end of February (I'll start in Jan) and to have 12 wholesaling deal in 2013.

Long term I want to buy-fix-hold 1-2 properties per year, not leveraging myself too much to minimize risk from market fluctuations. While I'm in Phoenix for now, the Army is paying for my schooling so I don't know where I'll be for the 4 years after school.

I'm looking forward to learning from you all, getting out there, and sharing what I find!

Hey everyone! I'm interested in coming to the next meeting. It sounds like the 2nd Tuesday schedule got derailed in Nov, are we skipping Dec and doing a reboot in Jan once the Holidays are over?

Thank you, Kyle J., for answering my logistics questions. And thank you Jon Holdman, Michael B., and Brian Hoyt for giving me the advice that I need to hear even if it's not what I want to hear.

I'm getting excited about real estate for the first time and I want to get in the game sooner than later. Most of my fellow dental students are going to be 300-400k in debt from student loans, not to mention another 300-600k for a practice and then a house. I'm on a real estate high because we're close to debt free and our first house has appreciated 50-60k in a year's time, and I think we might be able to get positive cash flow out of it (using the 50% rule) if we rent it.

I realize that we got lucky based on market timing, but now I'm motivated to actually learn the ins and outs of purchasing, renting, flipping, holding, etc. My wife and I managed a fourplex in undergrad for some out-of-state owners, so I know it can be done even though it's not easy.

So if I shouldn't buy while in the Army, what do you recommend? Just save with other investment vehicles and switch to real estate when I get out?

I know that there's a decent learning curve to doing real estate right, and I'd love to learn from personal experience over the next 6.5yrs (my commitment ends in 2019). Should I learn to flip or just start by birddogging/wholesaling? I'm too determined to make be successful at RE to sit around read biggerpockets for half a decade without doing anything about it.

I apologize if these questions have been answered elsewhere, I've read through pages of search results and can't find anything. This forum is a fantastic resource and I appreciate the time and experience of those who post here.

I'm in my second year of dental school in Arizona with the Army paying for it. My wife and I bought a house at the bottom of the market last year as our primary residence. When I'm done dental school, the Army will send me to an assignment for 4 years as a repayment for my schooling. At this point we have to decide if we're going to rent or sell our home and whether we should buy or rent at our first duty station. After four years in the Army I plan on getting out and starting my own practice, but we're not sure where.

My first few questions are logistical:

If we were to rent out our home while in the military, is the insurance the only change we need to make to our current mortgage?

Related to the first question, if we were to buy while in the Army, what would be the best way to finance? Since we'd be owner-occupants, could we qualify for another conventional loan as long as our DTI ratio is good? Or does renting out the first property disqualify us and make us resort to an investor mortgage? I think I'll be able to qualify for a VA loan as soon as I'm active duty.

To complicate things further, if we were to purchase a property with a rent-able basement or some other multi-unit situation where we were living in one unit, would this require different financing even though we were owner-occupants of part of the property?

I don't know if this helps, but our PITI is $755.32, our loan is for $125k and two comps down the street sold in the last two months for $180 and $190. When I'm a dentist for the Army I'll be making around 90k if I live off base. I also have about 15k in undergraduate student loans.

I've got more questions about whether or not renting is a good idea (applying the %50 rule to our property, etc.) or whether selling and using the cash to finance other properties would be better, but I think this isn't the right sub-forum for those questions.