All Forum Posts by: Ryder Meehan

A friend sent me a link to this new beta site for property analysis reports call HouseCanary.com.  I was a little skeptical since the market I'm currently investing in is a smaller town (Sherman, TX) and has less comps and robust sales data for most automated appraisals to work accurately.  For example, Zestimates are typically about 30% higher than what I would consider realistic.

Note: this review is only of their Value Report product: http://www.housecanary.com/product-value-report/

Upon visiting the site, it promotes $5 property reports and as cheap and skeptical as I am I was leery of letting go of that crisp Abe Lincoln I has been clutching in my hand but anxious to know if it could really be as good as the sample PDF report they offer was I gave it a go.

It required me to create an account and then much to my delight actually just gave me 10 free reports without ever entering any billing info!  This thing truly is in beta, there is actually no way to pay even if I wanted to - attempting to pay just lead you to a "please email us" page.

After creating my account I was prompted to enter the property address then I got a data preview with a link to "See Full Report" which then lead me to a robust report like the sample I had seen.  It was available in PDF and Excel formats for download as well which is nice.

The report gives a lot of comps and summarizes based on the comps.  

Here is their sample report: http://www.housecanary.com/assets/images/HouseCanary-Value_Report-SAMPLE.pdf

What I like:

- Attractive and easy to understand reports

- Market analysis is richer and more comprehensive than I have seen with any other tool or even been able to create in Excel myself

- 10 free reports is pretty damn generous, $5 for each report wouldn't be bad at all if I was seriously considering the property for purchase

- The "Nearby Properties" section of the report shows me how the sqft and lot size compare to others in the area, this is great so I know if my house is huge or tiny compared to average.  It also offers this for bedrooms/bathrooms but my county doesn't report that info so it's N/A.  Age of house is available too.

- Lots of cool ways to view the projected value of the property

What I dislike:

- Comps are too varied, I have a 2000 sqft house and it's included 600 sqft comps.  It also has some comps 3-4 years old.  I'd like some way to refine the variance of comps

- It would be nice to have links to see more data on each comp to see how similar or varied it truly is

- I'd like to see monthly plan, for those of us analyzing dozens of deals weekly it could get expensive fast but the $5/report a la carte price really isn't too bad.

Overall I'm quite impressed with the offering and value.  For my wholesaling business in Texas this is a great new tool in my tool belt with coming up with an offer price and marketing the deal to investors.

@Jay Hinrichs I couldn't agree more that a good broker can add tremendous value!  Most especially for the first-time buyer/seller and when entering new markets.

Now I buy directly from motivated sellers but still usually list with my broker when selling to get top dollar after renovation.  I love my broker and all good brokers!

Hope to see you there!

We are the only SF real estate investors group dedicated to out-of-state investing.  Find incredible cash-flow opportunities and affordable properties outside the inflated Bay Area!  This group is not sponsored and no pitching is allowed, just discussion and networking with other investors and those interested in investing.

This month we'll focus our discussion on how to find motivated sellers remotely.

Learn systems for building up your motivated sellers list and negotiating a deal to buy the property without realtor commissions. Then we'll share some ways to negotiate a win-win with sellers. And yes, you can do all of this from 2000 miles away with a little local help.

Agenda:

Please RSVP and join the group at the link below - Already 33 RSVP'd, join us!  Even if you can't make it tomorrow be sure to join the group to get in on the next one.

http://www.meetup.com/San-Francisco-Real-Estate-Investing-Out-of-State/events/232976532/

Dream team, ASSEMBLE! @Ben Phillips @Alice K. @Johnson H. @J. Martin @Raimondo F. @Jordan D. @Lynaire McGovern @Griffin D. @Eric Smith @Charlie Brown and many more!

Hi @Summer Bohannon with no capital to start and no experience (yet!) you are going to have to be really persistent and consistent.  I would suggest starting with wholesaling since it requires no money down (other than marketing costs) and can generate cash you'll need for future down payments, it will also give you the skills to find motivated sellers and under-priced houses.

There are countless articles on BP and other places to find ways to find motivated sellers so I won't bore you with them here and definitely check out the book, The Wholesaling Bible by Than Merrill to get started.

Dallas MF have been great for me and it seems like they just keep going up and up.  Good luck!

Thanks @Chance Housos originally I was planning to just post on Zillow.com and some of the other free listing sites but they contact me after seeing my Zillow listing.  I was planning on still paying the buyer's agent 3%, I figured saving on a selling agent saves me $7K on the $235K list price.  

I'm interested to hear more on how a seller's agent can add more value than their commission in a hot north DFW market. When do you use an agent and when FSBO? My plan was to FSBO for a week and if I don't get any bites then to call my agent up.

I really appreciate the insight!

@Jorge Zea thanks for that feedback, I really appreciate it.  

I've seen other flat fee listing services on MLS as you mentioned but according to their marketing message, they other way more than just a listing including: photography, digital lock box, for sale yard sign, showing agents as needed for unrepresented buyers, an online contract process, lead tracking portal, etc. I definitely need some of these, others are more just for cool-factor. Did I also mention I live out of state and have a tenant currently renting the house? Yeah, I know it's bold (or maybe just stupid) to FSBO but I think one of these services will give me a little more warm and fuzzy feeling about doing it.

Postlets is a good idea whether I use ListingSpark or not.  I was planning to still end up paying the buyer's agent 3%.  

Fortunately it's a strong market so average DOM is under a month.

I recently listing at house in Richardson, TX FSBO and got a call from a rep at ListingSpark.com

It sounds very compelling and almost too good to be true. Since I'm out of state, listing FSBO seemed a little intimidating so this seemed like a nice solution so I won't be able to do any showings myself. It's much of the seller's agent work for $7/day and includes services listed below. Has anyone ever tried these guys or a similar service and have experience to share - good or bad?

Below is the full pitch they emailed me.

We provide a service to give your home maximum exposure for a fraction of the cost to maximize your profits. When you are ready to significantly increase your exposure with MLS, we provide you with the following for just $7 a day:

• MLS listing as well as syndication to the other large sites like Zillow, Trulia and Realtor.com as well as other company sites like Keller Williams.
• Professional photos at no additional charge.
• High Quality Sign
• Digital lockbox that links to your ListingSpark account to provide information for each showing.
• Market data for active, pending and sold comparable properties in your neighborhood to aid in pricing decisions.
• E-Signatures for all contracts/documents.
• We answer calls and emails and handle them how you would want us to.
• We can show your home or you can depending on what you prefer.

We offer all of this for just $7 a day, billed on a monthly basis (28 day billing cycle). You pay $196 for the first month (this is our minimum financial commitment) and you are conveniently billed every 28 days to the card you keep on file. If you close or cancel in the middle of a billing cycle, you will receive a refund back for the exact amount of days leftover. You have the ability to cancel anytime for any reason while your listing is active (if you are negotiating or under contract we have to keep you as an active subscriber until the time of closing to be in compliance with MLS rules).

We sold over 150 homes last year and our clientele was predominantly for sale by owner clients.

Typically we can get you listed in the MLS within 3-5 days of creating your account.

Please let me know if there is any other information I can provide or questions I can answer. You can get more information online at ListingSpark.com, or you can take a look at our Zillow profile to get information about past and present sales as well as client reviews and testimonials.

Hi all, I've been using this one with my own revisions: https://www.biggerpockets.com/files/user/bokman/file/117-simple-jv-agreement

This is a 3 bedroom/1 bath centrally located in Bonham just 2 blocks from LH Rather Jr High and IW Evans Elementary School. Neighboring homes have already been fixed up and this one is in a quickly improving area with the opportunity to get ahead of the trend.
Price reflects necessary work. A great project for the handy homeowner or investor as a rental house or house to flip. Bonham real estate is trending upward and this is the by far the best value in town with some sweat equity.

Good bones but needed repairs:
- Roof replaced
- Flooring
- Kitchen cabinets
- Framing
- Exterior siding
- Interior and exterior painting
- Bathroom updating
- Miscellaneous updates and fixes

Ask Price: $13,500
Estimated Rehab: $20,000
ARV: $45,000

City Appraisal Value: $21,010 (as-is)

See All Property Photos & Details

@J. Martin Woohoo!! You are a bit of a celeb in the SF REI Meetup world so this is kind of a big deal =) Looking forward to it!