All Forum Posts by: Scott Schuetz

Hi Sandra- I'm here in Brevard county. The public MLS is tough to pull comps from. You can see what is currently on the market but not past sales or days on market. I'm always willing to help a bigger pockets member out, I can run a quick comparable for you. PM or email me the property address

Last year I didn't pay taxes quarterly and I ended up getting a penalty from the IRS for $440. Although not a huge penalty, this year I'm paying monthly payroll tax out of my S corp. 

Sounds like you're off to a good start! 

It's easy to set up an LLC. Based on your plans, I'd set one up right away.

@Account Closed

I'm a licensed real estate agent and technically I work under a broker. I work for a virtual brokerage and just pay a flat fee per year to the broker, I can buy and sell my own properties as well as helping other people buy or sell their homes.

I'll write a deal diary soon, but I started in 2009 by buying a duplex. Financed it FHA, lived in one side and rented the other.

Also to clarify, this was my 25th transaction not 25th property. I count each purchase as a transaction and each sale as a transaction even if it's the same property. I'm holding 3 properties currently. Some of the properties I held for some time, others were rentals and some were flips. I think my number of properties I've owned since 2009 is only 14. My apologies as I didn't mean to embellish

@Michael Faulk

 My initial strategy was wholesale or wholetail. If that didn't work then I was going to decide between fix and flip or fix and rent. Holding it as a rental was my last option as I'm trying to only hold properties I rate as class B or above.

@Annamarie Voglio

 @Bryan C.

I should write some type of story or deal diary. It would be good for me to post of some of the other deals and my path. I've learned a lot so far but still have much to learn. What would be the best forum category to post this under?

Thanks for all the support guys...  @Mike Jury  asked for numbers. This was an easy one, purchase price $32k, I spent $500 to repair a broken window, install a new back door, change locks and clean up the yard. Closing costs were just over $1k. Sales price $45k.

One of my goals when I bought this house was to test my exit strategy of selling to another investor. It turned out the deal was not attractive enough to the experienced investors I knew, but once I put it on the MLS it got lots of interest. Maybe buyers newer to investing or ones that can't find deals privately are willing to work off smaller margins. Regardless, it seems to be a good strategy that I'll continue to test. This is one of the benefits of having a real estate license. I can use the MLS as another tool to sell without it costing much money. For those that don't have your re license, you can use a flat fee listing. So for a few hundred bucks, you can get on the MLS

I've been investing since 2009 in a mixture, of flips, buy and hold and live in flips. The market in Brevard county Florida has been increasing in activity and prices. There's also lots of new players wanting to flip houses, especially inexpensive ones. 

This being my 25th transaction feels like a landmark so I wanted to tell you guys about it. I'd been looking hard for a deal and came across a FSBO on craigslist. It was a 3 bed 2 bath palm bay house built in 1958. I negotiated the purchase price to $32k cash and closed quickly. The house had potential, I had 3 exit strategies, 1. fix and flip, 2. fix and hold as a rental, 3. sell to another investor. My first choice was to try to flip to another investor. I shopped it around to my REI group and other investors I know. After a couple weeks of no solid offers, I listed it on the MLS for $46k. The phone lit up and had 7 showings the first day. One was a truck driver who just moved here from Ohio. He wanted a home to live in with his family and fix up. They made me a cash offer of $45k and I accepted! What I thought was going to be a wholesale type deal ended up going to an end user and everyone is happy!

@Shavonne Justin

 I'm a realtor and investor in Brevard county. Most of my investment is beachside, but I'm doing more and more on the mainland. The best way by far to get properties is to find the off market ones, that takes time though. There are a few good wholesalers in the area however most of those deals need at least some work to be rentable.

Eau Gallie and Sarno Rd areas are renter heavy neighborhoods, I rate them as class C properties. There can be good cashflow on many of those homes. For move in ready, you can still find cashflow deals on the MLS, call the rental ads from Craigslist and see if they'd be interested in selling, you could also market to owners that have filed recent evictions or try out of state owners.

There are many successful full time agents in my market that never answer their phone. If you can communicate through text or email while at your job, that may work. You'd have to set that expectation with your seller. 

I would focus on what you can offer your seller to give them a better opportunity to sell their home quickly for the most money.