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All Forum Posts by: Stace Breland

Stace Breland has started 1 posts and replied 6 times.

Post: Confused on where to start

Stace BrelandPosted
  • Frisco, TX
  • Posts 6
  • Votes 6
Quote from @Beth Blankenbicker:

Sometimes I arrive at a decision not by choosing an option but by eliminating all the other options. Maybe make a list of all the different ways to get started in real estate wholesaling, flip, buy and hold, house hack, etc.

Now eliminate what doesn't make sense, for example house hacking is an excellent way to get started but if you are straight up unwilling to live with a roommate or neighbor/tenant then cross that off.

Myself I can eliminate wholesaling because I work two W-2 jobs and I don't have the time to chase leads and if I'm making any phone calls its at 2 a.m. on my lunch break (nightshift) which I'm sure would not go over well with most people. 

Now with the shortened list break them down like buy and hold you could buy with traditional financing, DSCR loan, BRRR. If you don't have capital for the 20% down for traditional loans eliminate that. Keep eliminating until you have just a few options left.

Once you have narrowed it down to 2 or 3 options that COULD work for you choose ONE and focus on it until you master it. Once you master it then allow yourself to explore another option. There are so many different ways to approach real estate investing its easy to spin your wheels and gain no traction. (Ask me how I know this!!)

Anyway hope that helps.

Yeah, sadly house hacking isn’t an option for me as we already own our “dram home” in a dream location so moving out and taking up residence in a duplex or 4 plex or whatever would make my wife MOST displeased. Wholesaling isn’t an option (nor do I really like the sound of it) like you said because my primary job is far too well compensated to give up time there so yeah… a few things already off the list.  Most of the buy and hold options or STRs are still on the list so just going through education about those now to try to knock some more off the list. 

Post: Confused on where to start

Stace BrelandPosted
  • Frisco, TX
  • Posts 6
  • Votes 6

Man, a ton of great tips in here! @Bruce Lynn, I’d love to make the expo but I’m working all weekend pretty much.

@Bonnie Low Thanks for the book recommendation, I’ll definitely have to grab that one!

@Chad McMahan Holy crap, so much good info!  I learned a ton and might need to reach out to you at some point about your advice on realtors… that was gold!

Post: Confused on where to start

Stace BrelandPosted
  • Frisco, TX
  • Posts 6
  • Votes 6
Quote from @Bruce Lynn:
Quote from @Nathan Gesner:

The gurus often give you a lot of rah-rah motivation but very little practical information. 

Probably one of the Top 5 answers I've ever seen on BP.  Thank you.  @Stace Breland  this is great advice.
Since you are in Frisco...you are so lucky.  I feel like DFW is the center of the universe for all kinds of real estate meet ups and information.   From mobile homes, to flipping, to multifamily, to whatever you want to do, probably someone doing it here and shares a bit of their success.

Come join us on 9/14 6pm in Plano for mulit-family.   https://www.meetup.com/Multifamily-Investor-Networking-of-No...   Great group and many started somewhere else.    

There will also be a great meeting next month at the Truck Yard behind Nebraska furniture mart at lunch with Elevate Group.  This is multi-focused.  Not sure date is set yet.  Zach from Rise 48 will be the speaker and I expect it will not disappoint.   https://www.eventbrite.com/e/elevate-multifamily-investing-m...

One thing I think I would suggest is to focus on ONE Thing....how you pick that one thing....not sure about that. Maybe like others have mentioned, go to BPCON where you get exposed to lots of different ideas and avenues. Maybe write a business plan...or spend some time thinking and strategizing about different options....kind of a SWAT analysis....plan out the time, investment, passion, and profits of each avenue. Probably few people do this and we should. Plenty of people evolve too....lets flip....ohhh that takes time and work....ohhh let's buy and hold....I don't like dealing with tenants....I can make 3x rent with STR....then STR gets banned and we'll move it to MTR......and then if you have the money....lets do syndications as an LP.....I like this.....let's do it as a GP.....

Best wishes and good luck finding your passion.

Thanks @Bruce, definitely some good info here! Since you are local I’ll definitely take your opinion on the area as fact and think I need to find some of these meetings you mentioned. I definitely like the look of the meet up on 9/14 and am actually off work so will try to fit that in but I’m the link it did say that the purpose of the meeting was NOT mentoring so not sure if a noob like me will fit in too well with more questions and problems than answers and deals to discuss.

Post: Confused on where to start

Stace BrelandPosted
  • Frisco, TX
  • Posts 6
  • Votes 6
Quote from @Abbey Humphreys:

Hey Stace- welcome. I hear you on where you're coming from- lots of advice of a more vague nature and very little nitty gritty substantial steps of action. "Gurus" can be helpful, of course, but I think the vitriol on here comes from the snakeoil vibe that they give off in that they hawk this idea of "completely passive" income and get-rich-quick schemes. 

However, for more detailed direction, I would wholeheartedly recommend getting to know those that are involved in real estate in your market. This is possible through REI meetups and online forums. You can ask specific questions and in my experience, many people are more than happy to share what they've learned. Good luck!

Honestly, thanks to everyone above for the suggestions. There is some really good info here and I appreciate the direction. Despite what @Bob Stevens said, I don’t think it’s easy and “just do it” is the right approach. Paralysis by analysis is real, definitely in my case, and I know a bit but not enough to complete deals without making some major mistakes that are totally avoidable with knowledge. 

Post: Confused on where to start

Stace BrelandPosted
  • Frisco, TX
  • Posts 6
  • Votes 6
Quote from @Julien Jeannot:

Hey Stace,
I find that starting with the goal and working your way backwards to your current situation helps cut through the noise. Couple things to consider:

- Do you want to be active or passive?

- Build wealth or cash flow?

- Do you like be able to check on your place ofter or not? In/out state sort of thing.
I've tried a fair amount of strategies and settled on the build equity first, then reposition to cash flow on a portfolio I could keep my eyes on.

That left me with: invest in high appreciating areas with solid rent growth in my home Market of Seattle. The strategy has to be long term 5+ years of hold time. The pros are I've been able to 2x equity and started to cash flow nicely yr 2 or 3. The Con is a bigger down payment and slim to no cash flow early on. I could have done better on the cash flow yr 1 &2, but that would have required a heavier invested in time & $ to source properties.

Hey Julien,

 To answer your questions… a little of both on everything? Lol!  I need to be semi/mostly passive due to still working and not being able to devote full time to this but want to have an active hand in some of it so I understand all the moving parts and how to accomplish them. I’m not looking to hand my money to someone and hope it takes off… I want to learn how to actually do all parts eventually. As for the money aspect… build wealth is the eventual goal but I feel like (and maybe I’m wrong) that I need to put into something that will develop cash flow first and either that will allow scaling OR eventually (this becomes the longer strat) building equity and then selling. I do NOT want to start with one property and sit on it for 3-5 years (for any reason) before moving on to a second, third, etc.. I am truly looking to build a portfolio and scale it up much like Brandon describes. As for local or out of state… I couldn’t care less. I don’t need to look in on them and only really care about what deals end up being the best investment, not necessarily where they are.

What I truly envision is having multiple cash flowing properties with the ability to leverage each one to scale up for more and eventually build wealth. Perhaps that lie in the sky kinda mentality and I’m sure people come in here with aspirations like. One all the time to only fail, but I truly believe that it can be done.

Post: Confused on where to start

Stace BrelandPosted
  • Frisco, TX
  • Posts 6
  • Votes 6

Hey all. Very confused on where to start with sooo much info out there so let me tell you where I’ve come from.

So I guess I am new to investing… kinda. I actually had a failed rental home years ago due to it being semi forced into as we had a home in the Seattle area we had to move out of (and out of the area) right as the pandemic set in and so we couldn’t sell it at the time so rented it for a year. It was essentially a break even/lose a little type deal and after a year we sold. Not the best experience but also didn’t buy the home with intent to rent so it was a suboptimal situation to begin with.

Due to “circumstances” I am considered an accredited investor and I’ve looked at syndication for quite awhile and decided to take the plunge with Brandon (Turner) on one of his ODC offerings but it’s still very new so nothing much to report there. I like the syndication idea and will do more at some point but an extra $100k to invest isn’t going to pop into my bank account every month so not sure how often that will happen.

I am confused due to both information overload as well as vague information. I've read numerous books in the bigger pockets collection, some books not in there, Rich Dad, etc. The thing that I have noticed is that all do nice jobs in creating the right investor mindset (debt is good as long as it's good debt) and giving you a general idea of how to do things, but no resource I've found or read teaches how to go from A to B specifically and explains any of the processes in detail. At this point I know the concepts behind to house hack, fix and flip, arbitrage Airbnb, BRRR, etc, etc, etc but do not actually KNOW how to do any of them in detail to the point that I feel I could take the process from A to Z without pitfalls and mistakes.

Everyone here seems to poo poo the idea of paying “gurus” money to learn systems and how to do these things step by step but no one seems to offer ways to learn the actual steps that doesn’t want to charge you so doesn’t that make all of them “gurus”? What the difference in paying a Pace Morby or someone like that vs paying the hundreds or thousands of dollars for the bigger pockets boot camps or paying a couple thousand dollars to go to a conference? Just seems strange people hate people who ask for money for knowledge (gurus) but that’s happening with even some of the most benevolent names in the field, even bigger pockets big names.

Just not sure if this becomes a “just fall in and you’ll learn” type of thing or if I’m missing some good starting point for someone at my level who knows quite a bit but just doesn’t seem to be putting all the pieces of the puzzle together yet.