All Forum Posts by: Stephanie Grady

@Brock Mogensen hey Brock! We are in Milwaukee too! We are looking to explore commercial investing for the first time. We’ve done residential buy and holds, but want to get into commercial. I’d love to connect if you’re willing!

Hello bigger pockets posse! 

My husband and I are investors in buy and holds. My husband is looking to get certified as a home inspector with the idea that this would allow us to put cash offers on houses with no contingencies. So in other words, we would go and view a property, he would do an “inspection“ while at the property and we would be able to make an offer with no contingencies that day. I have a few questions. 

First: When looking online, there are multiple programs that claim to certify you as a home inspector. Are there some that are better than others? Are there some that are fake or not reliable? Does anyone have any suggestions on what the best online programs are? 

Second: Do you have to have an official inspection done on the house by a certified inspector in order to get insurance on it ?

I appreciate any feedback!

Hi!

We are looking at buying our second SF buy and hold rental property and have come across an electrical panel we haven’t seen before.  My questions are... what is it? Does this mean the whole house would have to be rewired? The amps and voltage concern me too.  Any insight would be much appreciated!

@Jeff S. thank you so much for your response. I sincerely I appreciate the insight. We are just getting started and have had success so far, but with this next purchase our financing is changing and I just want to make sure all of our ducks are in a row and be able to protect my parents.

Hi,

I have a quick question about private lenders. We are looking at buying and holding another SFH and will be able to make an all cash offer because my parents have agreed to lend us money at a good interest rate. My question is -- what is the best way for me to actually acquire the money from my parents so we are ready to go to make an offer when we find the deal we want? If the seller requires proof of funds, I want to be able to provide that ASAP so we can move forward quickly on closing. Should they send the money "now" via check or wire transfer, so the money is in our account ready to go? We are new to private lending so I apologize if my questions are extremely naive. Any insight would be much appreciated!

thank you everyone for your input!

Hello BP peeps!

My husband and I closed on our first SFH in a B+ neighborhood at the end of June. After a couple of weekends of hard work to get it where we wanted, we listed the property on Zillow, Trulia, Hotpads, Craigslist, Apartments.com, realtor.com and a few others. It's in great shape with hardwood floors and a nice layout. We have gotten probably a dozen or so requests to tour the property -- several showed up, others never did. Our home has been listed for a month now and I'm getting a little worried. We can afford to eat the mortgage payment, but would rather not of course considering we started down the REI path to build wealth and increase cash flow, not dent our wallets. The monthly rent is comparable to other similar homes in the area. We have stood by the principles Brandon discusses in his book requiring applicants to have credit scores 600+ and gross monthly (or combined monthly) income of roughly three times the rent. We don't want to waste our time on showings to applicants who won't qualify so when they reach out to us via Zillow, Trulia, etc we follow up with an email telling them we are happy to give them a tour of the home, but also tell them to be aware of our requirements. Does anyone have any advice on this? Is this too harsh? Should we be more lenient or stand our ground? Am I freaking out prematurely considering we've only been trying to rent it for a month or should I be worried? Also, does anyone suggest listing our property in different ways -- i.e. leasing agency, old fashion bulletin boards, etc?

THANK YOU so much in advance for your time to answer my questions. We are just starting out and very excited about our first purchase. Now, we just want it rented to great tenants!!

-Stephanie

Hi Everyone!

My husband and I are new to REI and are getting into buy and holds at this point. I have a a pretty broad question about rental saturation in varying neighborhoods. We are trying to get a sense as to what various rents are depending on the properties and areas. Through our research (mainly on Craigslist), we are finding some areas have barely any rentals available while others have a plethora of rentals. My question is: on average, is it a better idea to buy in area where there are a lot of rentals already in place or an area where there are not many? My fear is some areas won't support people wanting to rent a home. On the other side of things, if there is already a big supply of rentals needed to filled then buying in an area like that would lead to more competition for renters. Any insight would be much appreciated. Again, I know this is a pretty broad question and every market is different, but just a sense would be great! Thanks in advance!

Stephanie

thank you everyone for our responses! I appreciate the advice!

-Stephanie

Hi Everyone!

My husband and I are just starting out in REI, and before we invest in our first buy and hold -- should we create an LLC? I'd appreciate any feedback!

Thank you in advance :) 

Stephanie