All Forum Posts by: Jared G.

@Marian Huish Well that makes sense then. I wonder why MLS is frequently touted as a good place for beginners to find deals, then. I have never once read or heard that it was only for licensed realtors. Thanks for clearing that up!

I don't "get" how you use the MLS. Whenever I make a search for Washington, DC I am directed to a 404 error page. When I search in nearby Baltimore, I get 0 properties found for nearly every neighborhood I try, and those that do have something are mostly empty land.

What's the issue here? Not finding good deals is one thing, but not even finding anything listed seems like something's wrong.

@Arlan Potter Thanks? I'm asking how you would go about learning those things.

As a beginner, it can be hard to be proactive. It can be hard to figure out what a good deal even looks like.

Why, if there is a good deal in my midst, wouldn't a more experienced investor immediately get it? I live in DC which is a very tough market to compete in. What chance do I have, being very conservative, having bought nothing before, having little to no connections at all, over someone who is established, connected, knowledgeable about the area, risk tolerant, and ready to pounce?

I have no problem being patient, if there is indeed something to be patient for. I don't mean this to be a depressing question. I just want to know realistically and logically why, if there truly is a great deal out there, it wouldn't get bought by one of the hundreds of more experienced investors right away who know the business inside and out.

There seems to be a gap between what the beginner guide, articles, and podcasts teach and what I don't know, which is this: applying all of the formulas, calculations, and tips to real world examples. I can do calculations all day, no problem. But when I look up listings of properties, what I see is complete Greek to me. I don't see the variables to be calculated. I see listings with no information, or wildly varying information, or no photos. Everything decent is far and away too expensive. The few things in my price have been listed for 100+ days, and don't look like deals. 

Bear with me here as I go on. . . I don't know how you're supposed to know what's noise and what are listings even worth looking at. How happy I would be just to be able to run the numbers on a "pretend" deal (by pretending I have more money than I do) as a hypothetical learning tool. But I'm not even that far in knowledge yet. 

I don't know how to do the 1% rule because the listings I find don't tell me what a potential sensible rent would be (and the other properties around the area vary wildly by type, size, renovations, price, and everything else). I don't know if foreclosures are good or bad or how to read them. I don't know when a place would need basic repairs, or major repairs. How do you know if something being auctioned is good or bad?

Surprisingly, many of these things aren't covered in the beginner material. I've posted a few questions so far and the feedback has all pointed to one overall answer: go out and talk to people in real life.

Okay, I will do that!

However, one of the reasons why I find it better to ask for help in the forums and go through articles and podcasts is because these all seem like absolute beginner questions that I am asking hypothetically, just to learn how to answer them.

I am ready and willing to go out into the community, but if I am going to go out and put down $20 for REIA meetings, miss work to go to lunch chats, or take potential mentors out for coffee, not to mention cold call or email realtors, I want to do it right.

Have I ever analyzed a deal? No. So I don't want to be sitting there, having nothing to contribute other than question after question, not knowing a good neighborhood from a bad one, while experienced investors walk away from me mid-sentence (read about that several times on the forums here).  I don't want to approach someone working on a for-sale house and ask, "So. . . is this a. . . good deal?"

I can't tell you how many times I've gone to a club or meetup group and at the end of it realized I came away with absolutely nothing gained, not because of anything they did, but because I didn't even know what I needed to know. I don't want to stutter and stumble on the phone with a realtor because I can't answer her questions. My local REIA meets up an hour and a half away from me. I don't want to commute 3 hours just to "absorb" or "get the feel" of the scene without something concrete I am there to learn more about. I don't have a car, so if I am going to drive around a neighborhood (by virtue of borrowing or renting a car), I don't want to do it completely aimlessly. Time is valuable. I don't want to waste it when I don't have anything concrete to focus on.

Now, I am in favor of doing these things to learn when it's necessary. I am against doing them mindlessly. I want to work hard but I want to work smart.

Again, I am not against going out and talking to people, but I just can't accept that word-vomiting all of my potential questions to someone I just met would make any sense. My research has led me to read stories on here about meeting groups and the general consensus I get is that people there know what they're doing and want to associate with others who do, too. Should I really be going out to groups when I am at square one? Should I really be investing money and time to absorb information when I have what I thought were absolute beginner questions?

I know I may be frustrating the regulars here with what seem like repetitive posts, so I apologize! One day, I'll have it all figured out. . .

@Ned Carey Thank you, Ned. I guess my natural follow-up is how you know what the market price is. Anytime I search I seem to get a whole range of different sizes, prices, and conditions of home even in small areas. How do you know what makes a good or bad deal?

Hello! I'm starting out -- slowly. I'm looking in the Baltimore area for possible buy-and-hold properties to rent out, but this question is general for any region.

Let's say I've read around and looked in person and so I make a search on Zillow for a specific neighborhood I think is reasonable, say, 21212, with my maximum price of $150,000.

What comes up is many properties, ranging from $30k to $130k. They are of all different sizes, conditions, number of bedrooms, some are in foreclosure, some are on auction, some for sale -- and all of these different qualities make it hard for me to compare. How do you know what is cheap meaning it's a great deal versus cheap because it's something to avoid? When you see places that are falling apart, how do you know whether it's the good sort of "needs work" place versus the avoid-at-all-costs disaster?

I'm just clueless about what to do with all of this information as well as what other information I still need. My first instinct is to apply the 1% rule, but how do I know what a property is going to realistically rent for? How do I know what makes a good deal? I know a common answer is that I have to network, get out there, ask around, etc. but I am still confused on what information I am supposed to be trying to find out from these efforts. For example, if I were to call a realtor about this neighborhood, what information should I be asking to get a clearer picture of which properties are good or not? Other than just stating, "Tell me which places are good deals". . .

I see the search results, supposedly this is a good area from my research, but I can't make sense of WHAT I'm seeing when I see these listings.

I would be very grateful if someone could walk me through their steps, even if the search results are all hard passes, so I can see what you actually do with the research (i.e. "This first property catches my eye because A, B, and C. But these certain qualities X, Y, Z make it bad so I'm passing.")

The beginner material says "make sure a place fits your criteria" but I don't understand the search results. Even seeing it in person, I wouldn't know what it is I need to know or ask.

@David Cruice David, thanks for the advice -- I was so ready for someone to immediately respond with "get out there," so I'm very glad you didn't. Lol. I will definitely start talking to people I know.

So I admit I come into real estate from a place of wanting to boost and secure future financial independence, not necessarily due to a love of the field itself. I was mainly inspired to start researching investment properties by listening to podcasters like Paula Pant.

Now, as  I'm learning, a huge portion of succeeding in real estate is going out and talking to people -- investors, contractors, neighbors, residents of areas to invest in, etc. Making connections, networking, and starting conversations.

The thing is, I absolutely hate to do that. I can deal with talking to people if I have specific business or questions for someone in particular, but just chatting people up for the sake of it is something that gives me extreme anxiety. Going to meetups doesn't sound like fun for me, it sounds like a grueling chore. Am I simply not cut out for this business? I would rather know that now than find out years down the line. Or, is there anyone out there who has a different style of making it work that doesn't involve being extroverted? Is there maybe a certain aspect of real estate better suited for me?

Again, it's not that I can't talk to anyone; I definitely can if it's necessary. It's the general chatting and going out and meeting people just for the sake of making connections that I hate. If it were with people I have legitimate business with, I'd have no problem. 

@Ned Carey Thank you, Ned, for your thorough reply. I don't want anyone to get the wrong idea; I didn't ask this question because I think someone should be telling me the answers. I just want examples and context to learn from so I can then go out and compare what I see to what I've learned. I've heard that advice a lot -- to go out and talk to people and see the market -- but I still feel as though I don't know anything about the subject to be able to ask intelligent (or any) questions or even understand the information I'd be taking in. When you say I should be "evaluating hundreds of deals" . . . well, I asked this question because I want to learn how to evaluate listings and deals. To be honest, I don't know what evaluating a deal even consists of. It may sound like I'm acting helpless, but I think many people overestimate what beginners know.

For what it's worth, I'm looking to buy and hold a property and rent it out for cash flow. The 2% and 70% rule are definitely on the right track of what I mean to ask. But I know they aren't absolute and I'm sure they aren't the whole story. I'd like to know what the rest of the story is.