All Forum Posts by: Tim Crosby

I've been hearing about 'hard money lenders' since I first started looking into real estate investing, but always steered away from looking more into the concept with the impression that this might be out of my league. Now I've begun to realize that it's not, so long as we can help each other, we can deal!

This realization has also shown me that I have no idea what a hard money lender is looking for. I understand that everyone is different and they want different things. I also understand that being new to hard money, I will have to pay my dues and earn that trust before we can do anything overly complicated or bromer any high dollar deals. That said, I need to start somewhere and I want to learn.

Any information you can provide or if you know of any resources I should look into, just let me know. I'm particularly interested in hearing from the hard money guys and gals out there directly, but everything helps!

@John P Pirolli

Um, some people might not like this response, but man up and take some risks! My wife tries to doubt me all the time, but I keep moving forward. When I first told her about my plan, she said, "you cant do that now though, so why bother, you don't even have any money!" Three months later I bought our first duplex and we moved in about a month after that.

Now, we're here almost a year later and I'm ready for another deal and she's saying the same stuff. Guess what I'm going to do in the next few months? you got it..

@Anthony Wilson

A secured credit card will help, as long as you only pay bills and other expenses that you would pay without them. Best thing to do is to use it and pay it off immediately!

Another option is to have someone else add you as an authorized user for their credit card. They don't have to give you access to the account or anything, but you inherit their credit history with that card which might help.

When it comes to bad marks, you could fight ot, but it's tough. Sometimes it's better to wait for it to fall off, but if you cant wait the 7 years, then it might be best just to work out something with the creditor. You can set a payment plan on exchange for positive remarks on your credit score - then actually pay it off!

Credit repair isn't all that complicated, but its tough. You have to dedicate yourself to doing it. I recommend the Dave Ramsey Snowball Method to get put of debt! Look it up!!

@Don Regal

First thing to do is to figure out where you are, then you can make moves to plan out what to do to get you where you wanna go. If you're in $10k debt, I imagine your credit isn't that great. Main thing I would start doing is saving money, as much as possible. You don't need a lot, but $2000 will go a long way. Then assess your current living situation. Can you and your family move into a duplex? We went from a 1200 sqft home to a 650 sqft unit at a duplex. We got that through an FHA loan with ZERO money down. It was our first home so they covered the down payment. Can you do something like that? If not, again, start saving.

Ultimately it's going to come down to what you can do with what you've got. It's definitely possible, but you may have to make some sacrifices, or better yet, some improvements! If you're making $12 an hour as a mover, why not make $17 an hour as a truck driver?

@Frank Patalano

Holding me back? Nothing. I can find the deals to make the plan work. Extra cash would be nice, but it will come eventually, it just takes some time to save up. Soon..

How can I accelerate that process? If I could meet people to help loan me the money to do a job, that would be nice, but I don't know those people (yet). But I'm here..

@Jonathan Trimboli.. really, for what you want to do, it doesnt matter all that much. The main benefit to Mac is that you don't have to worry about viruses and those sorts of things as much. However, if you're asking which is best long term, 100% it has to be PC. I'll give you three major reasons:

1) Price. Mac is expensive by nature. Why pay extra for a brand name when the alternative is just as good and less expensive.

2) Compatibility. When you own a Mac, you have to make sure everything is compatible. The PC market is so huge, every company that isn't Apple makes a PC port for their product!

3) Upgrades. No matter what devide you buy, eventually you will need to update it. With a PC, specifically a desktop tower, you can always upgrade any outdated piece for minimal costs. With Macs, you either have to pay them to upgrade it or buy a new one. Yes, you can do it yourself, but if you're not careful you will trigger the tampering systems and your computer will **** down completely.

Hope that helps. Good luck!

@Aaron Bonne

$4,000 a month through buy and hold real estate, primarily through the BRRRR method. To do this I need at least 20 units that cashflow an average of $200 per month. It's been one year and I currently have 2 units. As of this moment, I'm in the market for a 2nd, more permanent property for myself and my family, but I plan to buy my next two investment properties by the end of 2020.

I don't care where you're at in the process - new investors, old timers, experienced landlords, contractors, agents, finance and legal people.. EVERYONE who lives in or around Polk County, Florida should message and connect with me! I want to know everyone!!

As you all know, real estate is hyper-local and everyone knows something you don't. We should all get to know each other! I live in Winter Haven and work in Lakeland. I'm currently investing in that general area. When I search for property, I search all of Polk County.. and if I don't see something I like there I search the surrounding areas.. Tampa, Clearwater, Brandon, Orlando, etc.

Find my profile and add me. Let's chat!

So, as an update, being that my current unit is so small, everyone I talked to was confident that a new baby would qualify me for a larger home with FHA, duplex or not. However, after talking about this issue more with my wife, we've decided that a better alternative for us might be something more conventional.

Rather than shopping for another duplex, we're instead going to look at a more permanent single-family home that we can build equity into. Sure, we might have to put up more money if it doesn't qualify for FHA, but we might also be able to acquire something with much greater upward potential.

The general idea is to buy a large home with 2 or 3 bedrooms, convert that to a 3 or 4 bedroom property and use that increased value down the road to help up get the 3rd property. It's basically the BRRRR strategy, without the renting part.. which leads to me to another question actually.. is that possible?

I'm not exactly sure how refinancing or the appraisal process works. For example, say I find a 3 bedropm home for 80,000 and I add a bedroom. How do I know how much value was gained? I assume an appraiser would tell me that. Does that automatically add equity, or do I need to refinance? Again, I assume that I do.. maybe I'm wrong, but if I'm not, how does that process work? What do I need to know or be ready for if I want to refinance a home I've done work on that I plan to stay in long term??

Also, thanks for all your help so far guys! If I need to move this to a different section or create a separate post, just let me know!!

@Travis Henry, interesting. I'm actually about to talk to another broker here in a moment. What is an LTV requirement? Also, while I've got you, any other recommendations or ideas about how I can lower that down payment? Maybe there's another type of loan I'm not considering??