All Forum Posts by: Vikram C.

Bryan, I have to agree with Bill on most of this topic:

1. If you have someone record a sham lien against your property, it is going to be illegal everywhere regardless of whether there are specific statutes prohibiting it.

2. If you borrow money from a friend and grant him a security interest in your asset, you have a real loan to pay back and the security interest merely encumbers your property and is not really an asset protection strategy.

3. If you and a buddy of yours "trade" loans and liens, it is in reality a sham transaction. If you guys do just one such deal, it may be hard to prove that it is a sham. But if you want a scalable solution to the problem, this is not a good way to go because a pattern of such deals will pretty much seal your fate in a court of law.

4. Mitch's idea is one possible way to discourage lawsuits. But I do not think it is as effective as it seems. Collection agencies typically do not delve into your financial details, so it will not dissuade them. Lawyers, on the other hand, typically take on a case based on the strength of the lawsuit and a somewhat more thorough examination of your assets than just checking the public records.

5. I think the idea of owning a company that lends to you and records a lien is also quite weak. Most judges are not going to be excited to see that. Plaintiff's lawyers, if they see a Nevada corporation with a lien against your property, will be even more excited to sue you because it is an indication that you have assets worth protecting.

Most simple asset protection strategies, and especially the ones that seem too easy, are not going to work that well.

Now, if you have an offshore "entity" that owns your home . . .

Francesca, your information is correct. Margins in Phoenix are very tight and so is the competition. I have found the same thing in Vegas. SoCal is pretty tough as well. Margins were a lot better a couple of years back when there was less competition.

Regarding which areas to invest in and price points, I think all price points are getting a lot of competition. I used to buy million-dollar homes with good margin but now even those have intense competition and thin margins!

BTW, you are right that the Arrowhead area is a nice and desirable one. The parts of Glendale north of the 101 are not quite as bad as the rest of the town. But Nick (motiv8d) knows Maricopa county better than me and can advice you on specific pockets to avoid, etc.

Ron, we specialize in buying at trustee sales here in Maricopa county. Drops are usually supplied by one of several data service companies such as Foreclosure Radar and Realty Trac.

If you are interested in seeing if we may be able to help your investor clients, please contact me by PM.

Thanks, Steve. I followed your link and found a good explanation here:

http://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2009/10/22/robin-auctions-sell-investment-properties-quickly-part-1-2/

Don, can you explain how this auction method works?

I have noticed the same trend. Vegas and Phoenix have both witnessed a substantial increase in the average purchase price as a percent of ARV and profit margins are quite a bit tighter now compared to a year ago.

Josh, BiggerPockets is a big part of the reason for my successful foray into real estate. I am not sure I would even be investing in RE but for this site. In addition, I found both my business partner and my project manager through BP. My contribution is very small relative to the value that I have received.

I really appreciate the fact that you have maintained this site with integrity and with an exclusive focus on what's best for real estate investors. I am sure you have received many lucrative offers from various RE programs to commercialize the site and it is great to see that you have not given in.

I encourage all BP members to contribute generously to the site in whatever way they can so that we continue to have this incredible resource.

You can attain your 20% target return using a number of strategies:

1. Buy-and-hold, as you have been doing, of both 4-plexes and slightly larger complexes. It is hard to achieve very high returns with much larger apartment complexes, though, because you will face competition from institutional buyers such as REITs.

2. Hard money lending. This is a very profitable business where you make a good ROI from points + interest. You will need to become skilled at evaluating the properties that you wish to finace.

3. Notes. There are some BP members who make good money buying notes at a discount, improving their marketability and reselling them.

4. There are also some other strategies that BP members use to earn high returns but they may be a bit too far from your goals / skills. These including mobile homes, mobile home parks, rehabbing and flipping, etc.

I do not know much about real estate or fixing homes although I run one of the larger RE businesses on BP. If you do not have a specific skill, all you need to do is find others who have such skills and bring them into your team.

Paul, I had a chat about this company with one of the top property management companies here in Phoenix. (Mark Taylor).

I really liked the SureDeposit service and the Mark Taylor people told me it works really well for them, and it also allows them to sign up tenants more easily because the tenant has to shell out less cash. SureDeposit reduces its risk by limiting its service to better apartment complexes and better property management companies. It will be virtually impossible for class B and C properties to get the service.