All Forum Posts by: Wayne V.

Another way to look at it is that the other investor is giving up 50% of his take to the contractor. You should be able to find another contractor, maybe two who can do what you need to have done. As a GC myself, I always try to have at least a couple of guys on my call list because odds are, when I need them, one of them is busy with another project, which will often be the case if they're good. Double down on your property search and use good old footwork to find and make your deals. MLS lists are great but everyone uses them so you'll be competing for the listed deals. Finding deals below the radar will get you lower entry costs also allowing for more profitable flips. Often times driving around if you're searching close to where you operate, or finding a realtor to act as a buyer's rep will turn up potential deals. I agree that their partnership may not be forever, but another competitor like them will pop up to take their place. It's just the way it is. Building a sustainable business model that allows for stiff competition is your best strategy. No matter how you slice it, it's a dog eat dog world out there, and from my experience, real estate and construction are where the big dogs play. We little guys just have to play smarter !!!

Hi Llona,

Greetings from a fellow New Yorker and welcome to BP. I operate out of the south Brooklyn area and have seen some amazing opportunities here in the last five years. Most recently the Gowanus area has exploded after years of being bad rapped because of pollution concerns with the canal. A Whole Foods Market moved in and the area has flipped almost over night to what will be a very gentrified and desirable neighborhood. Two years ago a rough building could have been picked up for $1.7 mil that now pre-rehab would be valued at near twice that. This probably wouldn't have worked for a new, solo investor, but would have been possible with the right partners. I'm just putting this out there to say that there are deals, but being NYC, the numbers are always higher. I agree that for starting out, you should trim your overhead (shouldn't we all), and look outside the area. I personally hold property in Connecticut, about an hour and half out of the city.

Good Luck Investing & Have Fun !!!!!

There's a significant difference between changing a washing machine hose and replacing a light switch, or doing other electrical work. There are lots of highly skilled folks who do excellent electrical work but who aren't licensed. In most jurisdictions where there are licensing codes, you can work on your own house but you can't hire out to do it. In lots of other places, no license is required whatsoever. In the case of the switch, the proper use of wire nuts, wrapping the wire the right way around the screws on the switch, proper polarity (yes, even for AC), and knowing when and where to use weather protected components are all important safety considerations. This isn't to say your handyman isn't qualified or skilled, but it's worth verifying his or her skill set by asking a few questions. Find out where they get materials and supplies and call the supplier for a reference. Trade suppliers other than the big box stores can tell you a lot about their customers.

Just a thought but you haven't mentioned what the old backsplash material is and how well it's adhered to the wall. I agree that tile is the way to go but even with a good mastic, if the subsurface isn't solid the new surface won't be either. The problem will be that if it flexes that grout lines will crack and the backsplash wont be watertight. The process that I would suggest only adds a step, and that would be to screw a layer of Hardi backer board,

http://www.homedepot.com/p/James-Hardie-HardieBack...

to the existing wall and then apply the tile. Hardi board is inexpensive and is made for adhesion with tile mastic. Side note, the little plastic spacers make the job go much faster by maintaining proper and uniform spacing between the tile.

Good luck and I'm sure the tile will look great

I agree that there's an added value in keeping good tenants even if it means renting for a bit below market value. The tenants we have in one of our houses are fantastic, love the house, keep it in great repair, rent is on time, and they even occasionally send us a bottle of home made wine, which is always a pleasant surprise. This after our last tenant being an enormous headache, always complaining, seriously trashed the place, and then complained bitterly for months when she didn't get the deposit back. After that, smooth sailing has an added value. By the way, this house was intended to be a fix and flip but the market dropped so we're holding it until the numbers look better. It is presently net $0 so not so bad particularly because there's no drama and  demands aren't being made on us as landlords. That said, I am thinking that we should impose a small increase just to keep up with increased overhead. Not sure we'll do it , but thinking about it.

I've been following a property and have been trying to contact someone about it. The property is located about ten hours from where I live so I can't go there to follow up on it myself. I was finally able to contact a realtor in the area who told me that the status of the property was now "Under Contract - Sale Pending" . While I get the general idea of what that means, is that to say that it's a done deal or is there a possibility that the deal might fall through and that it will become available again? What's the best way to track it so I can find out why the deal collapsed if it does, and move quickly to close on it?

Thanks !!

Hi Everyone,

We're moving Portland, Maine sometime in the coming year and I'm looking for properties to rehab and flip. I'm also interested in 1 to 4 unit multi-families, possibly living in one of the units during the transition. I'm an experienced GC, having done many rehabs, and would be doing the work myself. I'd like the first couple to be pretty low entry cost situations while getting started there so that we can build a bit of equity and learn more about the housing market in the area.

At this point, I'm doing my homework, getting as much information as I can, looking for properties, and making contacts where possible. I've spent a lot of time in and around Portland and know the area to some extent. I'd appreciate anyone's thoughts, advice, and network connections along these lines.

Thanks,

Wayne

Hi David,

Here's another possibility. I'm a GC and have two or three stone supplier / fabricators that I work with on a regular basis. Aside from doing residential work, they also do larger commercial jobs for which they order large slabs of stone, and often have left over material when the project is finished. For my smaller residential jobs, I'm able to pick up stone tops at pretty significant discounts from their leftovers. More often than not these are very nice pieces of stone. Just a thought.

Wayne

Hi Brandon,

Soliciting is probably the wrong word. I'm just looking for a good way to get things started.

Wayne

Hi,

I have a question that is I would like to ask for feedback, suggestions, and stories of your experiences with. Our portfolio to date consists of a house in Connecticut that we have tenants in, a mixed use commercial building in upstate New York, and a rent stabilized apartment where we live in the East Village of NYC. The NYC building was sold a few years ago and has undergone condo conversion for about 80% of the 225 apartments. Initially we were offered $310,000 as a buyout but we declined knowing that we would lose about half to capital gains and also knowing that we couldn't move laterally with the net proceeds and still have a reasonably nice, yet affordable place to live here. Time has passed, our last kid is graduating from college and we're ready to move on to pursue real estate investment in the Portland, Maine area. What strategy might we pursue in activating a buyout negotiation on our apartment. The building owners are typically making $2 mil plus on small conversions like ours and $5 mil to $12 mil on combined 2 apartment larger units. This one could easily be combined with the one next door which is a converted 2 BdRm that sold for $5.7 mil. Ours is a 2 BdRm corner apartment with lots of windows on two sides. We have met with two real estate attorneys who do tenant law and they say we should expect offers of around $1 mil but that the problem will be soliciting an offer. Obviously this would provide seed money for other investments in Portland and elsewhere. Does anyone have experience with this sort of thing?

Thanks !!

Wayne