For me, when you can spend a third as much money helping people than you can killing them, the choice seems obvious.

Once the investor has the property it is their choice whether to add it to their portfolio as a rental unit or try to flip the property for a profit.Hope that helped.

A decade ago, a good business plan, preferably technology based, would have gotten you more money than you could spend.

Determine how much the house is worth to you as an investor, and offer no more than that amount (preferably less).In many cases, that will put your offer much lower than the MLS price, in which case it's up to you whether you want to submit it or not, but there's no reason to look at the MLS price first, and make your bid based on that.

If a few of you don't mind sharing, How do you (or your CPA) prefer to setup Quickbooks for rehabs.

Has anyone had any luck with being able to use their title company of choice when purchasing REO's?

"It's kind of compounding the problem, I think." . . .The government's TARP purchases of preferred shares gave some banks a thicker capital cushion -- if only fleetingly -- which regulators hoped they would use to make more loans.

I find it very nice being able to find a great deal (yes, they can still be had on the MLS), do my own negotiations, schedule my own closings with the title company of my choice, AND earn a commission on top of it.

I've been running numbers, and if I can get something in the nicer area for $80k that rents for $1200 ... preferably newer construction to keep capital costs down.

Preferably under $130k.