BiggerPockets

Welcome to BiggerPockets, Bob! Tell us more about yourself. Wow - 40 years in the business is serious! How did you get started in the biz? What do you focus on now? Fill in some of the blanks . . . I'm certainly interested!

Here's to learning more about you and your experiences. I hope you'll jump in and share some of that wisdom with the rest of us.

Well, as you can imagine; it would take a while to "tell the whole story", but I'll
try a short version. Over the course of
my career in Real Estate; I've made a lot of money and I've lost a lot of money.
Actually I recieved my RE license in 1963
and started part time in a small mom and pop office in a northern suburb of
Denver back then the "Big companies"
would not take on a new person.
In those days the company owner took
8x10" black and white photos and lined
them up in the store front window for
people to come by and see.( Not open on Sundays) I kept my regular job selling
building materials, because a RE sales
was far & few between & the commission on $5,000 to $8,000 deal (split with the
owner) was not very much, but I thought,
being young, that this could lead to a
good profession, which it did in many
ways. (I could write a book) So, I worked
Saturdays in the office and did as much as I could, thru friends etc. for several
Years, gaining experience. The owner
had a few rental properties & I watched
how he aquired them. It was known that
he would buy properties. So, one Saturday I was in the office alone and in
came a young couple that wanted to sell
their house ...quick..they wanted to go
back to Kansas, they did not like the "big" city anymore. So we talked and
they wanted to leave that week end.
And I said the owner was gone all day &
would not be back till Monday. "Well can
you buy it". Since it was time to lock up,
(5 pm) I said I would come look at it,.....
Well,..it was a sweet little all brick ranch
with a basement all finished except for
carpet and paint. It was only about 5 yrs
old. The loan amount was about $8,000
FHA, I ask what they had to have, ( I only
had $450., in my checking acct)
They said $500.00 and they would be gone by Sunday nite. I said I just did not have that kind of money and while they
talked I went outside and looked around,
they came out and said what would I give
....I said $300., they said ok, handed me
a key, I wrote them a check on the hood of my car, they thanked me and were so
happy to be on their way...home to kansas. Well, I thought what have I done,
I went back to the office and searched
thru all the sold properties I could find in
their immediate area & figured out that
the place was worth,...$12,000 with PITI
of $102.00. So I had my first rental, YEA
I bought and sold several others in the area over the next few years, one I got
from the old "Majestic S & L" who was in
trouble, $7,800,...$81.00PITI,..again on
the hood of my car,...ONE HUNDRED
dollars down, and He handed me the keys. Now in those days the contracts
were ONE page ONE side. I bought
another for $5,600. same way. Life was easier then. Amen.!! Properties did not
increase in value much till the late 60's
When my parents bought a beautiful
big ranch on a large lot in "Applewood"
(new) for...my gosh,...$21,000....WOW.
It sold three years ago for over $300,000
Times do change.
The experiences above were, before
MLS, fax machines, cell phones all the
other "toys of today" If you wanted to show a listing of another company you
had to drive over to their office to get the
key, show the property, and have the key back within two hours, or they would
NOT allow you to show any of their other
listings again. (Before lock boxes).
Over the years I've sat on "site " with
New homes,..(made a bundle in the late
70's) THEN came 1981 and interest rates went from 9.5% to 16.0% in about
one year, well it was hard to sell property
then because the PITI was ....HUGE
So, What to do??? Ok, their were FHA
Non qual loans all over the place.
And RE went dead,...So switch gears
buy a $35,000 or $40,000 house and
give them $2,000 to $4,000 and take
over the loan ( non-qual) and another
rental ( with option to buy) rent for a while and I'll take $ small down( $ 1,500
to $2,500) and OWNER CARY A 2ND
FOR 5 YRS.....Oh, and the sales price
would be market,.. then....$42,000 to
$48,000 ( plus rental income, above the
PITI and tax breaks for me) Should of
bought more.!!! Those were the days.!!
Now in about 1983, the market went south, a lot of foreclosures around
Denver,..( but not nearly as severe as
this time). 2006 to present,...and will be
till 2011 before it tapers off. TOO many
jobs lost. Now you got wholesaling,
Fix & flips,...Short sales (never had those, before,...S/S) Just be creative,
is the key. This time the problem is more
Country wide,...NOT so before.
Properties had equity, fewer seconds
& HELOC's. I sold HUD condo's in
south Aurora for $24,000 to $28,000
that had sold two years before for $65,000 to $78,000... It was a tight market it about 1987 and then it started
to slowly improve, more and more and
THEN,...about 1993 if you bought a
property ( any Price) by 1997/98 it
had increased in value ..2 1/2 to 3 times
what you paid for it.things were crazy..
In the high end areas ( SE Denver, etc)
it was frantic, People were paying over
asking price by easily, 10 to 15%.
On weekends you would take your
buyers out to look and you park
and there would be 3 or 4 or 5 other
Realtors, with their buyers looking.
Run thru the house, "do you like it" "Yes"
race back to the car, slam a contract
together and get to a fax machine before
any of the other Realtors could get their
contracts turned in and try to put a short
acceptance time on it, so as to tie it up
before anyone else could. And since
you had gone thru this drill, 3 or 4 times
before, you over bid so as to not loose
it...So a property asking....$350,000
the offer would be $385000 to 395,000
The sellers LOVED it. The buyers were
Shocked, Stressed, and could not believe the insanity of it all. AND they
appraised..??? go figure. I know of a
case where a very sharp Realtor was
showing a fabulous home, in a gated
community west of Denver, they arrived
to look at the property and the previous
showing party had not left yet, so as
they are looking thru, he over hears the
other buyers and agent talking in the kitchen, yes they want to make an offer.
WELL,....the 2nd agent explained to his
buyers the situation, (and they also really liked the property (about 1.8m) so
the first agent tell her people lets go back to the office and write it up,.....
The 2nd agent, went out to his car and got... HIS... fax machine out of the trunk,
wrote the offer, faxed to the listing office,
with an acceptance time of TWO hours.
(the property was vacant, sellers were
out of state, (all of which the #2 agent
knew and knew that they could be reached quickly). Agent #2 got the deal
accepted. ASAP. The 1st Agent presented her contract and was told it was under contract. SHE WAS...P. O.++
Ah,.....The Real Estate Biz..!!!
I left out the part about in the mid 1980's
I & a partner..( of sorts)...lost 7.5m in
a deal with 4 National name motels in
Colorado and Kansas.
Real Estate is still the best game in town!