The Timid Investor
History
My Name is Charles Cline and I live in Bakersfield California with my husband. I have been obsessed with real-estate since I was a kid, my older sister's husband had purchased a Carlton Sheets VHS set and I at 12 years old watched every one. When I was in high school I had a teacher, Mrs. Castro who had turned her and her husband's teacher salary into a vast real-estate empire. By the time I was one of her students she owned multiple very large apartment complexes in the bay area, Mrs. Castro would talk about her business in class and it fueled my excitement about the industry. I would talk about it all the time, I would dream about having the nice things she had, but I never took the steps to make any of these dreams come true out of high school. When I was in my mid-twenties I started working in construction and tried selling real-estate on the side, again, this fueled my love of real-estate, but again I didn't do anything about it. In my late mid-thirties, I again got obsessed with real-estate. I went to a Fortune builder's seminar (which turned out to be just a sales pitch) and it got me extremely excited about real-estate, but I couldn't afford to buy their program. Instead, I found a guy who had bought the program, and I was able to buy one of his user log ins so I was able to access all of their educational information. Between that and discovering biggerpockets.com I was as interested in real-estate as I have ever been. I finally decided to pull the trigger (we already owned our own home with a FHA loan, but it was in only my husband's name) and I bought a four-plex. This property was a horrible purchase that had a negative cash flow, and I ended up having to let it go back to the bank. I gave up on the idea of investing, but now 3 years later I again am obsessed and have a huge dream of becoming a real-estate investor.
Challenges
I have some significant challenges. The first is I have suffered financially lately. A seven years ago I started a construction company that did very well, we rehabbed bank owned homes and did very well. But two years ago things changed and my business plummeted. I spent my entire savings paying employees that I kept way to long, I lost my four-plex because I could not continue to absorb the negative cash flow, I lost my Mercedes, and now I make about a tenth of what I made when things were going well. I went from being a successful business owner to a substitute teacher who does construction jobs for the banks on the side. Another challenge I have is I live in a very conservative town in central California and I am a gay man. As a result, I am not as good at networking as I should be. I assume people are going to not accept me that I try to hid who I am, instead of being comfortable around these people who I share interests with. Third, in addition to having a very low financial situation, I also have horrible credit. A couple years ago I had great credit, but after all the things that happened in the past couple years it has plummeted. Finally, I am very nervous about talking to sellers, the idea of trying to buy their home for 50-70 cents on the dollar scares the crap out of me. I feel like I am taking advantage of them. I realize there are situations where this is in their best interest and I am trying to wrap my head around that, but it has been a struggle.
Advantages
I have a few advantages. The biggest is, although my credit is horrible, my husbands was not attached to anything that went south. So he still has decent credit. The second possibility I have is that our home has equity (I can pull out about 80k while keeping 20% equity) and we can refinance that out being that Josh (my husband) has decent credit. Another advantage is that I have a construction background and know how things get done. I feel that will be an advantage when managing contractors. Finally, I think my biggest advantage is my love of real-estate.
Plan
My plan is to refinance our house, pull out 80K and buy a property to flip. I am not sure how I will find that property, but I am going to start going to the REIA locally and maybe I can meet a wholesaler that has a good deal. I also want to be more active on Bigger Pockets. Finally, I plan to start a website that chronicles my journey as an investor.