What do you actually do between “this deal looks good” and making an offer?

Question

I’ve been trying to get a better grasp on how investors move from doing a quick deal analysis to actually feeling confident enough to take the plunge.

From what I've seen in past discussions, crunching the numbers seems to be the easy part. The tough part is figuring out if the assumptions behind those numbers are legit.

For those of you who regularly dive into rental property analysis, I'd love to know what your process looks like once a property makes it past your initial screening.

1. What do you check before making an offer, and what can wait until after it’s accepted?

2. Where do you get your info — from websites, agents, property managers, contractors, county records, insurance quotes, etc.?

3. Do you keep everything in one spreadsheet or tool, or do you jump around to different places?

4. When one of your assumptions shifts, do you manually tweak the analysis and rerun everything?

5. What part of your workflow would you want to speed up or simplify?

I'm really curious about what experienced investors actually do in the real world. Thanks for sharing.

Denise Supplee · Answer

For me, the biggest thing is making sure the assumptions are realistic. Rents, expenses, insurance, taxes, repairs, and the condition of the property can change the whole picture. I like getting information from more than one source and asking questions when something doesn't look right. That's one thing I really value about our co-investing club too; having several people look at a deal can bring up things I may not have thought of. The numbers matter, but what's behind those numbers matters just as much.

Arman Ahmed · Answer

For me, once a deal passes the initial numbers, I focus on verifying the assumptions before getting too excited. I’ll confirm actual rents and comps, taxes, insurance, rehab costs, and the property’s condition, then have a local contractor or someone boots on the ground take a look if needed. I’d rather spend a little extra time upfront and kill a bad deal than discover the problem after closing. The spreadsheet is easy; getting reliable information is the real work.

What do you actually do between “this deal looks good” and making an offer?

2 Replies