All Forum Posts by: Aaron Godfred

This is a great article about home buying in Los Angeles.  I especially appreciate the frank advice one of the commenters left. 

https://la.curbed.com/2017/7/13/15951074/buy-house...

Let me tell you how smart buyers are getting deals done these days. 1. the offer price matters the most. 2. short contingencies are key. you can offer to do your inspections in 7 days – the reality is once you are in escrow if you need a few days more, most sellers will not be in a position to do anything about it. they don’t want to try and re-create the bidding scenario again. Also, at the end of day 7, you usually make a repair request and then it can take days more to hammer out an agreement. 3. Savvy buyers remove the appraisal contingency. Since they still have a loan contingency its basically a silent contingency. If you need to cancel because the loan isn’t happening due to an appraisal issue your mortgage broker just tells them the loan isn’t getting approved. you have the loan contingency and that’s all you really need. 4. include a letter about yourself – what you do for a living etc. without it your offer is just a piece of paper with a name – the sellers don’t know who you are and it helps if they have a sense of who they are dealing with. you can even BS a bit and say you really need to close soon for whatever reason – maybe kids are starting school – Sellers like motivation attached to offers – they will believe you will be less likely to walk away or cancel over an inspection item. Flippers BS all the time and tell Sellers they love the house and want to live in it with their family and then as soon as it closes the wrecking ball arrives. 5. the buyer’s agent needs to write a good clean offer without missing stuff – I see half assed sloppy offers all the time and that just means I have to clean it up with a counter. If you have to generate a counter that slows the process down. 6. The buyer’s agent should ask how long of an escrow period is desired by the seller, what escrow and title company they prefer etc and then write that all in your offer – again to try to get it accepted without needing a counter. 7, Bully offers work- writing way over asking and demanding acceptance before the 1st open house. It goes back to my first point – money talks. you have to play the game.

Thanks for the advice @Moshe H.

Hi BP friends! 

The day is finally here. I've had an offer on a 4-plex accepted and am looking for an investor checklist for closing, general words of wisdom as I go through the inspection process or any other things I should be thinking about over the next weeks. I've got a good agent and feel comfortable with her holding my hand through this but I'm the type to double check everything so I also want to know what to do own my own. Thank you!

Thanks for the update Adrian. I'm looking at purchasing a fixer Los Angeles duplex under rent control and wondering the same thing. Anyone else out there have experience with this?

Hi BP friends!

I'm excited to join this real estate investing community. I've wanted to invest in an income property for over 15 years and have decided that 2017 is my year. I've got a demanding full-time job at a startup and am burning the midnight oil listening to BP podcasts, scouring Redfin and Zillow and talking to anyone who knows anything about the Los Angeles market. Since I'm making up for lost time I'm targeting a 4-10 unit for my first investment and have a few partners on board to invest. 

I'm looking in a variety of neighborhoods in the greater LA area including Culver City, West Adams, Midtown, Van Nuys, North Hollywood and Glendale but the challenge is making the numbers work in this white-hot market. I'm also considering something out of town or out of state but ideally I'd invest locally for my first property. Any LA investors out there with some words of encouragement for someone just starting out?

I look forward to connecting,

Aaron