All Forum Posts by: Chris Gillins

@Matthew Rembish Why in the world do you think that you could resell a cash buyer a lead from Zillow, Redfin, Craigslist, or Homepath? Despite whatever you may have heard from the late night get rich quick scheme, or the weekend upsell conference, you cannot get something for nothing. If you cannot tell me as the end buyer what the ARV is, my rehab costs and my end profit, on a deal that I cannot get myself, why would we talk? Especially when your just pulling MLS listings that someone else has already put the time and effort into. Wholesalers need to provide so much more to their end buyers.

Go back and listen to every podcast from BP on wholeselling, there is a lot of useful info there. Checkout www.listsource.com, figure out your target market and start sending out mailers to garner those golden nugget off market leads.

@James M. 

Welcome to BP! You will be amazed at the amount of information contained herein and the outstanding networking opportunities. My wife and I are just getting into the real estate game ourselves, we just bought our first home in Woodland, not too far from you. I am fixing up the main house and we have a detached shop with a 1 bed rental above. Once the main house is completely renovated we will refinance/cash out and use that to kick start my General Contracting/Flipping Business. 

A great place to start learning the lingo is also;

http://http://www.biggerpockets.com/real-estate-investing

Good Luck!!

@Robert Kenny One thing to bear in mind with the USDA Loan, they can take an extremely long time to close. We were able to purchase our first home/rental property because a previous buyer tried to go with the USDA Loan and ran out of time extensions waiting on the folks at Rural Development, so we were able to scoop it up when it was re-listed. The FHA 203b & 203k programs are a lot cleaner and faster to close.

@Account Closed ,

I am currently working for a General Contractor - Stellar J - in Woodland, and renovating our first home. I have worked in both the Residential and Commercial sectors, and have a degree in Construction Management. After we get this house and Apartment (detached 1bd over the shop at the back of the property) renovated, we will do a cash out refi and then I'll be going full time on my own as a remodeler/flipper/GC. I also managed a 24 unit apartment complex while going to school. My main area of expertise is in rough framing and finish carpentry and I am a woodworker by hobby, but I can pretty much do it all. 

Right now all of my time is wrapped up in my W-2 job and flipping our home, but in a few months I will be looking to take on weekend side jobs. 

Hey Joe, 

I wouldn't say it's a deal breaker, especially in the area where we live, (I'm up in Woodland) this is pretty common. The black specs that appear in your photos just look like mildew, not mold, so some quick clean up with bleach should remove that issue. Is there a sump pump installed in the crawlspace low point? If not, a little bit of work with a shovel, some gravel and piping and you can get this taken care of on a weekend. I would also recommend looking at crawlspacedepot.com, they have a pretty good selection of products that are not terribly expensive if you want to go with the full waterproofing route. It might be worth a trip down to the local municipality, either clark county, or City of Vancouver, depending on where you live, to check out the site drainage plans and see what's going on there. 

Good luck!

Adam, 

I am in the process of closing on our first purchase which is a cosmetic fixer SFR with a detached shop that has a Mother-in-Law suite above that we will be renovating & renting out. The home is a HomePath property, however, due to demand in the area, we had to purchase closer to the top of our budget, such that we could not include any renovation costs. I went with a standard FHA 3.5% down loan, because that was easier to secure through my lender than any other loan type. One issue that we have had come up, is that a previous buyer was attempting to purchase the home using a USDA loan, but ran out of time to get through needed USDA appraisals. The problem is now because our escrow is being held by the same title company as the previous sale, and Fannie Mae is having issues returning the Escrow to the previous buyer, we are not able to get our title report. Ergo, we are unable to move forward, because our title report cannot be completed until the escrow is cleared from the previous buyer. And getting any response out of Fannie Mae, has been worse than pulling teeth. You are dealing with a Government entity that at best is semi-responsive.

That would be the downside, the upside is that there are deals out there that are homepath properties, so if your willing to jump through the hoops it is worth it. You have the flexibility to include renovation costs if you owner occupy, and there are loans available for investors, but require higher down payments, and you have to wait for a "first look" period of I think 20 days before you can offer as an investor. If you keep your eye on the properties sometimes they deeply discount the units to unload their inventory. For example, our appraisal came back at $19K over our purchase price, and that is without any renovation. Good luck!

So I thought I would jump back into posting since I have been doing lots of reading, and listening to all the podcasts. Great work Josh & Brandon, keep it up!

So our situation is this; we currently rent a 2/2 apartment, been saving for over a year, and have been looking to purchase our first property. With 3 kids we need more space than what we currently have, and quickly discovered that having a yard is a definite must have. After looking for a duplex in Vancouver, WA (the original) that has 3 beds and a yard, we realized that even the distressed properties were out of our price range, with the market heating up. So we looked into buying a re-habber, but there was a lot of competition, and we just couldn't connect on a deal after multiple offers made. 

Undaunted we did not settle into paying more than what we wanted or knew a house was worth, and kept looking for that ideal first home; a flip that had rental potential in the form of a detached building we could convert to a rental, an unfinished basement, etc. (I'll do all the work myself, as construction is my profession). We looked at 203K, HomePath, REO's you name it. Finally 2 weeks ago, we got back from a camping trip, checked Redfin, and there it was. The house we had previously put an offer on, was back on the market. It's a 4/2/2 with a separate detached shop that has a MIL suite over the shop, that just needs a little kitchenette to be rent ready. We offered right away, slightly above asking as it's a Fannie Mae and well below market value, and I know I can easily get the 1% rule or better renting out both units down the road. The other buyer tried to go USDA (not sure if they tried direct or guaranteed), but they ran out of extensions, so Fannie Mae put the house back on the market, and we had kept an eye on the house through Redfin.

Purchase Price = $177,000

Loan = FHA 203b = 3.5% Down

Low out of pocket entry into real estate investing with no outside (Bank of Mom) help, with plenty of equity and room for a family = Priceless

Hit me up if you want more details, I'll keep posting here as the process continues, our inspection is Thursday, fingers crossed nothing comes up!

As a responsibly armed american, I can say without a doubt in my mind that if we don't exercise our rights we will lose them. And as a father of 3 and the sole income earner, I carry everyday. For me the Smith & Wesson M&P Shield in 9mm is the complete package for all day, everyday carry. Or I'll switch out to a  G19 or full size M&P Pro. But beyond just carrying, and getting your permit, get TRAINED!  As famed firearms instructor, Massad Ayoob puts it, "It is not the gun that frightens the hardened criminal, but the resolute person behind it".

 I would also encourage everyone reading this thread to check out the USCCA. They have great material covering everything concealed carry, as well as offer very affordable legal insurance, should (God forbid) you be forced to use deadly force to protect yourself or others. It's the only kind of protection that I know of, and would be very comforting to have at your back should you ever be forced into that situation. Being judged by 12 is much better than buried by 6, but is also very expensive........

https://www.usconcealedcarry.com/

Help!!! We need an experienced Realtor for the Woodland, WA market who has actually done multiple FHA/USDA loans and understands what a newbie investor is looking for. First time purchase and we need it to count for the asset column. Any suggestions?!?

As long as you adhere to the requirements for the USDA loan, it should not be an issue. You cannot buy a property with USDA as an investment, it must be for your personal residence and you must live there for at least 1 year. Given that you already have a rental property you may be subject to closer scrutinization but that should not affect your ability to secure the loan. We recently heard of a couple who was declined an FHA loan because they already had two government backed loans, loan fraud is not something to play around with...