All Forum Posts by: Christopher Dowling

This is bad news. Is there a strong mortgage broker lobby here that wants to marginalize the private lender?
It's the lenders that take the risk; why do they need a license to do that?

There's no such thing as 'too little $ for the stock market.' Making money is making money. TDAmeritrade will give you 100 free trades upon signing.
Commodities will continue to rise in price. The world population is growing at an ever-increasing rate and supply is not keeping up.
A good way to gain leverage is to seek out and invest in those companies that source the material. Think about it: PoG rises one dollar, what does that do for a miner that produces millions of ounces? Quite a bit.
It is a roller coaster, but the fundamentals are there for significant gains for the foreseeable future. With QE3 all but guaranteed, investors will continue to run to gold as they have been.
The demand for the metal will not go down in the manufacturing sector as China is cranking up to full capacity again and India will always buy; the 'safe haven' status will only get strengthened by the further debasement of currency.
SLW, SVM, GG, GORO are especially strong right now due to the consolidation in January.
XOM is also looking good.

Thanks for the contributions. An interesting back-and-forth to be sure.
On the buying side, rehabbing seems to fit my goals and risk tolerance profile the best. I will probably choose one of the forms of finance, though.
All I know is that whatever I choose, all the other options will seem like 'less work'!

My epic thread-starting prowess humbly accepts your gratitude. :D

This is definitely a concern and why I am getting an attorney involved early on the front end so I don't hemorrhage on the back end.
I've got the time to work for free to learn the ropes, as well.

You guys are amazing. Thanks to all who have put time into sorting out the options.
One of the variables that you've brought up is risk and I'd like to describe a little about my risk tolerance.
Because this money is coming out of a portfolio of highly speculative mining stocks that redefine 'volatile' I'm not going to get choked up if I lose money here and there. $80k swings in a matter of days is not uncommon in this basket of stocks so losing money in any reallocation of these funds is acceptable as long as the degree of risk is rewarded over time.
Also, no, $500k is not a lot of money in this game. It's a nice round number to start with to get an idea of what my options are going forward with a new challenge.
The main issue for me is finding the niche that I enjoy over the long term and that suits my skills (plus ROI!).
Again, you could be spending your time building your own enterprise but instead you are assisting me with no expectation of compensation and for that I can't express enough thanks.

I've started VanEd and it's pretty straight forward. I've done my share of lesson plans and I have had no problems with the way the course is structured. Is there anything specific that you'd like to know?

Jon & Jeffrey-thanks. Sounds like my initial interests are still the way to go.

Steve-thank you for your concern. I considered the vultures descending but felt accurate answers to my question were more important. Do you have an answer to my question?

I came to BP to learn how to buy multifamily property at a discount to either fix and flip (a la Nickerson) or hold for cash flow.
Obviously, BP is a vast, deep resource of knowledge and I have since been introduced to quite a few ways to allocate my capital. I would like to choose one avenue, learn as much as I can, and specialize in it over the mid- to long-term. Which leads me to my question: if you had $500k that you wanted to grow into, say, $2m as quickly as possible what would you do with it?
Some opportunities I am exploring:
Standard residential, self-managed
Commercial multifamily
Mobile home parks
Commercial (retail, etc)
Land and farm
SFR notes, NPN or otherwise
Commercial notes
Tax lein
Other?
My wife and I have excellent credit and look to use leverage to maximize our returns.

Thanks for your help.