All Forum Posts by: Jonathan Tavarez

Hi BP fam.

I have been trying to understand this for some time, in my area hard money lenders won't do loans if the person purchasing the property with the loan plans to move to the property after rehab, what is the reason for this?  In my mind if I purchase a property with hard money then worst case scenario I refinance after 6 months and then do whatever with the property, is this a problem?

@Michael C. that is definitely a perk up there, I saw 2000 sqft houses with excellent schools for $250K and I immediately told my wife if it wasn't for the cold I would seriously consider moving up here.

@Caleb Heimsoth I have been in Maryland for 10 years now and I used to think like that but then a few weeks ago I took a trip to Rochester, NY and then I was so happy to have my home in MD LOL.

@Mitch Messer Thanks for the information Mitch, I will have to take a look and see if there is more than one way to do this process.  So far the only place I have seen these cases is the district court, but I will do a few calls and see what I can find.  Many thanks for the information.

@Thierry Lemercier Both areas are good and have seen a good price increase with all the recent developments.  Fine tune your strategy (rental, flip, airbnb, etc.), budget and reach out if you have any questions.  Best of luck!

Hi @Thierry Lemercier,

My generic answer is "money", it really comes down to "money" (since most likely at the beginning it could be hard to get really discounted properties). Well the real answer is strategy lol, but let me explain my comment about money. Maryland has some great areas to invest but for example if your budget is $100K or less then most likely you will have to go to Baltimore and surrounding areas, when you hit the $250K or $300K that opens up much more (Laurel, Columbia, Olney, etc.) but if you have a good crew and bigger than $350K budget then you can play with DC and some areas in VA but overall I think choosing your budget should be step one to then determine where you want to go. Best of luck!!!

Investment Info:

Single-family residence fix & flip investment.

Purchase price: $135,000
Cash invested: $50,000
Sale price: $245,000

Baltimore flip in Brooklyn Park (anne arundel county)

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

I love the Brooklyn Park area in Baltimore, there are some good houses for rehabs and competitive prices. I also believe the area will increase in price in the next few years with all the developments going around in the area and investor activity.

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

The deal was a Hubzu foreclosure, it took some negotiation because of the amount of offers but not too complicated.

How did you finance this deal?

Investor and hard money

How did you add value to the deal?

We finished the basement, added a second bathroom, new AC, new water heater, garden work among other things.

What was the outcome?

We made some money

Lessons learned? Challenges?

I was trying my same crew but added an investor/contractor to the mix as a test run to move in to more complicated deals. There was some communication issues and I think the renovation contract needed to be more specific since usually I run things with my vision but this time instructions were coming from 2 different directions and so at some point we found ourselves debating on things that should have been resolved at the beginning with original contract.

Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

I have lenders, contractors and agents that I can recommend, please reach out if you would like more information

Hi @Carl Martin,

I'm an investor in the DMV area and my wife is a realtor with keller williams so we run a little family team doing rentals, flips and a little bit of real estate notes.  It looks like you are from La Plata MD and I'm assuming you probably want to invest in that area, so probably I can't help you BUT I wanted to give you some advise because I have been there where you are today.  First budget, usually to find a realtor willing to work on properties under $100K is a little challenging because they get almost nothing on commission (sometimes what I do is charge a fee for the service in addition to the commission) so just keep that in mind.  Second a lot of realtors are not investor friendly and honestly I feel like the culture of the business is kind of not in that line, their best costumers are first time home owners (they overpay and dont ask too many questions lol) so what really makes a realtor "investor friendly" are the ones that are ok getting in to horrible properties or horrible areas and are ok making less money on a few deals because they know you will buy more from them.  The last thing I wanted to mention is maybe include in your post the specific cities you want to invest, your budget and what type of investments you will be working on (cosmetic rehabs, full gut, foreclosures, etc.) in that way the realtor will know what to expect.  Best of luck and if you need help in the DMV area let me know.

Hi BP family,

I have been looking in to eviction cases in my area (Anne Arundel County, Maryland) trying to get a pool of potential landlords for targeted mail (with the purpose of wholesaling). Probably I’m a pessimistic in this regard but I was expecting way more cases and each week I can say I’m lucky if I’m able to find 5. To make matters worse a lot of them are not individuals but rather companies submitting evictions and so there is no point of targeting those. I’m curious how’s the experience of other BP members that have implemented a similar strategy (I think this county has a population of around 700K), but again even when I include other counties is not that many. Let me know what you all think.

@Solomon Morris best of luck with your new property!!