All Forum Posts by: Keith Bloemendaal

 Actually, they are my prospects, I want them to sell my properties and bring their buyers to me, it's the other way around. 

It is not "douchey" but like others, I love the use of the word! 

To each there own, but I find FB to be a great place to talk about what I have going on. I am actually connected to hundreds of realtors local and regionally on FB and many show interest, send me messages to find out progress, etc... Really it depends on what your goals are and where your target market is located. 

With FB it's simple:

Pay to boost. 

Pay for Likes.

Post 2-3 times a day relevant material. 

You can use a very small budget to do this, I think I spent $40 to get over 250 likes to my page over a couple of weeks. 

Oh, and I do build 5-6 blocks from the ocean and out of the flood, so my pilings only have to go 8-10', so that makes a difference, but not $100/ft different....

Wow, I live in coastal NC and build elevated homes that are under 2k ft for ~$100per ft and sell at $200+ per foot. I just can't imagine it costing 2x as much in Pinellas, an area I am familiar with. I am curious how you end up on this....

I do both, but to me, development is "curb down", ie: roads, grading, clearing, utilities, stormwater, etc... construction is vertical construction, or "curb up". 

So if you buy a plot of land and subdivide into let's say 10 lots, get it ready to build on by installing the infrastructure, that's a developer to me, then a GC comes in and buys lots to build on. At least that is how it happens around here...

I typically use the municipality's GIS and public record info to see if anything has sold recently around the property and for how much per sq ft. I have a Realtor I work with, so I just get them to do comps for me too. 

 Exactly, and I knew this going in as to funding with banks. It still wasn't easy, but I did find a community bank I had funded construction with as a PM in previous years and had built a relationship with. Even with a partner who had financial assets to more than cover the construction loans, a lot of banks won't touch us because of our being new, so that relationship building I did in previous employment is paying off. This goes for suppliers snd subs as well, but that is another story...

@Don Harris hits the nail. I just ventured out on my own to build new homes, I do have experience and have built 150 homes in the last 3 years as the project manager and have been in construction over 20yrs with at least have of that in management positions or ownership positions (subcontractor). 

When I decided 6mos ago to do this, I did a thorough competitive market analysis with my realtor based mostly upon lot prices, per sq foot sale prices and per square foot construction costs. I kept my number very conservative so it wasn't sugar coated. Then I pitched it to about 20 possible private lenders. I finally got introduced to someone looking to invest. We met and went over basics. He liked it so we continued the conversation further and more details. I had a plan designed, ran hard construction numbers, picked out potential lot locations, etc... I have about 30 pages of details. 

Long story short, we partnered as 50/50, he puts up the cash for the lots, signs with me for the construction loans, and we split the profits 50/50. I have 4 lots under contract and should be starting my first home next week. I put $0 into this deal and we plan on trying to build 6-8 homes this year under this partnership. 

Don't give up!

Although I have heard ATL area is coming back nicely, my father has a rental home 3800+ sq ft he built 5yrs ago that he can't even sell for $100 per sq ft north of Atlanta. Make sure you do a proper competitive market analysis. Are you the general contractor or are you looking to develop and sell to home builder? 

In my area, I can get a development shovel ready in 6mos or less, and my typical *ball park per lot development costs are $20k depending on size/scope. I recently helped a developer put together a 19 lot piece with 5K-6K sq ft lots and it ended up being $15k per lot plus indirect costs (engineering, stormwater permits, DOT permits etc...) I generally start at $20k per lot, check zoning, allow for roads and stormwater and see if it comes close to working before even entertaining it.