All Forum Posts by: Account Closed

@Johnetta Myers Congrats on getting started. The Metroplex is a great place for real estate. Decide which kind of investor you want to be (SFR, Commercial, Land, Tax Liens, HML, Multi-Family, Notes, Fix & Flip, Buy & Hold, "Subject To", apartments, duplexes, assisted living, REOs, Foreclosures, Short Sales), etc.. Decide how much money you have access to, & the zip codes, city or state you want to focus on. That will determine the next step. Outline where you want to be in five years. Put it all in writing. Start working your plan. There are plenty of people around to help you each step of the way.

@Account Closed I think Maryland has a high transfer tax on houses, so call a Title company and ask how much that will be in your situation. You can expect to pay a real estate agent 5% to 6% with no guarantee which month the house will sell. There will other closing costs, but those are the big ones. That being said, unless you plan on moving back to the house in the future I'd cut my loses and move on to Texas. It can be a headache to be a long distance "accidental landlord" since your "head" isn't going to be into it and there isn't enough upside to off set the hassle factor.

@Andrey Y. I realize that is "tongue in cheek". The issue isn't so much whether one can make a profit on a Fix & Flip currently in those areas, but more of the risk factor for Buy & Hold. I'm told you can make great percentages on Fix & Flips in Detroit, (which used to be wealthier than New York and at one time was the wealthiest city in America) but because of the way the politicians have run Detroit and other cities like Chicago and Los Angeles, the long term is shaky for them. Buying & Holding in those cities will be rocky for the foreseeable future, just based on their unfunded liabilities that investors tend to ignore and shouldn't, IMHO. "Everything is Rosey" (for now). If your future retirement is based on Buy & Hold, it is a risk factor.

@Jacob Hartman @Ryan Sullivan  @Joseph McGranaghan

 If you want clarity in how much it matters which state you pick, see this post.

https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/311/topics/45...

@Joseph McGranaghan

@Paul Parker Paul, I have it broken down to how much tax I have to pay on the profit. If it doesn't eventually get to my pocket, it is a cost. Power, garbage, HOA, pizza for the crew, everything gets thrown onto the spreadsheet both before for projected costs and afterward for actual cost.

@Philip Breeden My college degree slowed me down. I wasted time because I could have used the same 4 years to build an income stream from real estate that allowed me to go to college for as long as I liked without worrying about income. Think this one through. If your goal is real estate, college doesn't get you there.

States raise real estate rates and reduce services when they start failing. People start migrating OUT of those states. And to add high taxes to already high taxes, Seattle is trying to put an income tax together "for the rich". We know that always creeps down the line and landlords and property owners will pick up the tab. 

Canary In The Coal Mine: Unfunded Liabilities Have Turned Illinois Into A "Banana Republic"

The state is buried debt, and hasn’t passed a budget in over 700 days. 100% of their monthly revenue is being consumed by court ordered payments, and the Illinois Department of Transportation has revealed that they may not be able to pay contractors (who are working on over 700 infrastructure projects) after July 1st if the state doesn’t pass a budget. To top it all off, the state’s credit rating is one step away from junk status, the lowest of any state. Because of these factors, Illinois may become the first state to declare bankruptcy since the Great Depression.

Governor Bruce Rauner has gone so far as to call his state a “banana republic.”

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-23/canary-co...

In other words, any financial calamity that occurs at the national level, would be magnified at the state level. The economy of these states would fall into a tailspin, which would make life for the average person exceedingly difficult.

So which states should you avoid? There are three factors you should look out for. There’s the amount of debt as a percentage of the state’s GDP, the amount of debt per person (debt per capita), and the state’s current credit rating.

The 10 states with the worst debt to GDP ratios are:

• New York-22.71%
• South Carolina-21.31%
• Rhode Island-19.40%
• Washington-18.83%
• Florida-18.65%
• Kentucky-18.50%
• Illinois-18.45%
• Connecticut-17.52%
• California-17.18%
• Pennsylvania-17.17%

The 10 states with the most debt per person are:

• Massachusetts-$11,337.63
• Connecticut-$9,297.33
• Rhode Island-$8,919.27
• Alaska-$8,516.41
• New Jersey-$7,517.15
• New York-$7,040.97
• Hawaii-$6,194.64
• New Hampshire-$6,152.00
• Delaware-$5,962.86
• Vermont-$5,259.69

And perhaps the most important factor is the credit rating of any given state. This gives you a good idea of how investors think a state will fare financially in the future, as opposed to a state’s current financial woes. According to credit rating agencies like Standard and Poor’s, as of last year the states with the five worst credit ratings are:

• Illinois-BBB
• New Jersey-A
• Kentucky-A+
• California-AA-
• Connecticut-AA-

Though those ratings don’t look too bad, it’s important to keep in mind that those states have had sub-par credit ratings for a long time. There’s no indication that they’re going to get their act together any time soon, because they’ve been teetering on the edge for years. When the next wave of the economic collapse hits, these states (along with states that topped the first two lists, such as New York, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, South Carolina, and Connecticut) are going to be the first to feel the pain.

@Justin B. 

You're my kinda guy if you track Zerohedge. 

But OUCH, most of those gross profits hurt! I always CLEARED at least $35k when I was flipping and made as high as $250k Cleared (after rehab costs and carrying costs are deducted). 

Now I can get $40k doing Subject To and not have to rehab. Flipping is for people that are bad at math. ;-)

Realtor.com says the Average Net is $15,000 per flip. Yikes!

@Justin B. Go to the county website for new filings of Deeds of Trust for the newest or simply ask a Title Company in your area. It's simple, it's done everyday. I guess it would be faster if you showed up to the closings, but that might get tedious. ;-)