All Forum Posts by: Lana Lee

Hi everyone. My business partner (ok, let's be honest, my girlfriend) and I started Desert Garden Properties, LLC, and bought two houses. Well, we only meant to buy one, but that's another story. Why the profile picture in the mountains of Idaho? Because last Fall we were pretty much planning on selling our own two houses, buying some sort of small RV, and backpacking around US National Parks and Wildnernesses using the RV as our base. We figured we'd start out doing that for about a year or so and see what happens, but we realized we'd have nothing to come back to and our cool houses (well, my average house and her really cool house) would be gone. Instead we decided to work toward building a business that we figured, if we worked hard at for a few years, and stayed in shape, we'd still be able to do our travel plan but be making money while on the trail and have something to come back to. Every few days we're like, "Now why didn't we just go backpacking?"

I'm 52 and from Boston and Melissa is 41 and from Philadelphia but we now call Phoenix, AZ our home. We love the desert. I work for Trader Joe's and while it's a cool company, it's still trading hours for dollars with someone else telling you when you have to work. No thank you. Not afraid of work by any means. I just want to do it more on my own terms. Melissa has several jobs which she loves including helping to run a wilderness education literacy-based program and teaching wilderness first aid. 

We love hosting and cooking for people and taking travelers on local hikes and mountain bike rides, etc. We like idea of providing people with a positive experience of living in or visiting Phoenix. Which brings us to our goals and dilemmas. We want to run an Airbnb. We want to run several Airbnb's. We want to be busy with visitors and then close up the places (or rent them for medium terms like for traveling nurses or project managers) and then take off and backpack for weeks at a time. We are interested in single-family and small multifamily. We have a ridiculous amount to learn. We are both very handy, quick learners, and have a few good resources up our sleeves. For instance her parents have owned a lot of real estate their whole lives and own a tax accounting business. I am shameless and bold and just introduce myself to people even though I feel like I have nothing to offer other than enthusiasm. I may have recently found a mentor and am very excited about that.

Oh and I heard about the podcast from Moises Acevez, a friend I work with who just got his real estate license. I didn't listen to my first podcast until weeks after he mentioned it to me. I now listen constantly and started reading some of the blogs and here I am joining the forums. I'll probably upgrade the membership soon, too. 

Thanks for reading if you made it through.

Peace,

David

Hi @,

Welcome to BP. 

You need to expand who you working with and get out at the networking trail to identify off market transactions for yourself. Also, buying mailing lists in areas you preferred for 4-10 unit property owners is important as well.

Let me know if you have any questions.

Regards Joe Scorese

Hello All!

Today I closed on my first investment property. Thank you to everyone that contributes not to this post but to the entire site as I've found so much useful nuggets to get this one done. I appreciate you 

 Glad to hear that!

CONGRATULATIONS!

How does that feel?

So did you end up applying for the mortgage first or HELOC. And did you use HELOC money for down payment on your first property?

Steve Vaughan that's a great idea! So you would pay the wholesaler an assignment fee, how you ever done that before? I feel as if a wholesaler wouldn't want to do that (I'm not sure though. Also, have you tried those other methods like you? How has it worked for you? Every time a deal goes on the mls for my market, it's gone extremely quick.

Hi guys, first time posting here. My brother and I are looking into buying duplexes in the suburbs around Philadelphia and New Jersey since that is where we grew up and currently live. I found a few duplexes that I feel I've ran the numbers including maintenance, vacancy etc and these properties should generate ~$200-300 cash flow a month once fully rented out. We plan on getting a few properties and generate the cash flow and leave it until we have enough for another property. We'll be putting 15% down and using a conventional loan at 30yrs fixed. 

I found these through real estate agents and looking online. I feel like I'm missing something though, these properties have been sitting online for months according to the websites. Can anybody give me an idea on something I may be missing or over looking as these seem maybe a little too good to be true? I appreciate the input guys. 

We use this strategy on our property in Hawaii. The key to it is understanding the fundamental difference between simple and compound interest. We were able to get a HELOC for 85% of the APPRAISED value of the home. This is drastically different than a HELOC based on a percentage of the equity in the home. Anyway, we took the HELOC and paid off the entire mortgage. Here is a quick rundown of numbers to help illustrate...

Appraised value= $725,000

Mortgage payment= $3200 monthly($1700 of each payment lost to interest)

HELOC= $600,000 @ 1.75% simple interest paid off the remaining mortgage balance of $533,000

New interest only payment= $770!

I charge my tenants $3650 monthly.

In real numbers all this equates to a savings of $364,000 in interest payments and the entire line paid off in 5-7 years. We take it a step further where we deposit our entire income into the HELOC. We're roughly depositing $18,000 monthly. You can just imagine how quickly we're attacking principle when our interest payment is only $770 and goes down with every payment. Another great feature is as we pay down the line we have access to it again.

Hi everyone,

I'm posting looking for advice, and to hopefully help educate future home-buyers!

So I just closed on a great deal in Philadelphia. A triplex in a hot area at a HUGE discount due to the fact that there is a squatter in the house. I'm told by the seller that the occupant has been there since 2012 and has avoided eviction a number of times. I believe they avoided eviction because the previous owner did not have all his ducks in a row. For example, taxes were owed, improper documentation, etc. This is not a malicious eviction, the people did not pay rent since 2012! I'd happily accept fair rent. 

So I'm going to attempt Cash for Keys with a mobile notary service present. If this does not work out, I am going to try and get the squatters to sign a lease so that I can proceed with the legal eviction process. Since I am dealing with seasoned squatters, I want to make sure I get this right the first time. 

My question is, What exactly do I need to do to prepare for the eviction process? I've applied for the Rental Licence, and once I have that I will get my Cert of Rental Suitability. I'm up to date on all bills as of the settlement date. Anything else I am missing? Any and all feedback welcome!

Thanks in advance!

Matt 

thank you so much Lana. I have to admit, we did do enough research and therefore we're in this ugly situation. A lot of what we're told was by the agent at the bank who helped us with the HELOC and the real estate agent. Assuming they were trying to be helpful, they kept saying it's okay, it's okay.

So you're saying that it's not an option to sell the property and use the gains to pay off the HELOC?