All Forum Posts by: Michael Borger

Hi Tyler. I started out wholesaling but now almost exclusively flip. Wholesaling is a great way to get started, especially here on Oahu with our expensive housing market. You could certainly hit a home run here and there, but I don't know anyone at the moment making a full-time living out of it. You could be the first, though! Just takes one deal, right?

Hi Noel. Welcome to BP. I'm also here on Oahu (Honolulu). There's a ton of useful information here and a very active forum, so just stay plugged in. If you need any specific help here and there, feel free to shoot me a line.

Mike Borger

My experience with leasehold is limited, but I generally agree with @Joe Sillaman . I'm about to list a townhouse flip for sale in Pearl City that I recently acquired. It was leasehold but the only reason I agreed was that the fee was also available for purchase, so I made sure to acquire both.

Well apparently I don't have a crystal ball like you do. You can estimate future appreciation all you like, but you have no real knowledge of what will actually occur. You're gambling that the market will act in some future way banking on the 'the past indicates the future' principle. That's speculating. If it's your form of investing, then I suppose it's one and the same, but you can't say it's not speculating.

Would your example of the prediction have held up if we were discussing this in 2007?

@Denise Dresbach I flip houses on Oahu, based in Honolulu, and I can tell you that this is NOT a cash-flow market. Can it be done? Sure, mainly by finding a distressed property you can get cheap enough and not paying too high in financing (if not sinking your cash into it). Or perhaps the vacation rental route like Micki says - I don't get overly involved in those. But Hawaii is not where people generally come to find cash flow deals. Our price points are just too high compared to rents, not even accounting for condo fees.

Some of my private lenders have said they'd like to find something that cash flows well enough but they just can't find them.

I suppose you may be able to find something that breaks even and then you hope for appreciation -- but that's speculating, not being a wise investor.

I'm also here on Oahu, Steven. I'm strictly an investor -- not realtor -- but I don't see why you would have to use the state contract. That being said, if you're unsure then I don't know of any reason why you wouldn't use it. The top of the contract basically includes language stating that it is for the general use of the real estate industry. Better to be safe than sorry, I suppose. However, if a wholesaler brings me a deal, I don't care whether it's on the state contract or not, as long as the contract language itself is acceptable.

Hi Jason - welcome to real estate on Oahu. I'm actually a coach with the FortuneBuilders program and I can't say enough about it, having gone through the training myself, but I've never heard of this Yancey fellow so I can't comment on that.

Regardless, the above posters are correct in that there's a ton of information here on BP. There's also the HIREI group that meets the first Thursday evening of every month at the Japanese Cultural Center on Beretania Street. You should go and meet some folks to get an idea of the general scene here before you decide whether a mentoring program is right for you. There are 101 different ways to be a 'real estate investor', so you need to learn about what's available a bit before deciding what path you want your real estate career to take.

The mentoring programs will always be available, so there's no hurry to rush into one if you don't think it's a good fit. For now, I'd suggest just being active in the forums and go through some getting started guides. That alone will be a big help in getting your real estate career going and exposing you to the core fundamentals.

Welcome to BP, John, and the local Hawaii real estate investor scene. I'm putting together a couple flips out your way right now -- lots of opportunities.

The most important thing is to get educated in the beginning and then put a solid plan into action. Too many people spend too much time learning before they ever start doing anything. Get your basics together and then start marketing. It doesn't happen overnight, but that's a good thing for those of us with a long-term business outlook.

Aloha,

Mike

Hi folks. I'm in multiple active flips here on Oahu and picking up another one next week. BUT - I'm hungry for more! (and more and more and more...)

I really want to work with some quality wholesalers here who are actively marketing for deals. BP seems like the right place to connect with some, right?

Not only will you get your wholesale fee, of course, but I'll show you my deal breakdown so you get some education out of it as well (I'm a coach in a well-know RE education program). I realize many people wholesale as a way to get into flipping (I did), so I'm happy to share some tips of how I put my deals together.

Want to get a hold of me? Just Contact Me Here or call the phone # on that site.

Thanks,

Mike Borger

Oahu Home Buyers

Hi, Sylvia. I'm based in Honolulu - there are definitely people investing in Hawaii. Of course, "investing" means different things to different people.

What's the story of the condo in Maui? Current value vs asking price? And, more importantly, what's your exit strategy if you acquire it? Buy and hold? Flip?