All Forum Posts by: Michael Haynes

Hello Damary Fletcher and son. Do you know that you can Sell your Residence after two to five years Tax-free up to $250,000 in Profit? At the moment, you can Buy cheaper than Rent if you have the Downpayment etc. The safest thing for you and your son is to learn how to use Zillow and do your Daily online Search for a place to Buy. I tell my Tenants who look to me for advice on trying to get a place and escape from the Rat Race, that you should draw a 5 mile circle on the map where you have your JOB or go to school. Look for Houses, Duplexes, Townhomes and Condos separately. Compare the prices For Sale. Become familiar with what is being offered and in what areas. Find a prospective property and drive the neighborhood. Some of the Real Estate sites give you lots of information concerning Crime. I just paid Cash for a nice 3/3 Townhome with garage and pool in Valrico to get away from the mess in Tampa and the most crimes here are Shoplifting and Car Theft. If you want to Invest in Real Estate in your situation, you should look to start with a Home and hold onto it long enough to realize some Appreciation in the property before you Sell Tax-free as your Residence. Don't forget to Homestead for the Tax reduction and if you never bought a home before you could qualify for all the First Time Home Buyer discounts which include help from the City and Lenders. Tax-free and Tax-deferred Investing is working smarter and not harder. 

Hello Nick Flint. The BP guys are great with the numbers, but, no one emphasizes that after two years your Residence is a Tax-free Sale up to $250,000. The best way for me is to find the fixer upper that I would move into. Live in your first one for the two years or more and find another to fix up to rent and move to when you sell your Residence. You always look for the area that you would want to live in. You could plan to move Up in size and ammenities and not horizontally. Don't forget to register for the Homestead exemption. That's the Tax-free way to have your Buy and Hold with only one Rental and Tenants for the Longterm. Then, you both have JOB's with enough current Income to put you both in the top 10% of inhabitants of this Planet Earth. That is the safest way to Invest in Real Estate as you can always just live in your Home while you wait for the Real Estate Cycle to play itself out and you only have one Tenant to worry about. If you want to take on more Risk, then, learn how to Trade Futures or Directional Options on Stocks like those guys who just piled on to create those Short Squeezes in the Market.                          

Hello Nick DeMatteo, I sold my four Commercial lots on Dale Mabry and Interbay in March for $370,000 to the guys at Beggins Century 21 on Neptune and Dale Mabry. John Lum is the Developer there and he built the 15 acres with 500 new Townhomes and Apartments behind the Home Depot on Dale Mabry and Gandy Blvd. He is building two, two story Duplexes on my four lots. Two one way on Roberts and two the other way on Mango as these were lots on the corner. You know they will ask more than $500,000 each when done. I took my profits and moved to a 3/3 Townhome in Valrico to get away from all the negatives in Tampa. My Agent in Brandon has a son who is a Builder and he has been looking for lots to build in S. Tampa and cannot find affordables. That is why the Builders started building out the West side of Dale Mabry three years ago, because the East side is so expensive to buy a tear down house to build those big, two story homes. The Market is at a Top. I made the mistake of not Selling some of my Rentals in South Tampa, in 2008 when the Government supported the Banks and destroyed the Middle Class and the Builders. I thought that a 10 to 20% drawdown is common for the Stock Market and then we lost 60% of our property values in South Tampa. I know three Builders in South Tampa that lost 120 and more Rentals in 2008. We have a new Administration and they are not Business friendly and looking to seize all the Money. If you were in California you might feel the pinch more severely than how we have it so good, here in Tampa...but, I would not want to start a new project at this time with prices at the top. Take the Money and Invest in something that does not require so much Rehab and Permits and Inspections. You don't need the Money, so, why look to do the Work? 

Hello Armend M. I just moved from Tampa to get away from all the insanity and crime. I paid Cash for a 3/3 Townhome behind the Home Depot in Valrico in a really quiet, clean, small gated Community with a pool. Soon as I moved in I found a 3/2 pool home to bid on for a Rental and asked my Agent for a recommendation for a licensed Handyman. She said she uses https://www.thehoneydocrew.com...

Hello Zaid, I don't know why everyone is always looking for your "Legal way out." That involves Time and lots of Money and lost Rents. The Deadbeat don't have the Rent. Ask It if they will accept a couple hundred dollars to just move and give you the key? Give them a Three Day Notice to begin the Eviction process, so, they know they are leaving soon. Stop fooling around with Management! The Day tenants are Late on Rent you put up a Three Day Notice on their door...period. In Tampa you have to have a Witness sign and date the Notice or take a picture of it on the door for the liberal Judges we have that will not Evict and make you go to Mediation where they will give them another 90 days without paying, before they leave and consider you a "Sucker." You can't evict right now because Biden gave them another few months without paying, but, you have to go through the motions and not get cornered by the tenant and start a push and shove where they call the Police and you get arrested for Domestic Dispute. That happened to me twice, after the 2008 Collapse of our Economy. The cops in Tampa are hungry to arrest anyone and get your prints and give you record. Did you see that the Fed's are investigating the L.A. cops for having Police Gangs? This is real. The cops and the tennats  are not your friends and that is one reason to just pay to get the key and get them out. I'll bet that your fourplex is on the East side of I275...

Hello Alan Davidson. I just paid Cash for a 3/3 Townhome behind the Home Depot in Valrico. Moved from the 3/1 house that I rented for 11 years in North Seminole Heights, Tampa. Just lived there for 2 years to make it my next Tax-free Sale of a Residence. I am asking $200,000. I will clear $80,000 profit and the mortgage was paid off by the sale off the Commercial. Sold my 4 Commercial lots off Dale Mabry Hwy and Interbay after 20 years of renting the 3/1 house for $1000 a month. I cleared $340,000 on that Buy and Hold. My partner and I used to attend a few REIA meetings 20 years ago to see what the guys were doing and make connections for a Team and Financing. We did one fixer upper for a profit and split up. He ended up with 90 Trailer and Modular Homes on individual lots all over the Bay Area. In a year they are usually Cash Cows and after he aquired a few he started to Bundle his Mortgages to get better terms and more Cash Back and it just kept growing from there. I also have houses that I built in Brazil where I will be retiring to when I sell the Tampa house and get the Johnson and Johnson vaccination. I don't want to have to stick around for two shots over three weeks and then get my Health Card to travel with, every two years or so. I have a small farm and mountain property where I will partner with my neighbor to raise 60 head of cattle. I have a beach home on a hill and 7 Kitchinete apartments, three hours East of Rio. The Buy and Hold thing takes ten to twenty years to fruition, depending on what point in the Real Estate Cycle you buy to fix up and if you can buy multi-family to start with. Rental Homes don't pay for themselves. That is why Newbies can start with Flips and work up some Capital and experience until their Cup Runeth Over with Cash. Or play it safe and fix up a house to be your Residence for two years or more. That way it will be Tax-free when you sell it. During that two years or more you just find one fixer upper to Rent until you will move in there and make that one your Tax-free Rental. Then, it is just Do It Again Sam the rest of your life as your Tax-free Buy and Hold. When I started studying 30 years ago, they always said that the majority of millionaires made their money with Real Estate Investing, not Flips. Takes time. Do you have the Time? The other caveat is to never trust any "Teacher" who has not already made a Million. The quickest way to learn any task is to Apprentice with a Mentor. BP and plenty of other guys have youtube videos on How to Make a Million in Five or Ten Years with Rentals. "Practice makes Perfect," but, it has to be Perfect Practice with a Mentor who could be your experienced Real Estate Partner. When I started 30 years ago to buy Rental Duplexes and Houses in South Tampa, my Broker was Bill Davidson. He was an older Business Major who had a Ford Dealership in Bradenton and retired as a Broker in S. Tampa. Bill was finding me properties that were not advertising correctly. The ads would only mention one house or one side of the duplexes and nothing about two lots. My neighbor's Agent just did that with his property. Really, stupid advertising only the front house on a single lot, next to my house and nothing said about the house in back! The Agent was asking double the value to start with and never had an Open House or suggested that he offer to SEll Financed by the Owner. He did that a year later and got $190,000. $50,000 Down on a 3 year Loan at 7%. The Buyer did two Flips that did not work out and now bought this one to fix up, having the rent from the house back pay for it all. I studied Carelton Sheets and his "Low and No Money Down" Real Estate course. Carelton was a Broker on Davis Island, downtown Tampa 30 years ago. That encouraged me to buy most of my properties negotiating with the Owner for $10,000 Down and one to two years to fix them up and rent to qualify for a mortgage. There is a new 3/2, 1600 sq. foot block house without a garage, that was just built, four lots away on the corner, by an Agent. She just sold the same type house on the other side of I275 on the North side of Seminole Heights. She is asking way too much, $385,000 for this sale. My new neighbor's cousin did two Flips with her and she now is just building new to sell. I hope she can advertise correctly and accept a good enough offer, quickly, before I start selling my house to help with the comps. There is a new Restaurant finishing the build around the corner from my house. And a block of four story Apartments on Nebraska Ave. four blocks South that are almost done. Where my girlfriend lives across from Rivercrest Park on N. Boulevard, the two new houses across the street were Sold, pre-construction, for $420,000. The neighbor sold the two lots on the corner for $240,000. The Builder made out big time with that job, but, it is in the best section of Semiole Heights. lots of people think that starting as an Agent is the way to go and learn the business until they find their niche. If you have Time, there are many ways to Skin the Cat.

Hello Kimberly Wood. Have you ever heard that the worst kind of Business to get into, is a Partnership? Have you seen a written contract? Did your Lawyer agree with the terms? Are your Partners family or longterm friends or an Investor who does this for a business? You don't seem to know your numbers for the Deal. Do you know what it is to Buy a Pig in a Poke? You have a JOB. Sounds like you have plenty of Cash for a Down Payment. You don't own your own Home. As a Military person you know that they don't let you buy your own home by transferring you out to another JOB or Base every two years or so. What did you read or hear that convinced you that Real Estate Investing is a good way to park your Money at a time when the Fed has moved the Interest Rate down to Zero? Have you ever read that past results do not indicate future returns to any Investment? Rental houses almost never pay for themselves. I just moved outside of Tampa to a quieter and safer town after managing my portfolio of Rental houses and duplexes in S. Tampa for 30 years. I paid $275,000 Cash for a 3/3, 1600 Townhome with garage and pool in a small, ideally located community. It was built in 2006 and was like new. It would rent for $1500 a month. Does that compute to satisfy the 1% or 2% Rule? I think not. But, I am selling my fixed up, 3/1 block home in Tampa that I just lived in for two years so that it will be a Tax-free Sale of my Residence. That house was rented for ten years at $1000 a month and paid for the mortgage. I will get $200,000. I paid off that mortgage after the sale of my Commercial lots in S. Tampa. So, I will have that money Tax-free in my Money Market account at less than 1% Interest a year, in another month. I could buy a like new, 3/2 pool home with two car garage in an excellent location for under $250,000 that would rent for around $2000 a month. Does that sound good? If I did not have a lot of paid off properties in Brazil, as a retired single guy, I would be happy to buy another, brand new 3/3 Townhome with garage and pool community, for $200,000 in Brandon to rent for maybe $1800 a month. With my SSI and what's left of the rent after HOA fee, Taxes etc. I could take care of my health and travel whenever I wanted to. My Daily Cash Flow comes from Daytrading the S&P Emini contract online. If I were younger and had not planned to retire near Rio, I would be thinking to buy a block of apartments or a Trailer Park to consolidate all of my Rentals in one place and have someone manage it for me. The one problem I had with my Portfolio of Rentals was that for 30 years I had to drive around each day, taking care of all the problems and collecting the rents etc. You need to have at least 10 Rentals in order to make the numbers work to have a Manager and Team and still make some money. I think that Absentee Ownership is a nightmare that I don't want to suffer. Everything I do is Tax-free or Tax-deferred. You can Invest and Trade out of your Roth IRA. If you stay in the Military for 20 years and get a Retirement, you can be a Triple Dipper and get another Government JOB like the Post Office after that and when ready, collect SSI and get Medicare. Any Real Estate Investment that you would consider, has to make you money from day one. You cannot count on Longterm Appreciation if we go through another 2008 Economic Collapse in the future...which we will.

Nick Flint. If you try to do any work without a permit and get caught they will make you take it down. If it was attached to the house with an overhang roof from the main structure it used to be able to be turned into an In-Law apartment. Lots like it's metal fab? You have to talk with the City Plans Department about Zoning etc. As a workshop...no problem. But, you still need permits to upgrade electric and a mini-split AC is the way to go. 

Stephannie S. You are thinking to Invest in Real Estate and be safe and you already know what a headache it is to do a fixer upper to sell. The safer way to do a Flip is to find the fixer upper and do the repairs yourself to move in and Flip it Tax-free as your Residence in two years or more. Bigger the better for more profit. When you are waiting for the sale of that property to buy another and BRRR it to get the wonderful experience of having a Tenant, until you sell your Residence and move into the Rental. Two years after that you can sell again and again...You have to decide if you want Buy and Hold or Cash Flow and that way you can have both, Tax-free. You can also use your Roth IRA money to your advantage. Keeping it small and being an Owner for the time being is safer.

Alan Davidson. There used to be a private Exchange Club in Clearwater with guys that wrote books about R.E. Investing. Just as there used to be an Inventor's Group. There is the Suncoast Real Estate Investors Association. I know the President of the Mayor's Development Council. The Council used to meet once a month and divide up all the File Minon properties that were going to be developed. My friend used to be a waiter at the meetings. The big guys bought up all the big ranches outside of Tampa, 20 years ago where they are building out in places like Trinity and Manatee. They know where all the new highways and roads are going to be built and you have to be lucky and have ten years or more to know where to buy for the future. When you drive into downtown on 60, have you seen the vacant block that was leveled and the other block of four story apartments finishing construction around 32nd. I always thought that Hooker's Point would be the place to buy up, before they extended the Causeway highway. Except for the Flood Zone, that would be a place to buy lots and just sit tight for the millenials who want a cheaper place near downtown JOB's. You have to just do your due dilligence or have connections.