All Forum Posts by: Robert Lorenz

From what I've read you can do this on a single contract if they're all foing to one buyer.  

Welcome Kenny.  You and your dad should absolutely pick up and read a copy of "The Richest Man in Babylon". It's a short, easy read and if I had read it at your age, my life would be very different. Also, start practicing now, where ever you are. "Driving for dollars" and property analysis exercises can help change the way you see the world.  Shake hands like you mean it, look people in the eyes when you're speaking to them or they're speaking to you, and read & learn as much as you can, always.  Don't wait to take action, and use the naysayers words as fuel for your fire.  

Prove them wrong.  Here's a quote I saw on another BPer's sig that I really really like, as a parting shot:

Success is not a destination. Failure is not an event. Success is a process, failure is a choice."

- DJ Benedict

Good luck, and good hunting.

So an engineer at work mentioned his renter neighbors had moved out this weekend and he thought the house was a bit of an eyesore.  I got the address and checked the comps (4934 E Mitchell, 85018 if you're interested).

Nice neighborhood, nice house.  I walked the outside of the outdated property and snapped some pics, rolled some numbers in my head around:

Mid-range ARV around 400k

new doors and windows throughout, 15k including entries for good stuff (I know that's high, better to err on the side of caution)

fresh paint in/out at $5 per sf for good stuff, call it 9k

flooring throughout, 6.2k at $3.50 a sf

2 bathrooms, 15k 

kitchen 20k including appliances

so about 55-60, plus some extra for unforseen and pool, so 65-70k, leaving me an offer of 200-230ish

I'm sitting in this driveway for a solid 45 minutes taking notes, running numbers, pulling title info & last sale price/date (Chicago Title mobile app), etc.  Finally found the owners phone numbers (on Google ;) and called.  Nice lady, 70 years old.  I ran my speel:

"Hi, I'm a colleague of a neighbor of a home in your name here in Phoenix, and he mentioned today at work that your renters moved out and the home needed some updating.   I see you live in Florida, are you retired?"

She entertained this for a couple of minutes, until I asked if I could make a cash offer on the house....

"I don't know, talk to my husband"

He got on, was immediately aggressive and said "No way I'm selling out to another investor, I'm an investor myself. If you want the house you can buy it when it gets listed on MLS!"

End of my very first cold call.  I had to drive 45 minutes home with my now-cranky 2 year old, missed my Crossfit class AND dinner.

I feel I am blessed that I am able to laugh it off, this is clearly not for everyone.  I can certainly see why about 98% of "wholesalers" never actually make a deal.  On the bright side, I passed a neighborhood on the way there that looked promising, and sure enough when I pulled in on my way home, I grabbed about 15 addresses of home with deferred maintenance sitting in a neighborhood with a 150k+ recent median sales price.  On just 3 blocks :)  

when life gives you lemons, right?

azreia.org

When a BP blog post says to join your local REIA group, this is what they're talking about. Ours is one of the best in the nation. Watch the videos on YouTube, search for Arizona REIA.

I'm in, see you all there :)

AZREIA.ORG  if you sign up, be sure to include the PREC membership. These meeting are excellent,  and the subgroups are very engaging and informative.   I attend as many as I can, and always invite others.  The next one is Phoenix Real Estate Club on Tuesday the 24th. $20 at the door unless you're a paid member.  Hope to see you there :)

Pre-forclosures should be easier, if anything, because you're still dealing with homeowner and not the bank.  Since the owner is in a bind, you're reaching out to help keep the house from being taken back by the bank.  This gives you the opportunity to get the house in someone else's hands before the bank takes over, keep a forclosure or short sale off the sellers credit history, and pay the bank what is owed. If you can make $ doing it, it's win-win-win-win.

http://a836-acris.nyc.gov/CP/CoverPage/MainMenu

Looks like this is the NYC version of our county assessor website, giving access to property stats and info, maybe tax and ownership history.  If that's the case, then when a contract is signed, your attorney or title company would submit the contract info here to be recorded for public/government record keeping,  essentially making the transaction legal and binding in the eyes of Uncle Sam.

I could totally be wrong, as I'm not familiar with NYC RE, but if I were a betting man I'd say this is probably pretty close. The website looks about as user-friendly and useful as any other crappy government site, so I'd be surprised if it sees much use.  I grabbed a couple addresses off Realtor.com and used it to find the BBL, but from my phone it seemed like a pretty pointless exercise. 

Just trying to help :)