All Forum Posts by: Samantha Miller

Welcome @Hunter Cone!!! Congrats on getting started with learning about real estate investing! Fellow exercise science major here! Graduated in 2015. A few years later, I bought a house near campus (while in grad school) and rented out spare rooms. I would definitely recommend this strategy, popularly called "house hacking". If I could go back in time to your age, I would buy a duplex near my undergrad campus, live in one unit and rent the other! Then when you go on to the Air Force, rent out your unit as well. Good luck!

Hi BP!

If you are an investor, I know you have many tasks in your day-to-day business that are crucial to growth, but take up your time! You'd love to outsource them to an hourly, remote worker, but are having trouble finding someone who is consistent, motivated, willing to learn, experienced, and organized. Maybe you need a licensed agent who understands (I mean actually understands) investors and how they work. 

Look no further!!!!

Who am I?

• -deal analyzer
• -acquisitions coordinator
• -experienced cold-caller
• -licensed agent (in PA only)
• -experienced wholesaler
• -Excel spreadsheet master
• -lead nurturer
• -researcher 
• -quick learner
• -creative problem-solver

What can I do for you?

• -analyze dozens of deals daily based on your criteria 
• -calculate cap rates, cash-on-cash return, NOI after expenses (vacancy, repairs, prop management, PITI)
• -pull data from various sources (MLS, zoning sites, public records, rent-o-meter, Craigslist, etc.!)
• -analyze costs of funding
• -gather quotes
• -organize leads
• -talk to sellers
• -nurture leads through follow up
• -submit offers!
• -handle transactions/paperwork (>>>licensed agent! PA only)
• -schedule/manage calendars and meetings
• -make calls, set appointments

Contact me today! Let's talk more about how I can help your business grow.

Email: [email protected]

Phone: 215-692-3107

Thanks @Joe White! I appreciate the encouragement!

Haha @Joe White I hope so, someday! Still just learning and getting started. I actually did put that list I described in my comment to use a couple weeks ago - didn’t go too well. I sent out 60 mailers with a single dollar bill in each one, visible through a security window envelope. Along with the dollar bill was a hand written note including my phone number (a Google number, not my personal one). All 60 addresses were listed as being in poor condition, tax delinquent, and mostly absentee owners in my zip codes of interest. I got 2 phone calls: the first was a lady explaining that the house had actually been knocked down recently. The second was a man propositioning me for inappropriate favors. So, yea. . . not a huge success on my first mailer attempt lol. 

@Todd Rasmussen Hahah cracking up at your first comment. On the second point, could you elaborate on excluding the non-arm's length quitclaims? Is that just due to the complications with title?

@Joe Villeneuve 1) Got it! That makes sense. 2) What types of answers might you be looking for, regarding those 10 people and how I knew them/ why they're selling. Would you say you're looking for signs of "motivated" sellers? Or perhaps trying to detect any potential problems with the property? etc. etc. 

@Joe Villeneuve 2 follow up questions: 1) When you say "camp out there" - what exactly do you mean? and 2) If I said I had a list of 1,000 properties in your neighborhood of interest, and I happen to know all of the owners want to sell, how might you pare down the list from there if you could only pick 100?

Here's a question - doing a little experiment. In this scenario, let's say you are aiming to do a flip or BRRR strategy, and you just aren't finding any good deals on the MLS. You've have in front of you a list of all the properties in your county, containing all available information about each one from public record. In your list, there are hundreds of thousands of addresses, and you have the option to choose any 100 properties to be put in direct contact with the owner. You don't know for sure that they will sell or can sell, but you can pick any 100 and be guaranteed to at least reach the actual owner and inquire more.

The question is: how would you select your top 100 "leads" and why? Below is a list of the types of information you have about each property. . .

Address, owner name, owner's mailing address if different from property, years owned, zoning, violations, tax assessed vale, last sale price, tax balance, condition (i.e. "new construction", "good", "poor", "structurally compromised"), etc. etc. 

For example, would you just pick the 100 with the highest tax balance? The 100 in a particular zip code with the lowest condition ratings? etc. etc. You can combine different bits of information to customize your list (you can add more than what I listed above if it's something usually found on public record), BUT you can only pick 100 properties to contact. 

What's your approach and why? Interested to see what people think. Thanks!!!

This is a bit of an indirect method, but I was able to download property lists from opendataphilly.com for free which contain all public data for about 500,000 properties in the Philadelphia county. It doesn’t specifically tell me if a property is vacant - but with a few filters I can pare it down to a small list of LIKELY vacant properties (ex. Coded as either poor or sealed/structurally compromised condition, owned for 30+ years, tax delinquent, mailing address different from property address.) By applying these filters (just using excel on the .csv file download from the site) I end up with a list of properties that are probably/likely to be vacant or at least very distressed.

One other cost could be transfer tax which varies depending on the city in which you are buying. Some states have none. In my area, for example, the city takes 4.278% of the sales price. I think Georgia does something like $1.00 per thousand? This could be split between buyer and seller, or paid by one party or the other.