All Forum Posts by: Lou Castillo

You don't need to put furniture in the house to stage it. I have tested both, and found that the furniture is not worth it unless you are going to go all out (think interior designer) and that just is not worth it for one house. Builders can do that to sell multiple houses from 1 staged property.

What you need to do is make the house feel more like a home than a rehab. Focus on the main areas that sell the house: Kitchen & Master Bath. Use floor rugs and towels to add color.  I like to open a bag of coffee beans in a decorative bowl to add aroma. I will also lay out a cutting board with piles of aromatic spices.

In the bath, decorate with decorative bottles, pot pourri, aromatic soaps. You can add bouquets of silk flowers if you use high end silks.

If you have a fireplace, decorate the mantle. You can place lean a large picture on the wall and decorate around it.

Yes...always stage before placing it on the market. You want your best foot forward.

Have you gone to the Tampa Real Estate Investor's Association meeting? You should be able to find wholesaler's there.

http://tampareia.com/meetings/

For me, rentals are a long term wealth building strategy and not about cash flow for today - it can get eaten up too easily. What I advise my clients is to not get into rentals unless you have a significant cash flow from other things you are doing. btw...I like to buy rentals subject to so I don't have to get all those loans.

Hi Stephen...

I started my investing career in Atlanta too and did very well with investing there. Send me your phone number via email to [email protected] and I'll give you the 411.

Good luck to you...great city...lots of opportunity!

You're welcome. I hope that helps.

Listen, if you go to my blog listed at the end of my posts you'll see a lot of articles about investing. I am also published on www.ezinearticles.com. Send me an email at [email protected] and I'll send you an ebook for free that I sell. It will help clear up a lot of your questions.

Roll them all into a large commercial loan. You can also use hedge fund money.

I have a guy if you're interested.

It sounds like you are trying to manage funds through separate bank accounts. Let your bookkeeper track expenses per property in Quickbooks or some other program.

You may want to consider a separate escrow account to protect Security Deposits.

A bigger consideration is how many houses do you want under the same corporate name? You have to balance the paperwork, tax filing, and additional cost with asset protection in the case of a lawsuit. If all your properties are leveraged to the hilt, not a huge issue, but if you have some with a lot of equity, you may want to consider protecting them. Discuss with your atty. Then you would need separate bank accounts.

There are a lot of things to consider here. 

1) What is it you WANT to do - a rehab - a wholesale deal - get rental property.

2) What resources do you have? You don't have a job, but do you have plenty of cash in the bank? Do you have great credit?

3) If you want to wholesale, you just need cash for marketing, but not purchase money. If you find a deal that does require you to purchase, you could use transactional funding. If you want to do a rehab, there are a lot of creative ways to fund the deal - purchase + rehab. If you want to have a rental property, the question I ask my Clients is do you have sufficient cash reserves or surplus income to handle unexpected expenses? For instance, prolonged vacancy; damage to the property by a tenant; large repairs.

4) I think what the others said above is also correct...depending on your situation, owning a rental may not be a good idea right now. And if you need steady income right now, getting a job may also be in your best interest unless you have large cash reserves to sustain you.

Good luck with whatever you decide.

You can use any Purchase and Sales Contract (PSA) . The key is that it is Assignable in your state. Generally it just requires a sentence somewhere in the PSA that says it is Assignable.

The simpler the contract the better so as to not confuse the Seller. My PSA is just 1 page long.

You will also need an Assignment of Contract to be able to sell your deal to an investor buyer.

Brant,

I am a little confused. Wholesaling is an exit strategy - not an acquisition strategy. What do you mean you would use wholesale strategies to acquire a house with cash? Do you mean you would buy from a wholesaler?

I think what you are really asking is whether there are some other creative financing routes for your rentals. Am I right? If so, here is what you might consider:

1) Purchase the house subject to the initial mortgage so that most of your purchase price is financed up front. Use your cash for the fix-up. Put a renter in place and let them season a few months, then go back and refinance the whole amount using the after repaired value and the seasoned rent as additional income source. The lender may not allow you to cash out (the cash you put into the house). That's why it is usually better to have a mortgage than just your cash.

2) Use a private lender for the purchase (you can also borrow the rehab). Again put a renter in place, let them season in the house, then refinance the whole amount using the after repaired value and the seasoned rent as additional income source.

Let me know if you have more questions or if I misunderstood.