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Thursday, December 13, 2007

Patrick's Freedom Plan

Wed September 20, 2006

For those of you who missed the boot camp this past weekend, you missed a great event. It was very motivating and encouraging to meet other people who are successfully making a living through real estate investing. It was also great to see that mostly everyone were Christians and gave God the glory for their success.

I should probably tell everyone a little about myself. Well I’m a soon to be 26 year-old from the

Philadelphia area. I have been happily married for almost 4 years. I’m a Christian and was raised in Christian home. I work full time as a computer contractor, and I work part time as a real estate agent. My wife and I own a duplex, and we also own 7 other units with our partners and friends. I love real estate and I know with the Lord’s help I can make a career out of this.

Since getting home from the boot camp I have been extremely excited to put what I have learned into action in hopes of reaching my dreams of becoming financially independent and a full time real estate investor.

I decided to start this blog as a way for me to keep track of my goals/ progress and also so other people from this board can help keep me motivated and heading in the right direction. I’m calling this blog “Patrick’s Freedom Plan” because that is exactly what it is. My goal is to save up $60,000 so that I can quit my job and pursue real estate investing full time and be able to cover all my monthly expenses for an entire year. I plan to accomplish this by wholesaling and rehabbing houses, and also from commissions I make using my real estate license. I’m giving myself 2 years to reach my goal.

So how am I going to find the deals I need to reach my goals? I’m going to implement different marketing techniques to get motivated sellers to call me. I have William Tingle’s Extreme marketing course and I plan to use a lot of strategies from his course. Below is a breakdown of what I plan on doing.

Website- My website is www.cash4housespa.com . Right now it doesn’t look very good because I put it together real fast over a weekend. I’m in the process of completely redesigning it and I hope to have it ready in the next week or so. I have gotten a lot of leads from my website the way it is now.

Business Cards- I have about 1,000 business cards that I ordered from www.gotprint.com. I used the design in William’s course. I’m going to leave these everywhere I go. I also plan on finding 25 small businesses in my target area that will allow me to leave a stack of cards with a business card holder on a counter somewhere inside. They will also go out in all of my mailings.

Bandit Signs- I have about 100 bandit signs that I ordered from www.banditsigns.com . I’m going to start putting these up in my target areas in the next week or so. I would like to put out about 20 per week. 

News Paper Ad- I have already called and placed a classified Ad in a small news paper in my target area. It only cost me $47 to run for the whole month. The paper goes out every Wednesday and goes to about 150,000 households. I used the Ad directly out of our Wholesaling workbook from the boot camp.

CASH FOR HOUSES!!!
Any Condition or Situation
Guaranteed Offer
Call Patrick XXX-XXX-XXXX
www.cash4housespa.com

Flyers- I’m going to have a “We Buy Houses” flyer designed and have it either printed locally or have the printed from an online company, whichever is cheaper. I’m also going to use another technique out of William’s course and also one that I learned this past weekend from Law. I’ll have my design on the front of the flyer and I will sell advertising on the back of the flyer to a couple of local businesses. Then I will have the flyers printed and stuffed in the large local news paper. The money that I make from selling the advertising should cover the cost of printing and also stuffing the papers.

 Expired Listings- Since I have my license and access to the MLS, I’m going to start mailing to expired listings in my target areas. I will pull the expired listings every two weeks to build up my list and mail to this list every other month.

Absentee Owners- I’m going to develop a mailing list of absentee owners using the MLS public records access. I will focus on out of state owners. I will mail to this list every other month.

Foreclosures- The foreclosure listings for my area are posted online every month so it’s pretty easy to get a mailing list of these properties. I plan on mailing foreclosure properties monthly using one of the letters out of William’s course.

Well that’s about it for now as far as the marketing goes. I think if I use all of these strategies I shouldn’t have any problems getting motivated sellers to call me. The calls should start coming in soon, and hopefully I’ll be posting about my first deal in the near future.

That’s it for today. I’m going to try and post a few times each week so everyone knows what I have been doing each week. I would appreciate everyone’s advice, support, and prayers as I work towards reaching my goals. I know if I trust in God and stay persistent I will reach them. Please feel free to email me at partrick_m_malone@yahoo.com with any comments, advice, or suggestions.

Patrick

 Friday September 22, 2006

Hey everyone just wanted to let you all know that my redesigned website is now up. I think it looks a lot better then the old one, more professional in my opinion. I have to give props to Antler Properties becuase I used the same template as them. I called some more places to get costs of classified ads and the smaller papers are charging about $25/week. I think I'm going to stay with only one classified ad for now and get some other marketing going. My goal is to put out 20 bandit signs and work on developing my mailing list of absentee owners this weekend. Anyone have an idea how large my list should be? I want to send letters with hand addressed envelopes and real stamps so it can be time consuming to mail a large amount. I'll update this again over the weekend to let everyone know how I made out.

Patrick

Monday September 25, 2006

Well I didn't reach my goals that I had set for this weekend. I'm pretty bummed out. I only put up a handful of bandit signs, but I did come up with a list of about 200 out of state owners, and 150 expired listings to mail to.  I also called the Penny Pincher for my area and got a price for a dislpay Ad. It was $25/week which included a free classified ad also. I'm not sure if I should do that or not. Its a little more then I wanted to spend on newspaper ads right now. On the plus side, I did have a settlement today for a property I listed through my RE Office. I will be getting about a $3,300 commission check. It was a lot of work but every little bit is going to help me reach my goals. I forgot, I also developed a flyer that I'm going to print and get pricing on for stuffing them in the newspapers. That was about it for this weekend. I plan to finish what I started with the bandit signs this week. I want to get about 20-25 of them put up by the end of this week. I also want to get my first mailing out to the expired listings and out of state owners. Oh yeah, I got a call from my classified Ad last night. Seller wanted $125K for a house worth 110K, no thanks. I'll pass. On to the next one.

Patrick

Friday September 29, 2006

I haven't had as much time to put towards my RE business this past week as I would have liked. I did finish my mailing list of expired listings. Its a lot of work becauase I had to cross reference the property address with the public records to make sure I had the proper mailing address. I have about 150 addresses to mail out to. I called the larger news paper to get prices for inserting a flyer into their paper. Its a little pricey becuase you have to do a minimum of 10,000 inserts. The cost was about $500 to have the flyers printed and inserted into the paper. I'm thinking of talking to a friend of mine who owns an HVAC company about splitting the costs. We'll see what happens with that. I decided to put another classified ad in one of the other small local papers. Its going to cost about $100/month for the ad. Hopefully I'll start getting some calls from these. I called the HML in my area about getting a pre-approval letter and they wanted $300 as an application fee for the pre-approval letter so I'm looking for other alternatives. I don't know how much I'll be able to do this weekend. We are having our friends from canada come down for the weekend. I would like to try and get some of my bandit signs out and mail out to some expired listings. We'll see how everything goes.

Patrick

 Monday October 2, 2006

Well its another wonderful monday afternoon at the office. You have to love coming into work everyday. I just can't get use to having to always work monday-friday for 40+ hours a week. It just doesn't seem right. Well this weekend was really busy for me. My wife and I had our family and friends over for a BBQ on saturday so most of my weekend was spent getting ready and cleaning up for the party. I did get about a dozen signs posted between yesterday and today at lunch. I didn't get to send out any mailings yet. I have no excuses, I just need to be more committed. I did make a pretty good contact last week. My wife use to work at an attorney's office and still remains friends with most of the women she use to work with. Well one of my wifes friends got me in touch with the attorney in the office who handles the estate sales. I have been emailing this woman and I'm going to send her comps for the estate properties she gets and in return she will let me know whenever a property comes through her desk. She has a property she is working on now that I'm interested in. I saw two properties that sold on the same block, one for 160K which was totally rehabed, the other sold for 115K. I don't have any numbers for this property but should in the next few days though. I will keep everyone posted. I'm also waiting to hear back from the newspaper for a price on inserting 10,000 flyers into the paper. I talked to a friend of mine who is starting his own HVAC company and we are going to split the cost. We'll both get a full page flyer that is 8.5X11. It should cost us about $250 each. Hopefully it will be a good investment. I want to thank everyone who's been following my progress and for your continued support and prayers. I know I'll succeed if I continue to move forward and trust in God.

Patrick

 Friday October 6, 2006

Well its finally Friday. I love Fridays, its always a great feeling when you don't have to go into work the next day. So far this week I have mailed out about 150 letters to expired listings and put out several signs. I think I have close to about 20 signs out now. I got a call from someone claiming to be from the police department in one of the townships I placed my signs. He said I had to get them all down by next wed or he will have to fine me. I'm not sure if he was really from the police or not, and I'm not sure if I want to go and take them all down or just pay the fine. He said it could be anywhere from $25-$300. Not sure what to do about it. I also finished getting quotes for flyer inserts into the paper. Its more then I had thought originally. It would be $630 for 10,000 inserts. I would be splitting the cost with someone, but thats still more then I want to spend right now. I could use that money for another ad in another paper. I plan on doing some mailings to pre-foreclosures using one of the letters out of Williams course. Hopefully I will get some responses from them. I have only received 2 calls in the two weeks my ads been running. One was from a contractor looking for work, the other was from a lady who wanted 125K for her house that was worth 110K. I just have to keep moving forward and I know things will start to happen. Thanks again for everyones support.

Patrick

Monday October 11, 2006

 I have gotten several calls from the expired listings I mailed to last week. So far everyone wants FMV for their property or wants me to come and look at it and "just make an offer". I'm not going to waste my time with these non-motivated sellers. I'm not sure if I should mail a second series of letters or not. I know follow up and repetition are key in direct mailing but I'm not sure if this is a good target market or not. I have a mailing list of 135 houses that are heading to foreclosure this month and next month that I'm going to mail to today or tomorrow. I'm using a letter from William's marketing course and I’m hoping I get a good response from it. I want to mail a series of 3 letters to these people. I also have about 200 out of state owners I'm going to mail to this week. I plan on mailing to this list every 2-3 months. I'll be putting up some more bandit signs this weekend as well. So the calls are starting to come in, now I just have to weed through all the garbage to find that one good deal I need. Thanks again to everyone for all the support and prayers.

 Patrick

 Thursday October 12, 2006

I just got back from dropping off 135 letters at the post office. These are letters to pre-foreclosure, and I used a letter out of Williams course. I got to use my new font that I had made out of my own handwriting and it worked great. I was very please with the results. I was able to print all my letters and envelopes, and stuff them all within a few hours and still get the hand written look that I really want. This has saved me hours of time, its great. For those of you who are interested in getting their own font made you can go to this site www.fontifier.com . It only costs $9 and you can download your font immediately which is good because I'm not a very patient person. I have still been receiving calls from the expired listings I mailed to. As usual, these sellers weren't motivated at all and wanted FMV for their properties, and in some cases 30K more then they were worth. Hmmm, maybe thats why they didn't sell in the first place! It just goes to show that some RE Agents will spit out ridiculous prices just to get a listing. Hopefully I will get a good response from the pre-foreclosure list I mailed to today. I'm going to send a follow up letter or post card in a few days from now, probably early next week. My next plan of attack is to put out some more bandit signs this weekend, and to mail out to about 200 out of state owners. Oh yeah, I have a post card that I made up and I'm checking different places to get printing prices. I'll let everyone know what place I find to have the best pricing.

Patrick

 Monday October 16, 2006

Well this past weekend wasn't very successful as far as real estate goes. I wasn't able to get as much done as I wanted to. We had to host a couple of family parties friday and saturday. Also my mother-in-law was taken to the hospital saturday for kidney stones, so we watched my wife's younger brother and sister saturday into sunday. She was feeling pretty good yesterday and might be able to come home today. My wife and I will continue to pray for her quick recovery. So all in all it was a very busy weekend for me. I did show some houses on saturday morning to a friend of mine who is looking to buy his first house. I'm working as a buyers agent for him and his wife. I was able to order my postcards on Friday night. I ended up going with www.gotprint.com. They seemed to have the best prices and I used them before for my business cards and was happy with their service. I ordered 5,000 4X6 post cards with color front and black and white back for $185 which includes shipping. I'm excited to get them and see how they turned out. I'm going to uses these to farm some areas I want to target. I'm continuing to get calls from my expired listings letters but no one who is motivated to sell, more people just calling to see how much I would pay them for their house. I did get another call from my pre-foreclosure mailings, but the owner wasn't motivated and wasn't interested in selling. He was more interested in getting a loan to make up his back payments. This week I really want to put out some bandit signs to make up for this past weekend. Lord willing I will continue to move forward and hopefully something will happen for me soon.

Thanks,
Patrick

Monday October 22, 2006

I can't believe how fast this past week has gone. It’s probably because I was off from work last Thursday and Friday. It was our anniversary last week so my wife and I decided to take off from work and head down into center city for a couple of days. We had a really nice weekend, but now its time to get back into the swing of things at the J-O-B. It’s always hard coming back to work after having a long weekend. Anyways, I'm still getting some calls from my expired listings. There still haven’t been any motivated sellers though. I just have to keep plugging away. Saturday I put out about a dozen bandit signs. Hopefully they will generate some calls. This morning I mailed out follow up post cards to my pre-foreclosure list. We'll see what kind of response I get from them. I have also been working on my business plan for the last week. Once it’s finished I'm going to see if I can find a bank who would be interested in funding some rehab projects. Once I get financing in place I want to start making offers on properties listed on the MLS. Hopefully that will be soon. My post cards I ordered last week are due to arrive this Wednesday so I will start mailing them to out of state owners. I have to keep moving forward and gaining momentum. Thank you all for your support.

 Patrick

Thursday October 26, 2006

Well my post cards that I ordered from www.gotprint.com got delivered last night and I'm very happy with the results. They turned out great, and I can't wait to start mailing them out. I have a list of about 400 non-owner occupied properties that I'm going to mail these to this weekend. Most of them are out of state owners, and the rest are just owners who live outside of Philadelphia where i'm targeting. I'm confident I should get some calls from these. I also got a call yesterday from my newspaper ad. A woman wanted 60K for a 3BR, 1Bath row that needed a new roof, update kitchen and Bath, and misc repairs. After checking the comps I saw the property next door to this one sold for 50K and was listed in average + condition. I called the lady back and explained this to her and told her I would only be able to pay around 20K for the property since it needed work. She said she would talk to her ex-husband and call me back. After getting advice from Law and Todd I'm going to call her back and see if I can meet her at the property and look at it. Starting today I'm going to plan on meeting those sellers who have enough equity to be able to accept one of my offers. I now know this is better then just making offers over the phone. We'll see what happens with this one. I got another call off of one of my bandit signs I put out last weekend. The guy wanted 135K for his house, but it was only worth 130K. Also he owed a little over 100K and needed the money to move. I don't think there is anything I could do for him. I think thats about all that has been going on these past few days. Still working on my business plan, and I'm hoping to find a bank to get pre-approved from. This weekend I would like to put out another dozen bandit signs, in addition to mailing out my postcards.

Patrick

Monday October 30, 2006

This past weekend was extremely busy for me. I met with two sellers this weekend. One called from one of my bandit signs and was selling a house for his grandfather because his grandfather got moved into an assisted living home. The property doesn't really need much work at all, just paint and carpet mainly. It’s in a very nice neighbor where homes are selling in the high 200's. The seller said the house was appraised for 260K back in may and they are asking 235K. I figure this house would probably sell for around 245K after some minor cosmetics. The seller told me to just make an offer and he will present it to his grandfather. If I use the 70% formula and estimate 5K for repairs and a 5K assignment fee my offer would be about 160K. I will call the seller and make the offer and see what happens. The other seller I met with was someone who called me from my foreclosure letter. He mainly was interested in getting a loan to bring his payments current so he could keep his house. The property is a 6 unit mixed use building. He only owes around 60K and needs about 10K to bring it current. I have to call the foreclosing attorney and verify these numbers. The house is listed on the MLS for 250K, and is actually under contract right now but the buyer hasn't been able to get his financing in place since June. The sheriff sale is November 14th which gives me about two weeks to figure out a solution. I'm not sure what to do with this one. It doesn't seem like the seller really wants to sell the property, but I will probably make him an offer anyways and see what he says. I talked to another seller over the weekend who called me from a letter I mailed out to expired listings. The seller lives in NY and has a vacant house in

Philadelphia . I am planning on seeing the property sometime this week. I have another seller I need to schedule an appointment to meet with. She called me from my classified ad and owns a house free and clear that is vacant and worth 50K. I'm going to try and see this house this week too and make her an offer. I was also showing houses to two of my friends who are looking to buy their first house. They both may be putting in offers this week on houses we looked at this weekend. A couple of commission checks would be helpful in keeping my marketing going. I mailed out 400 post cards to out of state owners and non-owner occupied this weekend also. Hopefully they will generate some decent leads. From now on I'm going to meet with as many sellers as I can and just make offers that work for me. I'm still working on getting my financing in place. I sent an email to my contact at a local bank that has financed most of our rental properties. I'm hoping to hear back from him this week about whether or not they want to finance me for rehab projects. We'll see.

Patrick 

Wednesday November 1, 2006

Its been a pretty busy past couple of days. Last Friday was my 26th birthday and yesterday (Halloween) was my dad's birthday. So not only have I been busy with trying to see my family, I have been working with my friend preparing an offer for their first home, following up with sellers, and not to mention the 8 hour days at the J-O-B. Its been tough, but I know it will be well worth it in the end. I can see things are starting to fall in place. Ever since the bootcamp I have been making it a priority to make sure I put God first in everything I do. I feel like He's with me now guiding me along this journey. Today I got some pretty good news. I heard back from my contact at the bank and they are interested in providing me financing for my rehab projects. They can lend 100% of the purchase price and provide repair money as well. It would be an Interest only loan based on Prime plus a margin with a 12 month expiration. Below is emails we sent back in forth in case anyone would like to know what I said.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dave,

Hi how are you? I'm a friend of Randy Foster and a part owner in Innovative Property Solutions Group. We have a few loans for our rental properties with your bank. I'm interested in purchasing some distressed homes in 2007 to renovate and sell. This would be on my own and separate from Innovative Property Solutions Group. I was wondering if your bank would possibly be interested in providing financing for these transactions? I'm looking for either a line of credit, or pre-approval for the purchase and renovation of distressed properties. These properties would be purchased at 70% or less of their after repaired value minus any repairs that are needed. I'm currently working on a business plan that would further outline my goals. The financing would be short term, typically for three to six months, and possibly up to a year. I would need financing for the purchase of the property, and also for the renovations that are needed. The loans would be paid off after the renovations have been completed, and the property has been sold to a retail buyer. If this is something you would be interested in, maybe we can get we can talk more about the details over the phone. If you need more information please let me know.

Thanks,
Patrick Malone

-----Original Message-----
From: Malone, Patrick 
Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2006 11:48 AM
To: Dave Eglin
Subject: RE: Rehab/Construction Loans

Patrick,
 

Goals for 2007  

1. Purchase 2-3 rental properties with minimum $200 cash flow per unit.


2. Rehab 2 properties with minimum $30,000 profit each.


3. Wholesale 4 properties for minimum $5,000 profit each.


4. Earn minimum $15,000 in real estate commissions.

1. Weekly Ad in the Northeast Times paper


2. Weekly Ad in the News Gleaner, The Breeze, and The Olney Times


3. Monthly mailings to Pre-Foreclosures


4. Monthly mailings to Expired Listings


5. Monthly mailings to out of state owners


6. Yard Signs


7. Vehicle Advertising


8. Search MLS

I think these are somewhat agressive goals being that I have a full time job, but I feel I can reach them if I put my mind to it and keep pushing myself. My loan officer told me this morning he has a loan program for 100% financing for investment properties with a 2% seller assist. This would be a great program for me to use to purchase a couple of more rental properties this year. I'm still working on getting my pre-approval letter so I can start making offers. I'm thinking about talking to my parents about them possibly funding some of my deals. They have a lot of equity in their house and it could be a good way for them to put their money to work. We'll see how that goes. Last week I got a couple calls from my ad in the paper. They weren't anything worth going out to see though. I got a couple of calls from post cards i sent out, people wanting to bird dog for me. I know if I keep putting the word out that I buy houses the calls will keep coming in. I just have to be patient while I weed through all the garbage to find the good deals. Well thats it for today. I have to get back to my J-O-B.

Patrick

Thursday December 14, 2006

Well I had a successful settlement this morning. I will be getting a $2,500 commission check some time next week. This will go into my freedom fund and will help pay for some more marketing. I have another settlement on the 28th which will be another $1,500. Even though I haven't gotten any deals under contract I know I'm progressing towards my goals. This isn't a sprint, its a marathon and every little step helps. I'm putting a plan in place for 2007 and I think it will be a good year for me. This weekend I'm going to look at an estate property that is being sold by a law firm my friend works at. Two properties have sold on that block, 1 for 115K and the other for 160K. The one that sold for 160K was a complete rehab and was done really well. I'm going to be more conservative with my comps and use the 115K to base my offer off of. We'll see what happens. Still working on getting my financing in place. I need to put more effort into that so I can start making offers on MLS properties. I think I will start going to the local banks and see what they say. Well thats about it for today.

Patrick

Thursday December 21, 2006

I have been pretty busy in a training class for work all week. I haven't done much marketing other then my ads in the papers. I'm still getting a couple of calls from them. This past weekend I went to see the estate sale property I was referred to by my friend who works at the law firm. This property was a total mess. The roof appears to be really bad since I saw on the 1st floor trash cans full of water. It would probably need 50-60K to fix up. I'm waiting for the law firm to get an appraisal on the property before making an offer. From my numbers I'm thinking I would need to buy it at around 20K. I got a call the other day about a Shell property several blocks away from temple university. It looked like it could have been a good deal, seller was asking 10K. Properties have sold on this block for over 100K. The problem with this one is there are two people on title and one of them has been missing for over a year. Not sure what to do with this one. I'm going to keep in touch with this seller and see if I can help them resolve this title problem. Starting in the new year, I'm going to be changing RE Brokers. I'm going to start working for a Remax office in my area. Hopefully I'll be able to increase my business a lot this year. I think I have finalized my business plan, and I'm ready to start meeting with banks. After the holidays I'm going to start meeting with a couple banks a week to get my financing in place. I have a feeling 2007 is going to be a good year for me.

Patrick

Tuesday December 26, 2006

Well its back to work after a nice holiday weekend. I can't wait until I can make my own schedule. A lot has happened since last week. I'm meeting with a small local bank tomorrow to discuss getting a line of credit or financing for rehab projects. I had my business plan printed and binded today from Kinkos and I'll be pulling my credit report to have it ready for tomorrow. Hopefully all will go well. I'm also waiting to hear back from the Vice President of another small local bank to setup a meeting. It will be nice to get my financing in place. I looked at a property last thursday which was a lead from one of my classified ads. The house is a 2BR single in a very nice neighborhood. Should sell for 210-220K. It needs about 30K in work. I'm going to make an offer of 115K today and see what happens.

Patrick

Friday December 29, 2006

The meeting with the bank went pretty well the other day. They were impressed with how prepared I was and all the documentation that I had put together. The only problem was that they wanted 25% down for every deal. I don't have that type of money so I told them it probably wouldn't work for me. Steve and Law responded to one of my posts and suggested calling them back and seeing if the 25% could come from a private investor or the seller taking back a 2nd mortgage. I called the bank back and I'm still waiting to hear from them. I think everyone is on vacation this week. This bank did refer me to another bank who they said could probably help me. I called that bank also and left a message. I'll keep calling banks until I find a few who will work with me. I'm making an offer on the house that I looked at last week. Hopefully it will be accepted and I'll be able to wholesale it. Its in a really nice neighborhood. Its definitely the worst house on the block. Here are the numbers:

ARV= 220K

Repairs= 35K

Asking Price= 150K

Offer= 115K

We'll see what happens. I think I may also make an offer on a shell property a seller called me about last week. I still have to drive by the property, but looking at the numbers it could be a good deal. Asking 10K in an up and coming area. Some properties have sold for over 100K on this block, other shells and fixer uppers have sold for 30-50K. We'll see what happens. I just have to keep plugging away. My settlement yesterday went well. I'll be getting a $1,500 commission check in the next couple of days. Its not huge, but it will help with my marketing costs and go into my freedom fund that I have. Next week I should officially be working for Remax. I just have to tell my current broker that I'm going to be leaving. I'm not looking forward to that.

Patrick

Sunday December 31, 2006

I made my offer of 115K on Friday. I heard back from the seller on saturday saying they received 2 offers for 125K and that they were going to accept one of those. I'm not sure if I'm being to conservative, or I just took too long to get my offer in. I should have made my offer last week as soon as I saw the property. I really need to get over my fear of making offers. I usually over analyze everything and delay things. I just really need to pray about things and trust in God, knowing that He is in control of everything. Well another lesson learned. I got a call on Friday from a seller who is willing to sell her house Sub2. Not sure if it will work but I'm going to try and take a look at the property today. Here are the numbers:

Owes 76K
PITI- $670
Rents- $750-800
Comps on this block:
$83,500
$84,900
$84,900
$80,700
$99,900

I thought I could possibly do a rent to own with this one if I bought Sub2. The seller said she can't keep up with her payments so I may be able to work a short sale if she does fall behind soon. We'll see what happens. I'm going to keep working on meeting with banks next week. I also have to tell my current broker that I'm switching to a new office and collect my $1,500 commission check. I can't wait to see what the Lord has planned for me in 2007.

Patrick

Friday January 5, 2007

Well I think I have finally gotten my financing situation taken care of. I called the bank that funds our LLC properties and they are emailing me a loan application. This was the guy I emailed over a month ago who said he could help me but stopped responding to my emails. Anyways I called him up and he said they can do 100% of the aqcuisition cost at prime +1 with .5-1 point. I would be responsible for coming up with my own repair money, but I don't think that will be a problem. Finally I feel like I'm moving in the right direction. I was starting to get a little discouraged. The Lord is awesome, and I have to remember to trust in Him, and just allow Him to lead me. I'm very excited to get this setup. Also I started with REMAX this week and so far I love this new office. This year is going to be a great one, I know it.

Patrick

Friday January 12, 2007

I have been feeling discouraged these last few weeks and I think I know why. I had a good conversation the last two nights with my wife and I think I'm feeling down because I have gotten my priorities messed up again. When I got back from the boot camp I was very excited about seeing what God had planned for me and I was making sure He was priority #1 in my life. Lately it seems like I have lost sight of that, and I have gotten stuck in the daily grind and haven't given God enough of my time or focus. When this happens I seem to get down, and things just don't seem to go right. For instance, I was excited to finally be getting my pre-approval letter this week. Well as of today I haven't heard from the banker all week, even after emailing him and leaving him a couple of messages. It can be really frustrating working with this guy sometimes. I know I need to get my priorities in order so I can get back on track. I need to get out of this hole I feel I'm stuck in. With the Lord's help I know I can do it.

Patrick

Wednesday January 16, 2007

I finally got my pre-approval letter on Friday afternoon. I basically had to keep calling and emailing the banker until he gave it to me. I guess persistance pays off. Now I have to start looking at properties and making offers. Part of me is still nervouse for some reason. I have purchased other properties beore, but those were with my partners and not listed on the MLS. I just have to make that first offer to get over the fear. That will be my goal for this weekend. I'm going to make at least 1 one offer on an MLS property I look at. I also need to get some more marketing going. I haven't had any calls coming in the last couple of weeks. I'm going to put up some more bandit signs and also start mailing out some postcards. I'm also thinking of calling people in pre-foreclosure. I have to get things rolling now.

Patrick

Wednesday January 24, 2007

Wow its been a week already since I last posted. I feel like I haven't been putting enough time into my REI business. The last couple of weeks I have been spending a lot of time working on starting up my Real Estate Agent business with RE/MAX. I have someone who is mentoring me so he keeps me busy with things to do. I have to find a balance between real estate sales, real estate investing, my full time job, and also my personal life. Last night my wfie and I went to a married couples bible study that was started by our church. It was awesome to take a night and meet with other christian married couples. I think this group is going to be such a blessing in our lives. They will be able to hold me accountable to make sure I'm always keeping my priorities straight and putting God first. I still haven't put any offers in on MLS properties. I'm making it a point to make an offer this weekend on an MLS property. I'm also going to be working on my marketing again. I'm going to work on sending some postcards to expired listings and try to put out some more bandit signs. I know I have to push myself out of my comfort zone.

Patrick

Thursday January 25, 2007

I'm going to really try and not lose my focus like I have done in the past. I mailed out about 100 postcards to expired listings this morning. Hopefully they will generate some calls. I also mailed out letters to all my friends and family letting them know that I just started working with RE/MAX and that I'm really trying to make this a full time career for me. This is stuff I should I have done two years ago when I fist got my license and started investing. This weekend I'm going to be listing two houses for sale that my partners and I own. We need to sell them so we can recoup our initial investment we all put in. I also plan on looking at a few REO properties and making some offers. I need to do this to get over my fear. I have also thought about doing some door knocking on pre-forclosures but I'm not sure how much time I'll have this weekend. I'm already busy Friday night, saturday night, and pretty much all day Sunday so that only leave saturday morning and afternoon. I will do the best I can. I also want to put out more bandit signs. Reading Tampa-Steph's blog really keeps me going. I wish I could put in the amount of time that she does but unfortunately I still have a full time JOB I have to come to everday. I know the Lord has a plan for me, and I just pray every day He gives me patience while He works it.

Patrick

Wednesday January 31, 2007

I went and looked at a couple of houses over the weekend. One house was structurally unsafe and probably should be knocked down. The other house was a nice twin in a decent neighborhood, probably a 3 on the neighborhood scale. I plan on making an offer on it this week. My parnters and I listed two of our rental properties for sale this week. Once they sell we'll be able to pull all of our initial investment out of the business and still have 3 nice rental properties to hold long term. Yesterday I partnered with my buddy Steve and we got a property under contract we plan on wholesaling. If this closes this would be my first official flip! I'm very excited and I'm praying that everything will work out. I know if I trust in God things will. Here is the message that I posted on the news group.

Hey everyone just wanted to post about a property we got under contract yesterday. I posted about this property a while ago. This was a lead from one of my classified ads. I met the seller a couple months ago and was going to make him an offer but I couldn't get a hold of him and he stopped returning my calls. I kind of forgot about it for a while, but I noticed his number was saved in my cell phone so this past monday I decided I would try and call him again. Well he answered and I asked if he was still interested in selling and he was. He said his house was scheduled for foreclosure in march. I told him I still wanted to buy his property. Yesterday I was trying to arrange a way to meet with him to get the paperwork signed, but I was stuck at work. I didn't want to miss another opportunity to get this deal signed up so I called up my buddy Steve_Philly and asked if he would want to partner up on this deal if he could go meet the seller and get the paperwork signed. He agreed. I already had negotiated a price of 70K for the property with the seller, but when Steve met him he was able to get him down to $67,500. So now we have to start looking for an investor to wholesale too. There is only one problem, there are tenants in the property we need to deal with. Hopefully this doesn't kill the deal. Anyways, here are the numbers.

ARV- 130,000-135,0000
Repairs- 10,000-15,000
Our Price- 67,500
Wholesale for- ????

This has been a great experience so far, and Lord willing we'll be able to see this one to closing. Its a good lesson about how important it is to follow up with sellers you have talked to in the past. Please pray that things will workout for us.

Thanks,
Patrick

Monday February 5, 2007

I feel like its been a long time since I last posted an entry on this blog. I can't believe it's been less then a week. I guess I just have been really busy lately. I spent saturday and sunday working on two of our rental properties that we are selling. One of them we had to clean out all of the tenants belongings after we evicted him. It was pretty disgusting. It smelled like someone died in the place. The other property we also had to clean up and who to some prospective tenants. This is a triplex and only 1 unit is currently being rented out. The other two units were just completed being renovated. We want to get tenants in them so we have some rental income coming in while we are trying to sell these properties. Hopefully they won't take too long to sell. As for the deal we got under contract last week, the title work has been started. Steve is going to be meeting with the seller to get an authorization to release so we can verify his payoff amount. We're still trying to workout the situation with the tenants in there. I'm excited to get this thing closed so I can say I got one under my belt. I have been reading Tampa-Steph's blog and I admire all the work she's been putting into her business. I wish I had more time to dedicate to REI. I'm going to be meeting with Steve_Philly and JerryNJ for dinner on Tuesday night. I'm going to pick their brains and see if I can learn some new things.

Patrick

Thursday February 8, 2007

I met with Jerry for dinner on Tuesday night. Its good to get together with like minded people. He's making offers like a mad man, something like 25 or so a week. I'm not sure what is holding me back from pulling the trigger. I thought before that it was my financing situation but I have that taken care of now. I don't have a problem making offers to FSBO's, its just properties on the MLS. I have to get over this fear. I'm making it a point and putting it out there for everyone who reads this to keep me accountable. I'm going to make at least 3 offers on MLS listed properties over the weekend. I'll post on Monday just so everyone knows for sure if I did it or not. I know 3 isn't that many, but its a start, and once I get over that initial fear I should be able to make a lot more. Anyways, things don't seem to be going to well with the deal I posted about last week. The seller seems to be flaking out on us and avoiding our phone calls. I'm going to try and call him today and schedule a time to get one of our buyers into the property to check it out. I really pray we can get this deal closed. I feel like I need to close on a deal so I don't get discouraged. I have to follow up on a few old leads over the weekend. One lady is from NY who has 3 vacant properties she wants to sells. She had them all listed on the MLS but none of them sold because she was asking too  much. I think only one of them has enough equity to be worth looking into. I'm going to make her an offer on it. I'm also going to mail out some more post cards and send out some letters to pre-foreclosures. I haven't been doing as much marketing lately as I should be and I need to get back into the habit of doing so. I seem to do things in spurts, not just related to real estate, but my life in general. I have to learn to be more consistant with stuff. Well thats about all thats going on for now.

Patrick

Friday February 9, 2007

Well I got a couple of calls from my news paper ad yesterday afternoon. I made offers on both of them but neither seller seemed motivated. I'll follow up with them in a couple weeks. I also got another call today, and a lead through my website today I have to follow up on. The lady who called me today doesn't have enough equity to do anything with. She owes 37K on a house worth 50K and wants about 10K from the sale. I may try and list her property for a commission. I'm just going to make offers on any leads that I get from now on. The worst that can happen is they say no. I have printed out 4 properties that I'm going to make offers on this weekend. I know yesterday I said I was going to make offers on 3, but I found another one that I liked. I have already pulled my comps and calculated my offers. I'm going to call all the listing agents today and let them know that I'll be sending them over an offer. We'll see what happens.

Patrick

Friday February 9, 2007

Well I finally did it. I just finished faxing my offers on 4 REO properties that I found on the MLS. I'm sure they will all be turned down but I don't really care. At this point I just wanted to get over the initial fear of making offers on MLS listed properties. I'm not sure what's been holding me back this long. I think this is going to be great stepping stone for me in my investing career. I'm going to make it a weekly habit to make offers on any decent properties that I see on the MLS from now on. Its easy and its free. I have the financing in place so that I can close on them if I need to. I really owe a lot to the support of the news group. Everyone on there is such a big help. While I'm waiting to hear back from those offers I'm going to be sending out some letters to pre-foreclosures and postcards to out of state owners this weekend. Hopefully I'll be getting some calls next week.

Patrick 

Sunday February 11, 2007

I mailed out my 400 post cards to out of state owners, and 50 letters to pre-foreclosures yesterday. Hopefully I'll get some good leads from them. Today I had to do floor time at the office for 1.5 hours. I got a couple of good leads. One couple is looking to buy their first house, and another older couple is looking to sell their current home and purchase a smaller ranch home. Hopefully I can work with these people and earn a commission that I can use to put towards my marketing plan and put some into my freedom fund. I feel like the Lord is really starting to bless me in this business and I know if I allow Him to stay in control things will workout for me. I just have to keep putting in the time and effort. I was looking through the MLS this afternoon and I have decided that estate sales could be a good source of leads. I'm going to add them to the mix with the REO properties to make offers on. Basically I'm looking for vacant properties to make offers on. I know in Steve's course he said like 98% of his deals were vacant properties so that is what I want to focus on. My goal for this week is to make 5 offers. If I can do 5 a week thats a pretty good start for me.

Patrick

Tuesday February 13, 2007

It's amazing how fast time goes by. I can't believe its just about half way through february. I also can't believe that its been about 5 months since I came back from the boot camp in September. When I look back I feel like I should be much further along than I am. I feel like I should have at least done a couple deals by now. I'm not going to get discouraged though. I do have one property under contract, even though its becoming more apparent that its going to be difficult to wholesale with these tenants in the property. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the place. I'm thinking about settling on the property myself, evicting the tenants, and then listing the property on the MLS. I know I could make a decent profit, but I don't want to have to deal with these dead beats at this time. I have just been praying that the Lord will give me the wisdom to make the right decision. Not much else going on. No responses yet from my marketing over the weekend. I have been in negotiations with a seller in NY who has 3 properties she wants to get rid of. Not sure how motivated she is, but trying to see if I can make something work.

Patrick

Tuesday February 13, 2007

Well I got an email this afternoon from the contact I have at the law firm about an estate property they want me to make an offer on. I wasn't sure what to offer because this was a twin but its connecting twin was torn down so now its a single but doesn't look as nice. Plus this property needs a ton of work. Well I called a guy who bought and sold a property on that same block and who is a really big player in Philly. I think he owns like 300 rental properties. Well I left this guy a message saying I had a lead on a property on a block he bought before. One of his partners called me back not to long ago and we had a reall good conversation. They are interested in seeing the property, and are cash buyers. They are also interested in seeing the other property we have under contract so I'm going to try and get them into both this week and see what they think. If nothing comes of either I have at least added a great buyer to my buyers list. Thank you Lord! It was an answer to my prayers.

Patrick

Thursday February 15, 2007

I got to work from home yesterday because of all the snow we got. It was nice not having to go into work. I can't wait until the day I don't have a J-O-B anymore. I called the seller of the property we're trying to wholesale to see if I could get the buyer I talked to over the phone in to look at it on Friday. He was acting all weird. I really think this guy is trying to play games with us.  I don't think he realizes we are his only option if he doesn't want to lose his house in March to Foreclosure. Anyways, he's suppose to call me back today to set a time we can walk through on Friday. Hopefully my buyer will be available. I'm also going to call the law firm today handling the estate sales and see If I can get this buyer into the property I looked at a few months ago. Maybe I could get a bird dog fee out of it. I got a call the other day from one of my pre-foreclosure letters. Looks like the sellers owes too much on the property but just wants out. I'm going to meet with her after work today to see if I can try and negotiate a short sale. I might as well try and capitalize on all the leads that come through.

Patrick

Saturday February 17, 2007

Well this seller I'm dealing with is starting to drive me crazy. He calls me from my ad in the newspaper asking for help and now that we have the house under contract he doesn't want return my phone calls. I'm not sure what to do at this point. I guess I can't really worry about it. Its too bad because this would have been an awesome deal. Its pretty discouraging, but I have to get over it and move on. I really thought I had something this time. Anyway, this morning I'm going to meet with my father-in-law and check out some mobile homes. I gave him "Deals on Wheels" to read and he loved it. I thought it would be fun to go and see what they were all about. After that I plan on putting in a bunch of offers on some REO/Estate Sales from the MLS. I never heard back from the ones I made last week so I assume they didn't take me seriously. I keep trying the letters of inent for a little and then switch to agreements of sale. Maybe I'll put some bandit signs out today while I'm out driving around today. I know I should. I'm amazed at how many Tampa-Steph puts out. I really need to step up my marketing plan.

Patrick

Monday February 19, 2007

Well this past weekend wasn't very productive at all as far as real estate goes. Saturday morning I had to go and take care of some things on one of the investment properties that I have listed for sale. Other then that I didn't do much else. I called Law from Mobile, and had a really good conversation with him. He gave me some good ideas on some different things I should be trying. I really need to get focused and start making things happen. I feel like I have been spinning my wheels for the last few months and I'm not sure what is holding me back. Whatever it is I need to figure it out and change it. I think the main thing is I don't have that sense of urgency that I should. I know that I have a pay check coming in every week, and even though I don't really like my job its decent money right now. I have to get out of that mind set if I really want to make this work for me.

Patrick

Tuesday February 20, 2007

I got a hold of the seller we have an agreement with last night. He finally answered the phone. He told me he has been stuck down in Maryland because his mother-in-law passed away. He said he would call me in a few days when he got back up here to Philly. I'll believe it when it happens. One thing I have learned from this experience is that if you get a really good deal under contract you won't have a problem finding a buyer for it. I have gotten dozens of calls from people who want to buy this property from me. Its too bad that the seller is so shady. I have an investor meeting to go to tonight. Its a small sub-group of our main investment group. Hopefully I'll make some good contacts there. I'm really trying to make it a habit to network more with people and tell everyone I meet with I do and what my goals are. I know its just a matter of time before things start to happen for me.

Patrick

Wednesday February 21, 2007

The investment group meeting was really good last night. I made some good contacts. I met a guy who owns about 75 rental properties, 55 that are section 8. Next month he's going to talk about the section 8 program. I don't know if I mentioned this in one of my earlier posts but I met an investor here at work for lunch this past monday. I saw his truck with "We buy houses" on it in the parking lot so I called him up. We had lunch and talked about what we both were doing. He works in a different county then me so we are going to exchange leads with each other. He also mentioned that he cashed out an IRA and would be interested in lending me some money for deals if I needed any. Overall it was a good lunch meeting. Lately I have been working on an idea to try and get as many people as possible to advertise my "We Buy Houses" message and phone number on their cars. It would be like a bird dog system, and I'm still working out all the details but I think it has good potential. I just saw one of the REOs I made an offer on last week was reduced 5K today. I'm going to go look at it this weekend and I may make another offer this time all cash and see what happens. If I make it low enough I'm sure I can find the money to fund the deal. They are asking 35K for the property and I know of comps on that block for 65K. I haven't been inside so I don't know the condition. My offer was 20K. I'll check it out this weekend and make another offer.

Patrick

Wednesday February 21, 2007

I got a call this afternoon from the post cards I mailed out a couple weeks ago. I guess they do work after all. This was an older man in his 80's. He has 3 properties he wants to sell, one of which is a commercial property he uses to run his flower shop. He said he will give the business away for free to whoever purchases the property. Sounds pretty interesting to me. I know this is in a pretty desirable area. I'm going to be meeting with his this Saturday morning. Hopefully I'll be able to work out a deal with him for all 3 properties.

Patrick

Friday February 23, 2007

Well I have decided that I need to take another step out of my comfort zone and start door knocking on pre-foreclosures. I have one specifically that I want to hit tonight. I know the block well because my best friend's parents live on the same block. The houses are worth $230,000 easy and he only owes $67,000. Too bad the sheriff sale is next week. If nothing else it will be good experience for me. I'm still not sure what I'm going to say, but I just want to get over the fear of knocking on doors. I know it can be a great source of leads. Tomorrow I'm meeting with a co-workers husband who happens to be an attorney and also an investor. I called him about my idea for my vehicle advertising and he said I should have some type if independent contractor form each person should sign. He could give me one but it would cost $250. Not sure I want to spend that money on that just now. We are going to meet just to discuss real estate and network. Maybe we can send referrals to each other. We'll see.

Patrick

Saturday February 24, 2007

I knocked on my first pre-foreclosure door last night. It wasn't as bad as I expected and I wasn't that nervous either. He wasn't interested in my services, but at least I got some experience in this. I'm going to try and make this a weekly habit. I'm meeting with the seller who called who has 3 properties for sale and is getting ready to retire at the young age of 83. Hopefully we'll be able to work something out. I also got a call yesterd from a woman who is heading to sheriff sale on wed next week. She said there was a lot of equity in the house and just wanted to see if I could help her. I tried calling her back a couple times yesterday but she hasn't returned my calls. If she doesn't call my by this afternoon, I'm going to stop by her house. Oh yeah, I'm also meeting with that attorney who is an investor this morning at 8:30am. Its like 5:30am now. We'll see how things go today.

Patrick

Saturday February 24, 2007

It's about 2:00pm and I just got back from meeting with that seller who has 3 properties and eating lunch. So far today hasn't been going as well as I had hoped. I didn't hit it off with the lawyer I met this morning and our meeting was only like 15 minutes long. Seemed like a waste of time to me. He didn't really seem interested in what I was doing. The seller I met with this moring was a really nice guy, just not that motivated. He's not ready to sell or make any decisions right now. He said he needs about a month to figure out what he wants to do. 2 of the 3 properties he wants market value which I will probably try and get listings for. The other one has potential but there is a dead beat tenant in the property, and I'm getting tired of having to deal with these guys. I'm getting ready to head out to do some errans. Have to go for now.

Patrick

Sunday February 25, 2007

I knocked on another pre-foreclosure door today. This lady called me on friday in response to a letter I mailed her about possibly being able to make her a loan to make up her back payments (Like William Tingles). I wasn't able to get a hold of her all weekend so I stopped by early this afternoon. She was very nice and appreciated the fact that I took the time to stop by. I could tell that it was a bad time because she came out on the front porch and closed the door behind her. I could hear her kids inside the house. I asked if she would like like to try and meet at a later time in the afternoon. She agreed. We met later in the day at a coffee shop to discuss her situation. The sheriff sale is on this Wed and she really was hoping to be able to get some sort of loan to make up her back payments. I explained to her that in her situation she really wouldn't qualify for a loan and it would be in her best interest to sell. I told her if I had a signed agreement of sale I could probably get the sale postponed 30days and that would give her extra time to figure out another solution. We signed an agreement of sale for 130K (comps up to 210K) and she has the right to cancel the agreement and pay me 2K in liquidated damages. I'm going to record this contract to protect my interest. If she can't refinance or work out another solution she is going to sell the property to me. I think its a win-win situation for everyone. Tomorrow I have to fax over the authorization to release and agreement of sale to the foreclosing attorney and see if I can stop the sale. The seller was so grateful for trying to help her and was thankful I might be able to help her. She really didn't know what else to do. I love this business.

Patrick

Tuesday February 27, 2007

We got an offer yesterday for one of our investment properties we are selling with out partners. Its a triplex. It was listed for $169,900 and the offer was for $155,000. We counted at $162,000 and then they countered at $160,000. We agreed. Settlement is scheduled for March 30. We bought this property in December of 2005 for 50K and put about 30K of work into. We currently have a mortgage of about $97,000 on it so after settlement costs we should walk away with about $46,000. Not a bad investment. I'm pretty excited. I'm suppose to hear from the attorney by 12:00pm today to see if she was able to postpone the sheriff sale for the property I got under contract on Sunday. She was trying to get us a 60 day extention. That would be plenty of time for me to find a buyer to wholesale it to, or close on the deal myself. We'll see what hapens.

Patrick

Wednesday February 28, 2007

Well the bank didn't postpone the sheriff sale. They said either way they were going to get their money so they might as well process with the sale. The seller was able to borrow the 20K to reinstate the mortgage from her mother, which is good. I'm glad she was able to save her home. She obviously doesn't want to sell her home now. I'm going to hook her up with my mortgage guy and see if he can help her refinance. I still have the property under contract, and If I help refinance I could still get paid 2K for liquidated damages for her buying me out of the contract. I'm really not that concerned about the 2K. I'm happy for the seller. I don't want to see anyone lose their home. I'm going to try and do some more door knocking this weekend and see if I can't get another property under contract by the end of the weekend. I got two calls yesterday. Only one of them looked interested. I'm going to schedule a time to look at it this weekend.

Patrick

Friday March 2, 2007

I can't believe its March already. Time is going by so fast. Today is my mom's birthday and of course I haven't gotten her anything yet. I know, I'm a terrible son. Leave it up to us men to wait until the last minute. We'll be getting together tonight with the fam so I'm looking forward to that. We got an offer on our other investment property my partners and I have for sale. This is a single family row home. Asking price is $64,900. Offer is full price with a 6% seller assist. We're going to counter at $66,900 with a 6% seller assist. It will be nice to get this property sold. It’s kind of far from me, takes about 45 minutes to get there. We'll probably break even on this one. At least we'll get our money back out. After all is said and done selling these two investment properties, my partners and I will have 3 rental properties with about 100K in equity with no money of our own invested in them. Not too bad. I'm pretty excited about that. Now if I could only find that first wholesale flip. I swear I feel like I'm like the crocodile hunter out looking for some elusive creature.....Crikey! I love Steve Irwin, God bless him and his family. Tomorrow I'm meeting with the seller who has two properties and a vacant lot for sale. I'm going to meet one of my cash buyers there and walk through with him to see if he's interested. If he is we'll make an offer right there on the spot. I may knock on some more doors after that. We'll see.

Monday March 5, 2007

I met that seller on saturday who had two properties and a vacant lot for sell. One property was a total shell with part of it missing a roof. Could be sold as a sun roof or skylight?? The other was a semi-shell in similar condition. Both houses when fixed up would probably sell for about 120K. Each one pretty much needs to be rebuilt from the ground up. I brought an investor out experienced with rehabbing shells and he said it costs $50/sf to rehab a shell. That would make these properties pretty much worthless. The seller wouldn't take less then $125,000 and wanted the buyer to pay all his closing costs. He wasn't very motivated. I'll keep his information on file. I have an eviction being done today. This has been a 5 month process. I posted about this deal a long time ago back in June/July. This is a duplex that had a dead/beat tenant in the first floor. I got it under contract for $32,600 with an ARV of $80,000 and repairs of $15,000. I was trying to wholesale it for $40,000 but I think the free loader on the first floor was scaring everyone off. So I talked to my parents and they ended up buying it with a Line of Credit of theirs. We started the eviction process in October and now they are finally getting around to evicting him TODAY!!! Only 5 months later and $4,500 in loss rent. Just in case anyone reading this thinks landlording is easy, its NOT! You better have cash reserves, and your properties better cashflow! Anyway, our plan was to evict this guy and then list it on the MLS, but I think I may just buy it off my parents and refinance to get all my money out and keep it long term. I'll let you all know how the eviction goes. After the eviction I'm going to check out a couple REO and HUD homes in the area.

Patrick

Tuesday March 6, 2007

I just got a call from a seller that seems to be a pretty interesting lead that I'm excited about. He called about a property on a street that I own a rental property on one block down. I know a house on our block has sold for $89,000. I also know that two REO properties have sold on this guy's block for $40,000 and $35,000. This guy is asking for $15,000 for this property. I tried calling him back to setup an appointment to meet with him tonight but of course I can't get through to him now. Now I'm nervous that I missed my chance on this deal. I should have made the appointment when I had him on the phone. Stupid.....Idiot! I don't know what is wrong with me sometimes. I wanted to do my comps and then call him make to set the appointment. I should have set the appointment first and then done my comps before hand and just canceled if the numbers didn't make sense. Another lessoned learned. Anyways, I'm going to keep trying to call this guy to see if I can get a hold of him and meet with him tonight. For all of you people reading this.....Don't miss out on opportunities like this! Learn to take advantage of them!

Patrick

Wednesday March 7, 2007

I was able to get a hold of the seller yesterday afternoon and schedule a time to meet with his mother Thusday night to look at the property. After talking to my wife about it, she reminded me that Thursday night is the night we have to meet with our accountant.....Great! So not wanting to lose another good opportunity I have decided to try and get this property under contract and then go out and do my due dilligence this weekend. I spoke to Law and Steve_Philly this morning and they both said tie up, and verify everything later. So I called the seller this morning and told him my "partner" drove by the property and checked it out and peaked in the windows and it seemed pretty decent from what he could tell. I told him we would like to make him an offer so we could get the paper work started and not be held up for any reason. He was fine with that so I emailed him a signed purchase agreement and he is going to fax it back to me hopefully today. I hate having to wait around for these things. It would be much better to get it signed in person and be done with it. I'm not a very patient person. I also got a call today that we should be receiving an offer on our other investment property we have up for sale with my partners. The agent said they should be dropping something off this afternoon. We'll see.

Patrick

Thursday March 8, 2007

I got another interesting lead yesterday afternoon. This call came from my website. I actually get a good amount of calls from it. Anyways, this guy went through a divorce a few years ago and he said he got stuck with the mortgage but his wife got the house some how. He said she recently died, and now he owns the house and just wants to get rid of it for what he owes on it which is $27,000. I drove by it last night after work. Its pretty much in shell condition and would need a total renovation. Comps in the area are probably in the $150,000 range. I mentioned it to one of my cash buyers and he is going to drive by it and tell me what he thinks. I'm going to call the owner and get it under contract and see what I can do with it. From now on I'm going to try and make the most of all the calls I have coming in. I haven't heard back from the seller of the Triplex I spoke with yesterday. I hope they don't flake out on me. Some of these sellers are so shady some times!

Patrick

Saturday March 10, 2007

Well its Saturday morning at 5:42am. For whatever reason, I can never sleep in on Saturday mornings anymore. I don't know what it is. I think I wake up early thinking of all the things I have to do today and I can't fall back to sleep. It never fails.....the days I can sleep in I end up waking up early.....and the days I have to get up for work I have trouble dragging myself out of bed. What’s up with that? Anyways, I'm going to be pretty busy today. I posted earlier in the week about a loser dead beat tenant I had to evict out of a property my parents had bought with me. Well the eviction went well, no problems there. He just left a basement full of dog crap for me as a present!! I guess he thought in addition to not paying rent he could use the basement as a toilet for his dog.....what fun!! Well we're getting ready to refinance this property and the appraiser is coming out today to come and see the property. It’s been a crazy week trying to get the place fixed up and cleaned out. I have to meet him at the property at 10:00am. We're hoping the appraisal comes in at $90,000. This would allow us to refinance at 80% and get a mortgage of $72,000. This would give us enough money for my parents to get all their money back out, finish doing the repairs, plus have some extra in the bank for future investments. Our mortgage payments would be about $530/month PITI and total rents would be about $900-950/month. Not a bad investment I don't think. As for the rest of my day, after meeting the appraiser I'm going to check out an REO property I made an offer on about a month ago. It’s not too far from this duplex. I made the offer without seeing the inside so I want to check it out with my contractor and make another offer with a better repair estimate. After that I'm going to meet the seller who has a property he just wants to get rid of for his mortgage balance of 27K. I'm going to meet him there with one of my cash buyers. I'll probably get this one under agreement and give myself 45 days to close so I can have time to find a buyer in case this buyer doesn't want it. We actually went and looked at an REO property last night that he wants to make an offer on. All cash close in 15 days. I love working with cash buyers. It’s so much easier then dealing with retail buyers and mortgages and inspections. Anyways, after that I'm going to check out the Triplex I got a call about the other day and get the paper work signed for that. This lady also has another property she is interested in selling so we'll see how that goes. I also got a call yesterday from a lady who is getting ready to sell her house and wants me to come out and make her an offer. She has another house that is listed for sale and is about to expire she wants me to make an offer on as well. I'll make offers on both and If I can't buy at my price, I'll see If I can get a listing out of it. Better then nothing right? Well it’s going to be a really busy day. Good thing I got up so early! Too bad we're going to lose an hour sleep tomorrow!

Patrick

Wednesday March 21, 2007

Well its been a while since I lost posted. Things didn't go as well as I had hoped that saturday I was running around all day. I didn't make it out to see the triplex for 15K because I ran out of time. The other house I looked at needed sooooo much work it possibly may need to be torn down. I was going to get an option on the property but I found out that the seller wasn't the actual seller. He was the ex husband of the woman who died and left the property to his daughter. So she really was the person I needed to meet to get the paper work signed. I talked to Law the other day and he gave me a pretty interesting idea I might try. He said I could get an option on the property in the name of an LLC, and also get a listing for the property and put it on the MLS. If the property sells then I would give them my signed option and my LLC would be paid at closing to release the option. I would also get paid a commission for listing the property. I think this is worth looking into more. I'm still trying to work things out with the seller of the Triplex. I did go out and see it and it needs a ton of owork, its pretty much a shell. The seller is very cautious and thinks I'm going to take advantage of her or something. I'm hoping to have a signed agreement by the end of this week. Of course, I have been hoping that for the last two weeks now. I don't know what is up with these sellers. Sometimes they are just so crazy! I went and met one this past sunday who wanted to sell his house in a very nice neighborhood. Probably a 4-5 on the nieghborhood scale. Similiar homes sell for 300K. They are building huge new contstruction homes in this area for 600K-1,000,000.  The house two houses down from his is listed for $269,900 and has been on the market for 90+ days. I walked through the house with him and we sat down at the kitchen table. I knew he wouldn't be interested in my low ball offer so I thought I could get him to list his house with me and make a nice commission. His house needed some work, updated kitchen and 2 bathrooms. Replace the windows, paint the exterior, new carpet, etc.  I told him his best bet to get the most money money would be to list his house with an agent. He said he would prefer to sell it out right and has never listed a house and never will. I said ok, how much do you want for it. He said, Well I'm sure they would probably list my house for 350K-400K. My mouth just about dropped to the floor!! I was thinking, are you kidding me??? I tried to show him the comps I had with me and he didn't even want to look. He just kept talking about all the new homes in the area going for 600K+. I told him his number was crazy, and there was no way we were even close in price. I wished him good luck and left. It was a total waste of time. I should have prescreened him more over the phone. Some of these sellers are so unrealistic. Well that about all I have for now. I have settlement for one our investment properties on April 15th. The other one we were suppose to sell the buyer is backing out because apparently he doesn't remember anything about the transaction now. No lie. I guess he has a selective memory. Got to love this business.

Patrick

Monday March 26, 2007

Well I have settlement this afternoon for the refinance of a duplex that I partnered with my parents on. Settlement is scheduled for 3:30pm. Hopefully there won't be any problems. It took us 5 months to evict a dead beat tenant, and now we'll be able to refinance to get our money back out of the property and finish all the repair work. Once the property is fully occupied it should bring in $900-950/month. Monthly PITI will be about $530. I'll give a further break down after settlement and once all repairs have been completed.

Patrick

Monday April 9, 2007

I can't believe its been two weeks since I last updated my blog. I feel like I've been in a total funk the last few weeks. I haven't done any marketing other then my ads in the paper, and I haven't put in any offers or gotten and phone calls. Its pretty depressing. Its my own fault. I need a my consistent system in place. I'm marketing the 2nd floor apartment of the duplex I just refinanced a couple weeks ago. I'm advertising it at $500 which included water. I've had a good response so far from the ad on craigslist. Now its just trying to make sure you pick the right tenant. We're still renovating the first floor so I'll be spending my weekend down there with a couple of my friends finishing up the work becuase my funds are low and I don't want to run over budget. Its amazing how much money you can put into a house. It seems to just disappear. Anyways here are the numbers from the refinance:

Bought in July 06
Price $32,600
Repairs $15,000
Appraised at $90,000
Refinanced at 80% = $72,000 mortgage
Cash at Closing = $67,500 ($72,000 - $4,500 for closing costs)
$67,000
- 32,600 Purchase Price
- 6,000 Holding Costs
- 15,000 Repairs
= 13,400 into my pocket

Plus

Total Rents = $1,000-1,025/month

Monthly PITI = $540/month
Monthly Cashflow of $460-485/month

I'll be very happy once this property is completely done and fully rented out. Its been a lot of work and I learned a lot. Now I have to get back and focus on my wholesaling. I'm still yet to prove to my wife that it works. She always gives me a hard time because I haven't wholesale a property yet. So that is going to be my goal now. To prove to my wife wrong, and make her a believe that this business really does work. Its time to get back on the wagon!

Patrick

Saturday April 21, 2007

Well its been a while since I have posted once again. I don't know what it is, but I have been in such a funk lately and I can't seem to get out of it. My marketing has completely stopped except for my ads in the news paper and my website. I've been busy with work, and now I'm working on rehabbing my duplex I refinanced recently because my budget is getting low and things are ending up costing more then expected. I have money in reserve in case I need to go over budget but I was hoping not to. I probably should just pay the extra money, and focus my time and energy into finding a deal. I have two settlements coming up at the end of this month. One is our investment property we are selling with our partners, and the other is a property for an investor I have been working with. He has been keeping be really busy. He's a cash buyer and wants to buy several houses a year. I'm hoping to be able to wholesale him some houses soon. Today I'm going to pickup a work van that I bought for my REI business. Its a 97 Ford E-150 and I'm going to deck it out with my advertising all over the sides, and back. Then I'm going to park it at different places each week. Hopefully I'll get some deals from it. It will also be good for hauling materials to properties and hauling away trash. Tomorrow's my wife's b-day so we're going out to dinner with her sister and husband. It will be nice to get out and relax. Next week I really need to crank things up.

Patrick

Tuesday May 15, 2007

Has it really been this long since I last updated my blog? Where does the time go? For whatever reason I can't seem to get out of this daze that I'm in. I think that I got frustrated with nothing really happening for my so mentally I took some time off. I'm going to start a Phase 2 of my blog and start it at the top so its easier to read for everyone. This will be the last entry of Phase 1. Hopefully Phase 2 I will start out strong and keep the momentum going. As always I'll need the help and support from the members of this board.

Patrick

Wednesday May 30, 2007

This past weekend was a really good holiday weekend. Not only did we get 3 days off from work, but my wife and I got a property under contract that we plan to fix up and sell to a retail buyer. Its in really good shape, and only needs some paint and a little updating. I'm excited that my wife came out to check out this property with me and is totally on board with this deal. I really want this to be a family business and maybe this could be the turning point to get her more involved. I know she doesn't like rental properties so this was a good property for her to see. Hopefully everything will workout well. Well here are the numbers on this one:

Price $163,500
Repairs $2,000
ARV $215,000

We settle June 21st and hope to have it back on the market by July 1st. I'm also ready to start working on my marketing again. I just ordered 300 bandit signs and I'm going to put them all out when I get them. I'm going to focus on bandit signs, ads in the paper, website, and pre-foreclosure door knocking. I think this will be most effective for me. Its time to take action.

Patrick

Monday June 4, 2007

I finally found a tenant for the second floor of our duplex we refinanced a couple months back. We started advertising the apartment about 1.5-2 months ago. We had a ton of people call, several people come and fill out applications but most had crimminal history that we didn't want to rent to. We finally found decent tenant who put down a security deposit this weekend. They are moving in June 15th. Rent is $475/month, the first floor will bring in $500/month for a total of $975/month. My mortgage payment (PITI) is $535/month so I have a gross cash flow of about $440 a month. Of course I have expenses I have to consider like vacancy, water, advertising, etc but I think this will make a good investment for the long term. As for the property my wife and I got under contract last week things are progressing well. We are getting financing through the bank who funds our LLC deals and they are providing us with 100% of the purchase price at prime +1 with 1 point. The appraisal has been ordered and we are set to settle on the June 21st. Hopefully we'll have able to have it back on the market by July 1st. I still haven't gotten my bandit signs I ordered. When I get them I'm going to put them out all over the place. I want to keep up the momentum I have right now. I got I call last thursday from my ad in the paper. This lady had a house worth 220K and owed 145K and had worked out a forebearance agreement with the bank. She didn't want to sell it the traditional way so I asked her what she wanted. She said she had an offer from another investor at 182K and that it was too low and wanted low 200's. I told her I couldn't help her. I'm working on an old lead I got from my website. This lady inherited two properties and is looking to unload them. She owes back taxes on the both of them. One is pretty much a shell, I haven't see the other one. We'll see what happens.

Patrick

Wednesday June 6, 2007

The appraisal company called me today to schedule the appraisal for the property my wife and I are buying. That should get taken care of this week hopefully. Everything seems to be on pace for settlement on the 21st. The contractor who has been working on our duplex has disapeared and hasn't been returning my phone calls for the last 3 weeks. We had an arrangement where he was living in the 2nd floor apartment and fixing it up in exchange for paying rent and now is suppose to be working on the 1st floor apartment. Well nothing is getting done on the 1st Floor apartment and I have a new tenant moving into the 2nd Floor apartment on the 15th of June. I'm not sure what his deal is but if his stuff isn't moved downstairs by Tuesday the 12th I'm moving it for him. I don't understand these contractors sometimes. You try to help them out and give them steady work and they always seems to screw you over one way or another. This business would be so much easier if I could find a good reliable contractor. I wish my wifes brother's would start their own business. They all do carpentry work and are really good at what they do but aren't ready to go out on their own yet. Maybe some day we can all do business together. I'm still waiting on my bandit signs to come in. Hopefully in the next week they'll be here.

Patrick

Wednesday June 13, 2007

Its been one crazy week. I mentioned last week how my contractor totally screwed me over and disappeared on me. Well I finanlly got a message from him the other day and it turns out he's been at the hospital the last couple of weeks because his daughter was in a car accident and that she had just passed away that night. Now I start to feel really bad for the guy, but at the same time I'm stuck in a really bad position. We finally talked over the weekend and worked things out. I went and moved all his stuff out of the 2nd floor apartment down to the 1st floor apartment, and got the 2nd floor apartment nice and clean and ready to go for the new tenant to move in on Thursday. I also have had my other contractors working there all week making sure everything is ready to go. My previous contractor (who moved downstairs) agreet to a payment plan for the past rent he owes me, as well as all the additional costs I'm being charged because of all the work he didn't do. This business can be really frustrating sometimes. We'll see how this payment plan goes. Hopefully it will all work out. On a more positive note I got a property under contract yesterday. This is the triplex I have been working on for the past couple of months. The seller finally signed the paperwork and faxed it back to me. I started title work and marketing the property right away. I have it under agreement for 17K and I'm trying to wholesale it for 27K. Hopefully I'll be able to find a buyer for it quickly. We also got our loan commitment from the bank for the property we are buying next week and intend to fix up and sell so thats good news. We're all set for that except we're still waiting for the appraisal but that shouldn't be a problem at all. Thats pretty much all thats going on right now. A couple deals in the works and hopefully more to come soon.

Monday June 18, 2007

As always, its been pretty hectic for me. This duplex is really starting to drain me. It makes me sick to think of all the time and money I have wasted on this no good contractor. My new tenant came and signed the lease on Thurday night and moved in over the weekend. Everything went well. My new contractor was able to tie up all the loose ends in the apartment and get everything ready for the tenant before she moved in. He really came through for me. Now we have to tackle the 1st floor apartment which is re-doing the bathroom, kitchen, and two bedrooms. I'm not looking forward to this bill. At the same time, I have to try and work out some type of payment plan to get the money owed to my from the slacker tenant/contractor. He said he wants to pay me $200/week until he pays me back. He was suppose to make his first payment on Friday and as of this morning I don't have any money so I'm not expecting anything. He is still living on the 1st floor right now and has a lot of expensive tools and stuff....maybe he would be willing to give them to me to payoff his debt. Anyways, we're all set to close on our flip on Thursday. We got our financing ready to go so we're just waiting for now. I have an add starting today and running for the week for the triplex I'm trying to wholesale. Hopefully I'll get some calls on it.

Patrick

Thursday June 21, 2007

Well its about 11:30am and I'm at work waiting for 12:00 to come so I can get out of here and head over to my closing. Today we're closing on our rehab property. Its scheduled for 2:00pm so I'm going to meet my wife for lunch before hand and then head over to the title company. I'm really excited about attempting my first rehab. I want to show my wife that this business is more then just landlording....which she hates! Hopefully all will go well and she'll be hooked. Speaking of landlording....my dead beat tenant/contractor hasn't paid me any money he said he was going to. Plus now his cell phone is disconnected so I can't get in touch with him. At least I have a good tenant who just moved in up stairs and her rent pays for most of the mortgage payment. Let this be a lesson for all who are reading this....Landlording is not easy. It takes money! It makes me sick to my stomach some times, but I have to suck it up and just tell myself it will pay off in the long run. Well I better get going. I have lots a work to plan for this weekend. I'll post some progress reports on our rehab over the weekend.

Patrick

Monday June 25, 2007

Everything at settlement went well on Thursday. The whole settlement took like 15 minutes and all the paperwork from the bank came in on time. I think I will use them again in the future for more rehab properties. I think we got a lot done this weekend. Our plans changed some with the extent of the rehab we were going to do. We decided to replace the whole kitchen instead of just painting the cabinets, I'm also going to reglaze the tile in the bathroom, and refinish the hardwood floors. Needless to say this is going to probably double my budget. I'm hoping I can keep everything under 6K. I got a quote to update the electrical service and it was only $800 so I was happy with that. Friday we tore out the old Kitchen and I picked up new Maple cabinet from a Kitchen and Bath Wholesaler for $1,600. They are really nice and I think they are going to help the place sell fast. We got the cabinets installed on Saturday. We also took out the old 70's yellow toilet and vanity on saturday and took out the old tile. Let me tell you, taking out old tile with a 3 inch wet bed isn't easy. I started trying to hammer it out with my hammer and that didn't get me very far at all. After an hour, lots of sweat, and a small hole and a big mess by brother-in-law tells me he has something better for the job. He goes out to his truck and and comes back with a mini hand held jack hammer thing. That thing rocked! We went to town with that thing and my brother-in-law was able to get the whole tile floor out in like 30minutes. We probably had like 6 giant trashbags full of tile and mortar we had to take out of this small bathroom. I never want to do that again. We were also able to get one of the bedrooms painted and the others prepped for painting. So we made some really good progress for our first few days of working. Hopefully we'll be done in the next
2.5 weeks. I'll post some progress pics soon.

Patrick

Wednesday June 27, 2007

I have my electrician scheduled to upgrade the electrial service to 100amp and replace all the outlets and switches in the house this Friday. I also have a tub and tile guy coming in on Friday to reglaze the ugly yellow 70's tile to a nice clean white. It will  make the bathroom look brand new. I'm starting to get a little nervous about getting this property sold. There are two houses on this street that have been on the market for a little while now. One has been listed for 67 days with very little activity. I just spoke to the listing agent and she said she hasn't had many buyers come and look at the property. She also said the owners are thinking about putting it up for rent. The other property which was a rehab property, but not a very good one just reduced their price from $224,900 to $214,900. This house has been on the market for over 100 days. I know they had an offer in the low 200's that they turned down. We were planning on listing our house at $214,900 or $219,900. Now I'm not really sure what to do. There are a bunch of duplexes across the street and apparently its making it less attractive for homebuyers to come in. This is a real bummer, but I'm going to stay optimistic. I'll just keep busting my butt to get the work done ASAP and get the property listed and pray that we sell it quickly. I know that everything will work out. Once we're done we'll have one of the nicest houses in the area. Tonight we are going to continue painting the bedrooms and prep the bathroom for the tub/tile guy.

Patrick

Friday June 29, 2007

We have been making good progress so far on our rehab. We got all 3 bedrooms painted except for the trim. Our electrician got an early start and started switching out all the two-prong electrical outlets to three prong, and installing new white switches and face plates. Today he will be upgrading to 100 amp service, installing some light fixtures and finishing switching out the outlets. It feels good having a professional do all that. I hate electrical work. Today is also the day we are getting the 70's yellow bathroom reglazed. Hopefully this bathroom will look brand new when he's finished. This weekend I hope to get the last few kitchen cabinets installed, and start putting down ceramic tile in the kitchen and bathroom. If I can get that done that would be guge.

Just to update on the Triplex Deal I was trying to wholesale I got title back the other day and there were a ton a liens on the property. The seller told me she owed back property taxes of $5,200 and that was it. Wrong! Turnes out she owes property taxes, income tax lien, gas lien, water lien.....to the tune of about $30,000! Deal breaker right there. I haven't been able to get in touch with her yet, but I know she's already talken to the title company. How do you not know you owe all this money?? What is even funnier is that she would rather keep this property and keep accumilating debt on it, then have someone buy it from her, pay off her debt and walk away with a clean slate. I don't understand people sometimes. Oh well. Something will come along soon.

Patrick 

Monday July 2, 2007

I have to say rehabbing a house and having a full time job is tough. I worked again all weekend and I'm exhausted this morning. Yesterday I spent most of the day putting in a sub-floor in the bathroom and laying ceramic tile in the kitchen. I finished about 70% of the kitchen floor. Laying tile is a really hard job. So far it looks great. I can't wait to see the kitchen when its finished. I hope this house sells fast and we make a decent profit after all the time and hard work we put into this place. I'm starting to get burned out. Our goal is to have an open house on Sunday July 14th. This will be one day before our 1st mortgage payment is due. I think this is a very realistic goal. We still have a lot of painting to do and have to finish putting the kitchen and bathroom together but I know we can do it. I'm confident all our hard work will pay off. I have been so busy lately I haven't been able to do any marketing or anything else besides work. I know in the future I will never buy a property unless I can afford to pay other people to do all the work for me. I would much prefer spend my time managing sub-contractors and have free time to do other things then do all the labor myself. At least I'm learning a lot this time around.

Patrick

Friday July 6, 2007

It's been a long week. Thank God I had off from work on Wed and Thurday and we were able to get more work done on the house. My wife and I are starting to get really drained from all the long hours from work and working on this house. We got a lot of painting done this week and I pretty much finished laying the tile in the kitchen. Now we have to paint most of the trim on the main level, pain the family room downstairs, lay the tile in the bathroom, put all the fixtures in the bathroom, and finish the kitchen. I was hoping to be done by the weekend of the 14th but I'm not sure if that is possible now. We will see. I'll be so happy when we can start marketing this place.

Patrick

Thursday July 12, 2007

Well this weekend will be the weekend of the 14th and we still have a lot more work to do on the house. We still have to finish the kitchen and bathroom, paint the family room, and paint all the bedroom and closet doors. The floors were refinished yesterday so we can get back into the house tonight. I'm hoping by the end of this weekend we'll be just about done. My budget keeps going up and up and I'm starting to get a little stressed over our financial situation. I'm worried about what will happen if we can't sell this place fast enough or for what we anticipated. We have cash reserves if we have to hold onto the property, but its hard to see your bank account get lower and lower and have all your money tied up in this property. I just pray that everything works out and we'll be able to sell it quickly and for a decent price. I think the Lord is actually using this time to teach me a lesson that I need to trust in Him more and realize that He's in control of everything. I don't think I have been putting all my faith in Him like I should be. When I start to feel stressed or overwhelmed, I always feel better if I take some time to pray and ask that God will give me peace and give me His guidance through the situation. It's a comforting feeling knowing He's with me every step of the way.

Patrick

Thursday July 19, 2007

We schedule an open house for this Sunday. We aren't even done all the work yet, but I knew we needed to set a deadline for ourselves. We still have to finish the kitchen and bathroom. I'm pretty much burned out at this point. That last few nigths I have been working my regular job then staying up to 12:00am-1:00am trying to get ready for this open house. We did a tile back splash in the kitchen on Sunday that has taken us way longer then we expected. It took us pretty much all day to install. Then when I grouted it took so long for me to finish I was having problems wiping all the excess grout off the tiles it took me forever. We're still scraping grout from between the tiles. I have to use a chisel to scrape around each tile to make it look right. Its taking days now. All I know is that we need to be ready by sunday. I have already mailed out 200 letters to the neighborhood and put an ad in the paper advertising the open house. We may have to pull some more all nighters. I know I can't take much more of this. I just hope it all pays off in the end.

Patrick

Monday July 23, 2007

We had our open house yesterday from 1-3. We didn't have as many people turn out as I had hoped, but we did have 4 people come through who all seemed pretty interested. I have their contact information and will follow up later this week. Everyone who stopped by came from the directional signs I had put out and not from the ad I put in the paper or the MLS sheet. I thought it would be the other way around, more people coming from the ad in the paper and MLS. I'm going to be doing another open house next weekend. I need to bust my butt now to market this property and get it sold. So far I have learned a lot in the last month about rehabbing houses. We still have a few misc items to do on the house but its about 98% completed and nice enough to start showing. I'm going to try and upload some pictures to my website so everyone can see. I'm so glad to be done with the rehabbing phase of this project and onto the selling phase. Lord willing it will sell quickly.

Patrick

PHASE 2 - A NEW BEGINNING

Monday October 29, 2007

Wow, It's been 3 months since I last updated my blog. I have been in a really bad slump and to be honest have gotten somewhat depressed over this rehab property that I took on. It has been on the market now for 3 months with no offers and little interest. I have done an open house almost every weekend and a ton of marketing. We have dropped the price and tried offering incentives to the buyers and agents. Currently we just started offering a $4,000 bonus to the selling agent with an accepted offer by November 20th. If we don't get an offer y then  I think we have decided we may just have to rent this stupid property. This property has been a drain on my personal life, and my finances. I just try to be strong every day and trust that God will work everything out.

On a more positive note my wife and I got back from Aruba where we celebrated our 5 year anniversary last week. We had a great time. I got to take a break from work and all this stress and I'm ready to start a new chapter in my life. I am currently starting to implement Shaun McCloskey's Short Sale Automation system into my business. If you don't know what that is I highly reconmend you check it out. Anyways, I have decided to focus my business on short sales and people in pre-foreclosure and to follow Shaun's system. So far in my investing career I have lacked focus and I think this system will be easy for me to follow. So far I have setup my website, phone system, and I just sent out about 400 postcards to people in pre-foreclosure over the weekend. I also have started contacting realtors who have properties listed for sale on the MLS that have "Short Sale" in the description and introduced myself and what I do. On Wed I have a lunch appointment with a Bankruptcy attorney to discuss the possibility of doing business together. Everything is mapped out for me in Shaun's book. I just have to follow it. I feel like now more then ever, I have a clear path to success.

Patrick

Tuesday October 30, 2007

I went to show a vacant unit we have to some prospective tenants last night as well and meet some of my contractors who had finished up some work on my nightmare duplex property. This is the property where the tenant was a referral of a friend and was suppose to be doing work in exchange for rent....well yeah. I totally got screwed over in that deal. I figured that scum bag probably cost me about $5,000 in additional work and lost rent. It makes me sick! I sware I want to slap him with a law suit but I know it wouldn't do me anything good because he's such a loser his credit is already shot to $!$% and has a pile of law suits already against him so I would have to get in line. It would just be a waste of my time and money. Maybe I can start a bash campaign online so this guy doesn't get anymore work. Hmmm, I'll have to look into that some more. Anyways, as much fun as I had last night shelling out more money for all the work this loser didn't do correctly, when I got up this morning I had a message from the 2nd floor tenant saying her toilet is leaking. GRRRrrrr!!! I sware she calls me like every week. I don't know if it's her, or if she got a Lemon apartment because of the loser contractor who did the work. Either way this property is driving me nuts and I'm getting to the point where I just want to unload the thing. What a way to start the day.

Wednesday October 31, 2007

Happy Halloween! It doesn't feel like Halloween today. Today is actually my Dad's birthday. My wife and I usually go down to my parents house and celebrate my dad's birthday today, but since my birthday was last week we celebrated them together this past Sunday. Well I got my first call yesterday from my post cards. It was pretty encouraging. Here is a copy of my post from yesterday

"I just got my first call from my time bomb post cards. I'm very excited since today is the first day they would be delivered. They were mostly interested in saving and staying in their home. I gave them information on how to get in touch with the loss mitigation department and try to work out a forbearance agreement so they could make up the payments over time. The reason they were in foreclosure was because the woman got injured and was unable to work for a month or so and she fell behind. Now her fiance has moved in with her and they are trying to get caught up. They owe about 55K and comps are around 155K so they have pleny of equity. They asked about possibly refiancing so I'm going to try and get them in touch with one of the lenders I work with to see if they can help them out. When they asked me how much do I charge or how do I get paid, I just told them it's free as it only cost me a little bit of time on my part. I feel good about trying to help people without always thinking "How am I going to make money in this situation". I could tell they appreciated I was willing to help. When I asked them why they called me they said they were sick of everything else they had received in the mail and everyone else they had spoken to. Isn't it nice to be different??"

Today I met with a bankruptcy attorney from the law firm my wife use to work out. I told him what I did, and told him I was looking for a trust worthy person I could refer my clients to who needed to file bankruptcy. He was very interested in working with me. He also said he could refer people to me who were dismissed from bankruptcy or could no longer afford their homes. So we're going to try it out for a little bit and see how it goes. Overall I think it went very well.

November 19th, 2007

Where does the time go? I can't believe its November 19th and I haven't updated my blog since Halloween. That is pretty pathetic. I have to be more dilligent in keeping this up to date. Well it doesn't look like I'm going to be able to use the bankruptcy attorney I met with a few weeks ago. While he was very nice and I think we would have worked well together, he was just way too expensive. His firm charges a minimum $2,000 retainer fee for all bankruptcy cases and I don't think any people facing foreclosure are going to have that kind of money or they wouldn't be falling behind on their payments. I have another meeting with another attorney next monday so we'll see what comes of that. I have been doing weekly mailings to a pre-foreclosure list I subscribed to but I haven't been getting any response at. Its very disappointing and its hard to keep spending the time and money doing the mailings. I'm going to keep it up for a few more weeks before deciding to focus my energy on something else. I was finally able to get a tenant for the 1st floor of our duplex. We got the lease signed and collected two months security and first months rent this past Saturday. This was the property were I got totally screwed by letting the do work in exchange for rent. Never will I do that again. Its been over a year since I bought the place and its now fully rented. Can you say PATHETIC! At least this property will cash flow nicely. I'll have about $430 of Gross positive cash flow monthly now that its fully rented. It's about time! Now I just have to get our rehab property sold. That property is killing us. I'm looking at either renting it or doing a rent-to-own. I need to do something because the holding costs are killing me right now.

Thursday December 12, 2007

Well we finally settled on our first rehab yesterday afternoon. We didn't cash the big paycheck like we had originally hoped, but we walked away pretty much in whole. We did lose a little bit of money, but for the most part got most of our investment back. I haven't done the final numbers yet but I think we lost maybe about $2,000 after everything was all said and done. We learned a lot throughout the process and we put a lot of work into. It sucks that it turned out this way, but it could have been a lot worst. The market changed a lot here in Philadelphia in the last 6 months and there are a ton of homes on the market right now. I'm glad we got out now before it gets worst. I'm ready to look for the next deal, and I'm going to focus hard on wholesaling all my deals to build up my cash reserves from now on. I'm not discouraged at all, I know I can succeed in this business and this was just a small stepping stone to my success.

Patrick