Chattanooga REIA Blog

612 Articles Found.
Now displaying 401 - 420.

---

While I personally don’t use a lot of post card mailings in my real estate business, they definitely have their place. One of the main uses for a post card mailing is to either test a new list before spending a lot of money mailing to it, or to canvas large areas at very little cost to you. Post cards are also a very inexpensive effective means to building your buyers list.

If you are going to implement post card mailings, there are several different ways to do them effectively. On my web site at www.marketingmagiclady.com, I provide you with resources to find list brokers so you can focus on the specific mailing you want to do.

One effective way you can create these mailings is to download your list to usps.com and let them do the mailing for you for the cost of mailing the post card including printing. The post card is simply black and white, no frills, but can be used to canvas specific areas or large areas with your message.

There are some good reasons you might want to do this. One reason would be to do a sweep of a particular zip code range or group of subdivisions you want to mail to in order to find motivated sellers. This is a very inexpensive way to accomplish this. Another reason would be to do post card mailings to specific areas with high numbers of rentals in order to build your buyers list. Read More >>

---

Two decades ago, Kim and I set a goal to replace our earned income with investment income.

There are a couple of advantages to achieving this goal.  First, you don’t have to labor for a living.  In other words, your capital is working for you instead of you working for your capital.  Second, the tax rate on earned income is much higher than it is on investment income.  Said another way: With investment income, the government lets you keep more of what you make, and when it comes to money, more is better than less, right? 

To accomplish this goal, we figured we’d need fifteen single-family rental properties.  Each month, the tenants would send in their rent checks.  Part of these checks go toward paying the mortgages, insurance, property taxes, vacancies, repairs and management.  We get to keep whatever is left over to spend or invest how we see fit.

There is a downside to owning rental property.  Though for tax purposes the government considers what you make to be passive income, there’s still hands-on work that needs to be done to maintain the property and manage the tenants. Read More >>

---

Checking information with REIA Comps will quickly tell you that HUD foreclosures are available all over the United States.  The thing to keep in mind is, the sales process for purchasing a HUD home isn't quite the same as you'll encounter when buying a home from an individual.  However, the no Deed Restrictions these homes have can significantly boost your wholesaling business adding real income to your RE business.

HUD properties are sold using a bidding process. HUD foreclosures are homes owned by the government as a result of repossession.  These types of foreclosures are sold online from former mortgage holders who defaulted on loans guaranteed by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. 

HUD homes are appraised, then priced at fair market value for their location.  HUD employees do not work with buyers, but NAID approved Agents.  HUD will generally accept the highest bid.  The foreclosures are usually sold at or below REO prices. This is like finding shells on the beach, believe me.  HUD sells these homes through approved brokers who often times advertise in the local newspaper to gain additional potential buyers. Read More >>

---

QuickBooks’ structure is universal enough to appeal to millions of small businesses. Custom fields help you shape it to meet your company’s unique needs.

If you’re using QuickBooks, you probably know that you’re complying with the rules of double-entry accounting. The software is designed such that you can be compliant with these requirements without even being aware of it. You’re dealing with invoices and purchase orders, bank account reconciliation and bill-paying and payroll, not debits and credits and journal entries. QuickBooks does the double-entry part in the background.

While every business that uses QuickBooks is following those same rules, each has its own unique structure and its own need to modify some elements of the program to do certain tasks, for example:

• Store more specific information about customers, vendors, and employees in their records,
• Differentiate between variations of similar inventory items, and,
• Create more targeted reports.

This is where custom fields come in. Read More >>

---

This is a question I constantly ask my students about every offer they are thinking about making to purchase any property, and I also ask myself this question before making an offer to purchase on every deal I do. It’s a wonderful thing when you put together a profitable deal but why not take a minute before submitting your offer to a flexible seller and ask yourself, “is there any way I can make this deal better”? If you are paying cash for the property I don’t know of any way you could make the deal better unless you offered more CASH to the seller. I truly believe that would be a huge mistake. It would be a huge mistake because it would in most cases only benefit the seller and not you.

Always Ask Yourself, How Can I Make My Offer Better For Me And The Seller Before Submitting Your Offer to Purchase Any Property?

The question is how can you make a better deal for you? If you are paying all cash, good luck. If you are getting seller financing terms there are many different things you could ask the seller for that could make the deal better for you as well as for them. Here are Six creative suggestions you might offer a flexible seller. Especially to those flexible sellers who want a certain price, monthly payment or interest rate. Read More >>

---

If you have Buyers that are experienced, they know the drill.  A wholesaler gets a deal and pushes it out to their Buyers list.  Then all the wholesalers on that list send it to their Buyers with some marking up the price.  And then the next level does the same.  And somewhere in there are the bird dogs that literally do nothing but press the forward button thinking ‘easy money’.  Problem is the Buyer is on all of these people’s lists.  Depending on the timing, he may see the lowest price first or one much higher.  Or maybe the Buyer is not on the primary wholesalers list so he never sees the original deal.

At this point, the Buyer naturally goes to the lowest price wholesaler to get the deal.  But if that wholesaler doesn’t control the deal, then the relay of information from wholesaler to wholesaler begins.  And more often than not, inexperience or greed or dishonesty shows its head.  You’ll find few cash Buyers are stupid so they pick up on this and walk from the deal.  People can sense when something is up and all it takes is one less than confident conversation to kill the opportunity. Read More >>

---

Everyone knows that the first thing we need to do to be successful in real estate investing is to find the Holy Grail of real estate: The Motivated Seller.

And when it comes to finding that beautiful motivated seller, there’s essentially two options: FREE and PAID.  Another way of saying that: TIME or MONEY.

Obviously, if you have more money than time, you’ll have more choices at your disposal. Direct Mail is most likely your highest & best choice. Hiring someone to find those motivated sellers for you would be another great option.  But this article is NOT about those options. We’ll save that for another time.

No, THIS article is for those of you without the means to pay much for your marketing. This article is for those of you who are currently ‘financially challenged’ (another way of saying broke), or who have more time than money AT THE MOMENT. Read More >>

---

This past February, I attended the Keller Williams Family Reunion in New Orleans, along with 15,000 other “Type A” real estate agents. One of the highlights of this convention is Gary Keller’s Vision Speech. He makes this speech to educate us, so that hopefully, we will be the economist of choice in our market.

“You have to look at the past to predict the future”, says Gary Keller, “Mortgage rates are national rates.” Keller said, “While the government does not exactly know how to raise rates, but, low rates are helping affordability in most U.S. markets.” Mortgage rates averaged 3.85 percent in 2015, down 32 base points from the 2014 average. Since the Federal Reserve is now actively raising the federal funds rate, it is expected there will be upward pressure on mortgage rates in 2016.

Last year was the 5th best year in home sales in the history of home sales due mostly to the mortgage rates being so low. In 2015, 5.26 million homes were sold, making it the best year for home sales since 2006, which was the height of the market. In 2016, some slowdown in sales is expected as interest rates slowly increase. Read More >>

---

Creating value in real estate is a great way to make money. In this article of the Master Lease Option (MLO) Series I will discuss how you can add value to your real estate deals using MLOs so you can make more MONEY!

Getting a seller to accept a master lease option deal is everything when using this technique. If a seller doesn’t believe that giving you a MLO on their property is the best option, then they won’t. Your job is to make the seller realize the value in allowing you to solve their problems with a MLO offer. The best way for you to present this idea to the seller is to know how to create value for this person. This will start by analyzing and becoming familiar with what the deal needs. In most cases we will get MLO deals done on distressed assets. You will show the seller that you can “un-distress” their property with a MLO and this is the biggest step in getting your offers accepted. If you can turn their property around then you have created value and the likelihood that you will complete the transaction is much better and that is what the seller wants. For the MLO to end in a sale and this is what you need to convince them of.

 Why is the seller selling? You should get the best answer to this question as the first step in your analysis of any deal. Sometimes sellers will be honest in their answer and sometimes not. First ask the question directly. No matter what type of answer you get ask several more questions to get the real story. Read More >>

---

One day I wanted to go fishing to a new spot. I knew where it was but had no clue as to how to get there from where I was at the time. I could have used a GPS if I had the address. I could use technology but Google maps needs to know the general area where I wanted to go. Another option, I could just ride out in the general direction and hope to see something I recognized. I could go old school and get a folded map. My time is money so I needed to go out there and get the fishing done, have my fun and relax. Then get back in time to meet my coaching clients for a discussion of how to create inventory fast, efficiently (low effort high return), and effectively (cost effectively). I needed the most direct route to get to the fishing spot with no time to loose, which maximizes my efforts and gets to the sweet honey fishing hole fast. I chose the old tried and true method. It would get me there. The good news was the map was only 12 years old.

Well the fishing was great and the method of maximizing the fun worked. You are asking yourself "why do I care about your fishing"?  Because fishing is similar to creating inventory!  You must do the right presentation to get the fish to be interested in what you have to offer and catch the fish or land the deal.  So if you are offering cash to the seller, they might be interested unless they have a big tax liability, have done a loan modification, and have 2 years before they can sell. If you offer fair market price in cash the owner will definitely be interested (however you will not be able to sell it or turn a profit).   I use artificial bait when I fish (creative financing). I also do catch and release (wholesale).  It takes a certain magic to look like the real thing, smell like the real thing, and get the fish to strike (close the opportunity and get paid)! Read More >>

---

It has been said that, “the devil is in the details. We, at “Little Pink Houses of America” have developed a needed and profitable business model that can be practiced in your own community where you can build a $10,000/month income. We call it our Executive Lease-Purchase program.

We discovered that only 20% of a given market has the ability to qualify for a house purchase from a traditional lender. Yet, home ownership is still seen as desirable by a majority of people in the United States today. There is a big gap in the market between those that want a home and those who can qualify for a mortgage. There are many reasons for this: credit problems, another house to sell, moving etc.

We’ve discovered a very lucrative niche in the market that helps those who can’t qualify today, but through our program of matching buyers who need some time to qualify and sellers who have not been able sell their home, a workable solution through our executive Lease-Purchase program. When we match buyers who can’t qualify today but will in the next 1 year to 3 year period with our help and sellers who can’t sell in a traditional way right now, we receive a $10,000 plus fee. Here’s how you can too! Read More >>

---

Our clients who focus on real estate IRAs are encountering a more mature point in the investment cycle. We’ve had a nice run up over the last several years. Indeed, if you had some cash to play with in 2009 and 2010 and a bit of patience, it was tough to go wrong with real estate IRA strategies. The real estate market was attracting a boatload of institutional money and all the real estate investor had to do was step in front of it.

Now there’s still institutional money coming in, but investors have to pick their spots a little more, and getting your valuations right is going to have increasing importance going forward.

Meanwhile, the permabulls at the National Association of REALTORS® has also released their 2016 trends piece. Naturally, they think it’s always time to buy, so take their advice with a grain of salt.

Here are the NAR’s predictions for 2016, plus a few thoughts from us on how they may play out for our clients and those considering a real estate strategy in their retirement accounts. Read More >>

---

I almost didn’t write this article. What you’re about to discover is so profoundly - yet simply - powerful, that if you truly understand and apply these simple secrets, I can practically guarantee such phenomenal personal and financial growth over the next few months that you won’t even recognize the dynamic person you’re about to become!

Yes, these secrets are that powerful. But don’t just take my word for it. Read, learn, and apply. Then find out for yourself!  Keep reading…

Now, before we get into “The Big Secret” and all that, we first have to understand something.  And it all begins with you asking yourself a question.  I’d like you to honestly ask yourself this: “Why don’t I have some of the things I desire from life yet?”

Why aren’t you in perfect shape? Why don’t you live in that awesome house yet? Why isn’t your bank account as big as you’d like it to be? Why do you still feel guilt? Stress? Anxiety? Why aren’t you driving the exact car you’d like to drive?

What answer did you come up with? What reasons did you give? Did you blame some outside circumstance or situation? Was it your parents’ fault? Was it Obama? Oh yeah - it was the market! Or maybe it was “The Man” keeping you down, right? Read More >>

---

I recently marketed to people who have second homes and are either close to being upside down on the mortgage or they are in foreclosure.  So far, I’ve closed on 2 deals from this marketing.  One of the leads owned a house in Sanford:  1,050 sq ft, 3 bedrooms, 1 ½ baths, living room, kitchen with dine-in area, separate laundry room and 1 carport.  The house was in great shape. It was a block house and really only needed about $3,000 to $4,000 worth of work if I wanted to retail it. 

I partnered with one of my Apprentice Students and we reviewed all the facts about the house.  The A/C unit was only a couple years old, it still had a wall furnace that could be disconnected, it had newer vinyl windows and just needed a little TLC.  There was an outstanding mortgage on the home for $29,000 and my offer was $27,500.  The mortgage payment amount was $600.00 a month (PITI), principal, interest, taxes and insurance. 

I really wanted to take this house subject to the underlying financing and keep it as a rental.  I was dealing with an 80 year old Seller, via his children.  They just wanted to be out from underneath the home and didn’t want to keep the mortgage on the property.

After several changes to the contract, we agreed to purchase the property CASH for the mortgage balance ($29,000) and pay all the closing costs.  There was a family member living in the house and we couldn’t close until he vacated the property.  We filed an Affidavit of Purchase and Sale on the Property and chose not to show the house during the time we had it under contract, and we waited until it closed.  Read More >>

---

There are a few investment strategies you may want to take a look at if you are about to take the leap of investing in real estate. Especially since about forty percent of all homes in the first quarter of 2015 were sold to investors. 2016 is shaping up about the same. Truly, this is a huge portion of homes sold and having the right strategy can make a world of difference when it comes to the kind of profits you can earn.

First though, we have to take a valuation first approach to every transaction. Knowing the true value before you buy is huge. One of the most common investment strategies using real estate comps by REIAComps some investors are accustomed to is 'flipping'. This is a way you can make a very quick profit. If you see you can get a property rehabbed quickly and move on, flipping is ideal. Frankly, if quick profits are what you want, then flipping can be the way to go.

Another investment strategy many consider is renting property. Acquiring for long term hold can be a great way of making extra money.  The income can be used to fund other projects and deals.  This is because not only will you make some profit by being able to capture tax advantages and capital appreciation, but you will also gain profits from the monthly rent you are charging. However be sure you are very careful about the person or people you are renting to. Be certain to do your due diligence for all potential renters.  Read More >>

---

When Kim and I were baby real estate investors, we were totally focused on buying our first investment property.   Then one day it actually happened!  I remember leaving the closing attorney’s office feeling pumped up.  When we got in the car, Kim asked, “Now what?”

Now what, indeed!  I hadn’t given that part of the equation much thought.  This happens to a lot of new real estate investors.  So once you buy a house, what do you do next?

To answer this question, let’s look at three properties we worked on recently. 

The first is 337 Rail Drive in Adairsville, Georgia.  Kim bought this house at the November 2015 foreclosure auction.  From the start, it was a flip.  In other words, we bought this property to resell quickly.  We’re flipping this home because we need to replenish our cash reserves.

Shortly after purchase, Kim had the property trashed out.  Because our contractors were tied up rehabbing Akin Drive, she elected to delay doing the extensive repair work Rail Drive needed.  Instead, she offered it at a wholesale price, which was well-below market.

In less than a week, Kim found a qualified buyer and accepted her purchase offer.  Unfortunately, about a week later, the buyer changed her mind because she was scared about the amount of work the property needed.  We refunded her earnest money, hugged, and parted friends. Read More >>

---

So how are we going to get ready to have a conversation with our motivated sellers? I believe that readiness is a state of mind, and I have put together some ideas for you designed to help you have meaningful and successful conversations with motivated sellers resulting in profitable deals.

First of all, expect to be anxious and know that it’s okay to be anxious. You probably wouldn’t be very good at what you do if you didn’t care about the outcome.

Next, while you are feeling anxious, get in front of a mirror and practice what you are going to say to the seller. Do this more than once. The more you practice what you are going to say, the more comfortable you will be and therefore less likely to forget what you were going to say. Practice controlling your voice and be mindful of how fast you are talking. Your speech should be at a moderate volume and speed when speaking to a seller.

Remember to breathe! Practice what you are going to say all the way through without making faces, gasping or throwing out any expletives. Your seller doesn’t care if you’re speech is perfect, they just want to know what you can do for them to help them solve their problem. You might even want to practice what you are going to say in front of a spouse or close friend. Read More >>

---

The One Thing the Gurus Never Tell You Is, Wealth Is Created Over Time, Not Over-Night.

I recently had a conversation with one of my students who made a statement to me that I found very disturbing. This person asked me why I continue to try to buy houses with seller financing terms when money is so easy to get today. He asked me; why not take the fast and easy road to success instead of thinking only about long-term investments. Believe me there are many reasons.

The minute those words came out of his mouth, I knew he was an inexperienced investor who apparently had been to a seminar recently and apparently believed the rhetoric the speaker was saying about doing deals with the latest way to get rich quickly.

I have personally lived through seven different economic cycles over my 36 year real estate career. Over that period of time I have seen with my own eyes, when the economy changed every few years the methods we were using at those times drastically changed, and not always for the better. Depending on what was being done at that time, every niche method of buying eventually changed and then someone else came up with another fool-proof way to get rich quickly. This is a never-ending fact of life that will always be occurring for eternity. Read More >>

---

So you did not win the 1.5 billion dollar lottery. Now what are you going to do to pay the bills, Christmas expenses, college tuition, medical expenses, health care insurance, car payment etc.?

Yes I played the lottery to the extent that if I lost I would not jeopardize my wealth. I would not experience a hardship even if I didn’t win the 1.5 billion dollar lottery. (You know that sounds great when you say it) I’m sure there is at least one reader of this article who spent $2,500 dollars on tickets for the lottery. I hope this wasn’t your rent money!  I play a game of chance when I travel. Will the plane crash? This game of chance happens when I am riding in the tram to pick up my car. I count the number of people and calculate in my head, what is the percentage chance I will be the first person to get off the bus?  I know that there is at least one person who will beat those odds just like the lottery. (You have to buy a ticket to win).

So we take risks everyday in life.  However, too much risk can lead to failure or even death. SO let’s get a solid plan for your success in real estate. Let’s not gamble but manage risk!   Let’s talk about your goals and what do you need. Do you need money short term or money long term?  Happiness short term or happiness long term? Excellent health short term or excellent health long term?  Being spiritual and doing the right thing every time? Being able to sleep at night comfortably? Read More >>

---

Remember being in elementary school?  If it was anything like mine, sometimes a classmate would get in trouble and the teacher would make him write ‘sentences’ for punishment.  Remember?  Write such and such sentence 25 or 50 or eek! 100 times!  It was like being sentenced to prison.  It was very painful when one was young but we oftentimes got the message…don’t mess with the teacher.

So let’s bring that back for a moment.  Repeat after me…

I shall always have more than one deal going…

I shall always have more than one deal going…

(Repeat as long as you need to until you never forget it…)

It’s such a simple lesson!  But far, far too many times I see this happen with wholesalers, especially new ones.  You work on this ONE DEAL so hard and do everything in your power to make it happen.  And it is a sincere effort as well where there is rapport and legitimate effort being made to get it to the closing table.  Then at the last second, the unthinkable happens…it falls apart.  Seller suddenly changes their mind.  Even worse, it’s for a legitimate reason such as a health issue arises.  And the Seller is very apologetic and you know they aren’t making it up.  Still the deal is dead, at least for the time being.  Read More >>

---

More: << Prev 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 Next >>

• Join Chattanooga REIA for Only $100/yr