OMG! I last posted when?!?

Umm, ok, so I said I was going to be better at posting. I guess that translated to "I may never post again." It has been MONTHS since I have posted...not good.

So, I have had a bunch of stuff going on, but at the same time it doesn't really feel like it. It's strange.

Here are some highlights (chronological order, will add details soon)

1. Sold a property on eBay to a guy in Australia (Sep 09)
2. Got a fire-damaged triplex under contract for $1 and found a buyer
3. Got some new websites, updated existing sites
4. Finally replaced my PC with a brand spankin' new iMac (this thing is SA-WEEEEEET!)
5. Wife and I had a baby. Awesome!
6. Burned out triplex deal fell apart (thanks, mayor)
7. Had to re-do all of the sites I built myself (see #4)
8. Started getting some traction with affiliate marketing and CPA offers
9. Got shut down by Craigslist
10. 2010 came along
11. May have lost the deal with the Australia buyer...no, it was not a quick close (for MANY reasons)

That is a run down of the big things that have happened since my last post. I'm pretty sure I am missing some things, but they must not have been that big of a deal if I cannot think of them right now.

Here is Ethan

Ok...things are rolling a bit now

First off all, I have to admit blogging is not very high on mt priority list , so I have to work on this.

I spent a lot of time this summer working on websites, some internet marketing education and pushing properties. My priority has been getting upfront work completed AND getting a deal or two done because cash is kind of a priority in my life these days.

So, I have gotten most of the upfront stuff taken care of, so that is really good.

And FINALLY, I have sold 429 Hallett Pl. Cash buyer who is someone I kind of know and is getting into the investing game. Closing is today. Thank God!

The numbers on this deal are great for the flip they want to do, so my fee could have been higher, but I needed to sell this thing. After 3 extensions (one from me, 2 from the seller) payday is finally here. Barring any last minute deal implosions, I will be depositing a much needed check this afternoon.

Now I just need to find a buyer for an occupied duplex I have. It is one I got back in July but let go because we could not get access to check it out. Went back to the seller (who is super motivated) with an offer of $13,100...for an OCCUPIED duplex...and it was accepted immediately. So, I am trying to move it for $19,997, but I am finding that it might be too low. Umm, what?

Anyway, we are currently going through the same access issue, this time from the PM, so who knows, I may end up dropping it again. I do not want to because these sellers have a number of properties available and I would like to take a crack at those as well.

We shall see.

Boldness is rewarded

Well, I wish I could say I have found a buyer for the Hallett property, but I have not. I had a serious buyer lined up, but she was going to use hard money and the lender has cut back on his LTV (to 60%), so the deal became too expensive for her. Oh well. The website and ads I have posted have helped me pick up about a dozen more potential buyers, so it has not been a total waste of time. I have gotten with some other investors I know and have them spreading the word to their lists, so hopefully something shakes out. I still get leads from my ads, so there is some potential there as well.

Now, for the boldness stuff. In the grand scheme of things, this is probably not all that bold, but it has been a step for me. I am sometimes too laid back and go with an attitude of if they say no, I move on and too often I seem to present things in a way that make it easy to say "no". I have recently begun taking a slightly different approach. Now I have been going at this business with the attitude "what's the worst they can do, say no?" and this has paid dividends quickly. Too frequently I have offered prices that I think the buyer will accept, not necessarily the price that works best for me. Now, I have still gotten good prices, but not nearly as good as I may have been able to. Recent actions have gotten me different results.

On Friday I got 3 properties under contract, 2 are cash flowing already and one is ready to go.

Duplex (rented) - Duquesne, PA 15110

Single-family (rented) - Braddock, PA 15104

Single-family (vacant) - McKees Rocks, PA 15136



All of them are under 50% of ARV and I did not go higher than $18,200 for any of them. I had another offer accepted at $16k for a duplex in need of work, but the seller is looking for far more hand money than I am willing to give. However, we only got to this point because I kept at it on trying to work something out. I am not creating anything revolutionary for investors, I am just seeing how I can get better results by making small changes in my mindset.

I currently have 4 properties that I am trying to sell and they have all gotten some amount of interest. I just need to get these sold and my stress level will go waaaaaay down. I have not had the results I would like so far, but I am on the right track, I can feel it.

I have the opportunity to partner up with a mentor of mine that should do wonders for my lead generation. It will be a bit pricey compared to what I have been spending on marketing, but if it pans out the way we think it will (300-500 leads in 30 days), then it will e money well-spent.

I will keep you updated (while I keep my fingers crossed).

Come On!

I work my numbers, I talk to my agent (who is an investor) and I talk to other investors and they all say that this house is a no-brainer deal, yet nothing.

I have the property sent to 3,000 other "investors" and I get (still only) 125 hits from that group. Ugh.

Maybe this will help...I am a member of the Virtual Deal Factory community (by Mark Evans DM and Damian Lanfranchi)and Mark is a real estate mentor of mine. Each day on VDF there is a new video on the home page and today Mark promoted my deal BIG TIME! To see it, got to the Home Page and in the drop down box select Webisode #86.

If a guy who has made millions in real estate says it is a no-brainer deal, then I am not imagining things...IT'S A GOOD DEAL. Someone else (with money) needs to realize this. So far I have gotten one inquiry from this so far today, I am keeping my fingers crossed for more, but it only takes one, right?

I have gotten a couple other inquiries from other marketing, but still no takers (including the buyer who stood me up on Friday).

Keep plugging away.

Umm, yeah...

This has me scratching my head. I am part of a real estate investing group that consists of somewhere around 3,000 "investors". I use this term loosely because there does not seem to be much activity going on with these people. I (and a couple other investor buddies) have suspected as much, but now it seems to be pretty clear.

As a benefit of being a part of this group, when we have a deal to market, they will send out an email to everyone. So, the property that I mentioned in an earlier post (great investor location, good price, low amount of rehab, etc.) has hardly even been sniffed by this group. Because I had my doubts about how many of these people are active investors, I created a BudURL for my property page and had it put in the email this way I could track the hits just from this group.

Maybe I am expecting too much, but from a list of 3,000 investors there have been about 125 hits...4%. This seems rather low considering this group paid anywhere from $5,000 to $7,500 to attend the classes and become a member of this group.

At the end of the day, while I am not looking to hold anything right now, closing on this myself is not the worst outcome. I should be able to cash out about $10k and clear $150-$200/month, I would just rather have a fast payday...give me nickels now and I will work on collecting dimes later.

Have a Great 4th of July!

Update

So, the 4th of July is upon us, meaning summer is just blowing by yet agian.

Anyway, I have been pretty busy of late.

I had an offer accepted on an estate property back on June 11, well on Saturday I finally got the signed contract back, so now I can market it. it is in a great rental area and I expect this one will get lots of interest.



More info HERE


I have gotten about 10 emails asking for more info and one investor who wants to take a look...need to move fast on this one. The owner will bolt if she sniffs wholesaling of the deal, so assigning is out, a double or simultaneous close is how this will be done. Prefer a simultaneous close to save about $2,500 for what a transactional lender will charge me.

* I was contacted by an investor in Florida who is selling 12 properties in Erie PA (his hometown), which is about 90 min. from me. Waiting to get details from him, but there might be something to salvage out of the list. Some rented, some vacant, some singe-family, some multi-units.

* Contacted an investor looking to unload a Sec 8 rental in a so-so area. Long-term tenant in place, rent is $600/mo, a cash buyer would net about $450/mo after taxes and insurance...have not gotten any takers on something like this yet.

* Got a message thru RealEstateInvestor.com from an investor who has 10 properties in the Pittsburgh area that she wants to sell ASAP. Like the Erie properties, some rented, some vacant, some singe-family, some multi-units. Posted some leader ads to gauge interest, nothing so far.

I have also continued to work on my website to make my property pages better. Feedback I have gotten thus far has been positive...just want to make it easy for the investor buyer to say "I want it!".

That is all for now.

What do you know, it's the middle of June already

Well, I have certainly failed to be anything close to consistent with my posting. Not posting kinda defeats the purpose of having a blog. At least something is better than nothing, so if I cannot do it everyday, I will work on doing more than what I have been (that should not be too hard, huh?)

Ok, so the property that I got under contract for $7,500 was of absolutely no interest to anyone. I got a couple of tire kickers, but that's about it, except for the guy out of state who anted either a BPO or an appraisal done. Oh, and he wasn't going to pay for it. Uh, no.

On Friday I got a much better property under contract, or at least i think I did. We came to a verbal agreement on the purchase price, I signed the papers and my agent sent them on to the seller's agent to get signatures. I have not gotten anything back as yet, so that's why "I think" I got it under contract on Friday. The tough thing about this one is it's an estate so some extra eyeballs will be reviewing it AND one of the parties to the estate got scammed in one of the big mortgage fraud scams around here, so doing a straight assignment is a no-go for this deal. I can do a double close, but I did not exactly account for this in my calcs, so I may need to take a little less to get it moved.

It's a pretty sweet deal. It is basically move-in ready as a rental and is in a great area. It just needs some cosmetic work and maybe some electrical work. The house is old, but the fuse box has been upgraded to a breaker panel, except they ran the line off the fuse box instead of removing it altogether. Not sure how that will go in the permit inspection. If that is ok with the inspector, then rehab will be something around $4k-$6k.

The ARV is in the $85-$90k range, I got it for $33k and it should need under $10k to get it going. if I can move it for $40k, I will be happy.

After talking with some other investors, though, I will be moving my focus from SFH to multi-family, especially duplexes. The SFHs are not moving very quickly in general, so I need to change my approcah a little bit.

So, that is what is new on the REI front. On the internet marketing front I have been doing some work as well.

With moving to a virtual investing model, using the internet has become key. A natural extension of this is to incorporate affiliate marketing into what I am doing. So, last week I kicked of my first full-fledged campaign. I will look to promote real estate products, but that is a more specific niche, so my first campaign is for a product that will have broader appeal...buying a car.

If you are looking at buying a new car, a used car, or determining whether to lease or buy, check out this product and learn some great money-saving tips...www.CarBuying-Advice.info.

As part of my campaign, I have created 5 Squidoo lenses, please take a moment to check them out and give them a rating.

1 www.squidoo.com/NewCarBuying-Advice
2 www.squidoo.com/UsedCarBuying-Advice
3 www.squidoo.com/BuyingACar-Tips
4 www.squidoo.com/BuyingAUsedCar-Tips
5 www.squidoo.com/TipsForBuying-ACar

I have a goal of getting a campaign like this set up every-other-week, so by Labor Day I will have 7 campaigns out there beginning to generate some income to supplement what my wholesaling brings in. Wish me luck in this!