My story journey actually began in the early 80’s after having my income taxes prepared. I was notified by my accountant that I had a $12,000.00 federal tax bill and a $5,000.00 state tax bill.
This wasn’t good news, gone are the days of refunds. This was a new level of pain I had never experienced before.
My accountant suggested that I purchase some rental property to create some tax deductions and that started my residential property investing activities. Just think, my tax problem was created by the government and solved by the government.
That same year, I attended a Robert Allen No Money Down Seminar that was taught by Carlton Sheets.This week end workshop lasted 2 days and cost me $500.00. There was a lot if information poured on me that week end.
I was working full time, so I had to come up with a way to purchase 5 properties that were worth $30k or more within the next 12 months to fix my tax problem. I completed that workshop in November and spent the Christmas Holidays studying the content . I wanted to purchase 1 property per month for 5 months. But I had to continue working my full time job.
Though I really would have like to have purchased one apartment complex and be done, I wasn’t mentally prepared to purchase a $2,000,000 property. I just wasn’t there so I focused on the single family foreclosure properties. I decided to purchase Government foreclosures exclusively.
My Investing Game Plan
1.Purchase FHA AND VA Foreclosures because financing was available from FHA and VA.
These are properties that you simply bid on and if you win the bid, you get a 80%-90% FHA or VA loan on the property. I would only need to put 10% down. And the rates were low and these loans were full assumable and non qualifying.So if I wanted to ever sell on of the properties, the loan could be assumed for a $45.00 assumption fee. Those were the good days!
2. Ease Of Access And Availability
At that time, FHA AND VA would run ads every week listing the properties they want to dispose of. Today, these properties are listed on the internet at hudhomestore.com . VA Properties can be found listed on the govsales.gov web site.
This means that I could locate properties and bid on properties without spending a lot of time. Remember, I had a full time job.
3. I stream lined the process.
I couldn’t purchase the properties directly from the Government. I had to use a licensed realtor in order to submit a bid. So I worked exclusively with one small family realty group. I gave them a $1000.00 Deposit to use and they would do the inspections and make recommendations and I would simply do one look and be done. I would sign the bis and they would present it and do all the follow up work.
NOTE: This worked for the realtors because they have a repeat customer, and it worked for me because I had no idea what I was doing. I learned a lot from these realtors because they knew the process and the local market better than I did.
And I basically leveraged their knowledge. A true win win relationship! Learn from others!
4. Financing Repairs.
I would purchase the properties at 90% LTV, and put 10% down. Because I had to hold the properties, financing repairs became a very immediate concern. Hard money was not an option. But my realtors friends tolds me about another government insured loan program that was exclusively for single family home owners repairs. The only requirement was that I be the title holder of the property. My local bank would make the loans and good old uncle sam would guarantee 100% of the loan.
I simply need to submit a list of the repairs and apply for the loan. This loan permitted a 15% profit to the owner for doing the repairs. This fixed the repair financing problem. This loan program is still active today and it official name is:
TITLE 1 INSURED LOANS FOR PROPERTY IMPROVEMENTS . You can check out the particulars at hud.gov .
I used 8 of these loans over a 12 month period to finance all my property repairs.
5. Locating Tenants
After the properties were repaired, I listed them with section 8 and rented them to the Government.
Guaranteed rents were nice. The government provided all the solution to my tax problem.
I used this system to purchase 20 houses in 11 months while working a full time job.
My plan was never to sell. Refinance the properties if I wanted to tap into the equity.
Selling was not an option because it would trigger more tax problems.
My motivation was my inspiration. The WHY is always more important than the how!
6. Connecting The Dots
I want you to notice a pattern from this message. It’s the same pattern I use today.
Dot 1: The Pain Or Pleasure Factor
For me, my pain was pay those large tax bill for another year. It doesn’t matter which you use because it’s real and it works to motivate you. Today, I use the pleasure factor rather than the pain factor.
DOT 2: Simple Processes
It’s important that you think thing through and find the path of least resistance.
Buying on the court house steps or directly from individual owners required too much time.
Things that were hard, I simply wouldn’t. Simple things are hard not to do.
I rather think things through rather than trying to figure them out. That week end seminar
gave me a tons of information to digest. I had to consume it and modify it to meet my needs and objectives.
Today, I provide my students with Step by Step blueprints and processes to follow.
DOT 3: Speed Of Implementation
This process for purchasing SFR was easy and fast to implement. 20 Acquisitions in 11 months.
It’s important that to move from the class room and into the real world lab as quickly as you can.
This is where and how you discover things that aren’t covered in the books and class room. There is no substitute for experience. The Good Bad And Ugly. The success leaves traces and the failures do also.
DOT 4: Persist in Your Pursuits
Learn to be sold on your plan. Buy into you. Vote for you. Don’t give up. When things aren’t going as you wish, step back and reboot. Ask yourself the right questions: What went wrong? What did I miss? What can I do to get back in the game as quickly as possible. Have a play until you win attitude, not a one and done attitude. Your success does not have an expiration date. Play until you win and persist in your pursuits.
Conclusion
Two year into the residential investing game everything changes when I received a call from my banker.
This call changed everything for me and put an end to my SFH investing career. I have a separate work on this titled
“Why Residential Investing Sucks” that explains what happened.
Today, I use these process to purchase and flip multi million dollar properties and transaction and share them in my training courses. It’s all a matter of simply playing the “Buying And Selling Money Games”.
Resources:
Title 1 Home Improvement Loans
