New Additions for HFS Members

The past few weeks have been real exciting here at House Flipping School. Personally I have met a ton of new people, some who have been investing in real estate for years and others who are just thinking about getting started. It's been a real fun ride.

On October 16th we held our first ever monthly House Flipping School MeetUp. We had over 65 people show up from a variety of different backgrounds and professions. The MeetUp proved to be a great opportunity for building your team and making those connections that really help grow a business.

While at the MeetUp I was able to talk directly with many blog readers and House Flipping School members. It was nice to get out from behind the guise of the computer, and actually speak 1 on 1 with many of you.

A few HFS members even gave me some helpful recommendations on how to improve the membership side of this blog. In particular these members wanted:

• An easier way to navigate through the dozens of educational posts here on HFS
• Access to some "older" pieces of premium content that were available when we launched HFS over 1 year ago

I take your recommendations seriously, so last week I reached out to my website guy Ryan and explained that we needed to make some changes.

Here's what we have added so far to the HFS membership experience. This is really just the tip of the iceberg of what we have in store.
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5 Little Known Ways to Finance Your Next House Flip

This guest blog post is written by Jimmy Moncrief of realestatefinancehq.com

I’m a credit officer (read: underwriting) at a bank so I am naturally skeptical when loan officers pitch me their customers who flip houses.   However, over the years I have seen people who have literally had nothing to a million dollar net worth, purely from flipping houses.

House Flipping School does a great job on educating you how to flip - especially on how to flip houses with no money.  My skill-set isn’t house flipping, it’s financing so that is what I’m going to focus on - namely some other methods on how to finance a house flip - whether its your first or your hundred and first.

How to Finance a House Flip - Things to Consider

It is very rare for full-time real estate flippers to only do one deal at a time.   If they are doing their bookkeeping and have a strong way to stay ahead of their finances, then they should be able to juggle multiple deals. Additionally, the very successful home flippers want to do more deals because the more deals they do the more money they make.

However, there is one small caveat.  The more deals you are involved in, your company and personal cash dries-up due to all your cash being in the deals you are currently working on.  This not only causes stress in your business, but also limits you in future deals.

Lenders always want to match the maturity of the loan with the repayment strategy.  Since all flippers I know want to be in and out of the house within one year, I focused on those loan options.

I know everyone always wants the lowest interest rate.  I agree this is very important.  However, I also want you to think about the time value of money.  What do I mean by this?

If you can acquire a property 1 month faster and pay a 100 basis point (1%) premium, it’s probably worth it.  Let’s go over the math: Continue reading

How Get Your House Flips Done On Time: Managing Your Contractors Part II

How Get Your House Flips Done On Time: Managing Your Contractors Part I

How to Get Your House Flips Done on Time: Final Touches on Hanover

House Flipping Update | the Hanover property

One of the ongoing house flips I have in the works right now is a deal in Hanover, MA that was once on the brink of collapse. This particular house flip almost never happened, but thanks to some swift negotiation I was able to purchase this house back in August. Since then my team of contractors have been working hard to fix this place up for its future homeowners.

I think the best way for you to learn about the house flipping business is to peer into my business and see how we do things. Books and manuals are great, but nothing beats the real deal. In this post I want to let you in on what's happening with the Hanover flip, inside and out.

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House Flip Breakdown | Analyzing the Whitman Property

If you have watched the Whitman Round Table Discussion then you know that this particular house flip got off to a slow start. We actually owned the property for two weeks before we began any renovation work. Of course this is not ideal because I prefer to hit the ground running and start work immediately after closing on a property.

Yet the slow start was actually a good thing. My team and I are finding lots of profitable house flip deals right now, and my team of contractors simply cannot keep up. We are going through some "growing pains." Soon I hope to be working with additional contractors so that we can remain up to speed with our current deal flow, and not have another two week lag time like we did with the Whitman property.

In this post I want to take you through the Whitman deal, from how we found this property all the way to the final renovations. It's been quite the ride and I am really looking forward to the final sale.

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How to Analyze Deals Quickly & Submit Offers that Get Accepted

How to Analyze Deals Quickly & Submit Offers that Get Accepted

If you flip houses for a living then you know that real estate never sleeps. Often times your phone will ring when you least expect it, and suddenly there is a deal on the table. Smart decisions need to be made quickly when this occurs, or else you may miss out on a valuable money-making opportunity. To excel in the house flipping business, an investor needs to be able to analyze deals quickly and submit offers that get accepted.

Take for example what recently happened to my acquisition manager Bill Roberts and myself over Labor Day weekend. Bill and I were just hanging out, taking it easy and unwinding from what had been an eventful week. We were just about ready to "shut it down" for the weekend when Bill's phone rang.

It was a real estate agent calling on behalf of a local asset manager, about a deal that we had previously passed on. Low and behold the asset manager was now ready to negotiate. As mentioned above, real estate never sleeps!

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The #1 Obstacle Preventing People from Flipping Houses

My palms were starting to sweat and I felt hot all over, borderline anxious even. I was in the midst of a meeting with a rather challenging client, whose tile flooring was "just not looking right." The only problem was that the flooring had been changed and altered a few times now, in an effort to make her happy. As cliche as it is I was having an intense case of "The Mondays." I knew I desperately wanted to change careers and get into real estate, yet I was just too fearful to make the leap.

My phone rang just as I finished the meeting with my flooring client. It was my wife, informing me that something was wrong with her vehicle, and that the parts and labor to fix it were going to cost nearly $1,500. That same anxious feeling began brewing again in my gut, and suddenly I felt hot again.

I had been involved in the flooring business my entire life. It was all I ever knew and it had treated me well. Yet something was different now. Going to work had become a grind and I was having trouble finding enjoyment in my career. Problem customers were just the tip of the iceberg. On top of all that finances were getting tight. My family was growing, yet my income was not. Looking a few years down the road I saw college tuition, which scared me half to death.

I had to make a change, not just for me but for my family and our financial future.

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