tonrob

Mrs tonrob and I have been mulling over the makings of a fairly major idea and I wanted to see if anyone had any opinions about it.

We're both relatively pi$$ed off with our jobs and have had enough of the cold in Western MA (where we've been for the 3 years since we came to the US). We'd always said that once we got our GCs we'd want to experience living in other parts of the US. We have no kids, and no ties in the area apart from a mortgage (and our jobs of course).

I've always fancied being self-employed and had hankered after real-estate investment (probably just flipping houses at first) although I have had no experience in this area other than a whole heap of reading on the web. (And yes, I realize the HGTV programmes represent a skewed view of reality on this subject!)

An article on forbes.com (from July 2007) listed Raleigh, NC as the 4th best place in the country for this type of activity (and the most affordable in my book, the others - from memory - being Seattle, San Fran and LA). Raleigh would also seem to meet our needs better from a climate perspective and from what I've read it sounds like quite a nice place to live.

The latest version of our plan sees Mrs tonrob pick up work (say, at least for the first year) so we have sufficient income on which to live and have health coverage while I try to get our business off the ground.

Anyone have any thoughts on:

- house flipping in the current market conditions?
- Raleigh as a place in which to do this?
- our general levels of sanity?

I know this needs a lot more research and in all honesty will probably not happen but thought there would be a few opinions on this most esteemed of boards.

BritGuyTN

- it's a really ****ing stupid idea
- raleigh is very pleasant
- you are both ****ing mental

BritGuyTN

Joking aside

flipping right now is a terrible idea - i mean, REALLY BAD

I know so many people half-way through flips giving up and walking away since they will lose money on the sale

many flips also basically end up you being self employed for the same return you get in mcdonalds

If you really want to do some kind of real estate investing, look at rentals; I have a pretty decent portfolio of income-producing properties

rentals are very straightforward as long as you have a good system, and you can get good deals right now from people who are stupid and are in forclosure

I also only do multi-familiy - i.e. duplexes or triplexes/apartment buildings


check out

www.biggerpockets.com
www.thecreativeinvestor.com

feel free to ask any questions

BritGuyTN

this is crucial - this article was probably written in may, just before the ass fell out of the market

meauxna

lol, I was going to advise you to read all of BritGuyTN's posts that even remotely relate to the topic.. I'd have to agree with that now, including his reply here!

We stuck our toe in the water on this in '06-- we have the perfect set up to be able to flip, know our market, can do the work, have the financing.. everything in place really. We got our property through a 'who ya know' connection and got it for a screaming deal. When we penciled out the earnings from the rehab work it would need, carrying costs, the 6 months realistically of labor it would need.. trust me, it is not the masses of money they *appear* to be making on HGTV et al.
We *did* discover that we could flip it to another flipper with little effort and our timing would be just right. We made more money doing that than if we'd made the improvements, and our local market took a little beating right after we got out. The property is still on the market, listed with a Realtor (we sold ourselves, on craigslist).

There is another flip in our neighborhood that has come down $100K in price & been on the market far too long.. the guy way over improved it and is taking a bath now.

We were just reviewing our plans for the coming year, and decided that this is about the worst time to get into flipping and we're looking at income properties instead.

NC sounds really really nice though!

lisag8070

Raleigh really is a beautiful city and you cannot beat the weather here in NC, nice mild winters and lovely long summers..

But I do agree about flipping houses, now is not a good time even here in NC a house can be sat on the market for at least 6 months, with big price drops (in my area a beautiful 4 bdrm house, 2,500 sqft was up for sale for $250,000, 7 months later it sold for $195,000..

Good luck with whatever you decide and you can't beat NC for a place to live..

meauxna

For some reason, it makes me feel better when our views agree.

tonrob

Honest, concise, and exactly the kind of feedback I was looking for!

chicagojlo

Why not combine and do flips that you rent out for a period of time, basically until the market picks up?

tonrob

Thanks for the advice - this is definitely an alternative avenue to explore. I'll read up on the links and then perhaps take you up on your offer of answering a question or two!

Not sure when that article was written. It did make reference to the market going south (and this being one of the factors they were taking into consideration when making their assessment) but as you say still perhaps things hadn't gone quite so tits up at that stage. I suppose this begs the question of whether just because Raleigh was considered good for flippers back then is it the right place to move to with a view to doing rentals now?

Basically we could move anywhere that has reasonably low property prices to do this. My wife works in hotels and there are therefore always fairly good job prospects in any US city of decent size.

tonrob

Thanks for sharing your experience - karma sent.

tonrob

Another good idea.

BritGuyTN

single family residences are often a crap rental proposition

more units actually spreads your risk and effort, 50 rental units really is not that much more effort that 15... seriously

BritGuyTN

this is called wholesaling and can often be much more lucrative than flipping

the effort is in finding the great deals and getting them under contract to assign to someone who is prepared to take on the big risk and effort of flipping

glad it worked out well for you

meauxna

I do like that idea as well--this can be a good time to pick up property IF you know your market well.

I hear Atlanta has good prospects, especially if you're into 1920-1940s style bungalows etc.
On the West Coast, since there aren't many of those vintage houses left that are affordable, 1950s+ ranches are the new rage.. only you have to call them Atomic Eras.

Another thought I had is to look into the licensing costs for different markets. If you want to do your own work, you want to stay on the legal side of the contractor's board etc. You can also get your materials at a lower cost if you're licensed.