Im hoping to get into the house flipping business because I've seen that it is quite profitable

How should I start off

3/11/2012 12:54:40 AM

I'd recommend that you begin by flipping a house.

Or if you want to get fancy, you could flop it.

You may also be able to get tacolu to pay for the privilege of taking all of the trash out of it

[Edited on March 11, 2012 at 1:14 AM. Reason : ]

3/11/2012 1:13:08 AM

I'd start by buying a house.

3/11/2012 3:22:42 AM

Is this something that is viable in the current state of the housing market? I know there are penalties involved when you purchase a house that you don't live in.

3/11/2012 8:33:27 AM

Obviously you have to know the market, be able to purchase at a low price, know costs associated with improvements/realtor/closing/carrying. Finally be able to sell in this market which includes competitively pricing. A lot easier said than done.

3/11/2012 9:14:23 AM

Woosh

3/11/2012 9:25:12 AM

I'd watch a few tv shows first and do what they do. It's incredibly easy and you'll make truck loads of money.

3/11/2012 9:29:34 AM

^ ding ding, and don't plan for any "unexpected" expenses

3/11/2012 9:31:38 AM

Do you have money to invest?

100% loans are hard to come by these days and only for owner occupied properties.

3/11/2012 9:50:34 AM

Yeah, there are no penalties for buying investment property--just fewer advantages and incentives.

3/11/2012 10:20:05 AM

You are probably gonna need 20% down on whatever property you buy + cash for the renovations.

3/11/2012 10:29:12 AM

I know a couple people that buy, live in and renovate for 2 years or a little more, then sell and repeat. Not for the faint of heart, and you have to do almost all the work yourself to see a profit.

3/11/2012 10:41:37 AM

I think ctnz71 does this. Talk to him.

3/11/2012 12:54:18 PM

Quote :

"I know a couple people that buy, live in and renovate for 2 years or a little more, then sell and repeat. Not for the faint of heart, and you have to do almost all the work yourself to see a profit."

I have a client that does this, he has a full time job as a mail carrier. Works on his properties most of his time outside of that.

He keeps an open line of credit on his primary residence (which is paid off), he can go to auctions and write a check, or pickup a distressed property and close in days instead of weeks....takes his time doing renovations and then sells them for a profit.

He also changes his primary residence every couple of years which is also usually a flip house and probably does not pay any capital gains tax on that.

He makes good money doing this, but he works hard at it...its nothing like the TV shows.

3/11/2012 1:12:04 PM

Quote :

"Im hoping to get into the house flipping business because I've seen that it is quite profitable How should I start off"

You should start by having $1,000,000 in your bank account.

3/11/2012 1:55:05 PM

Realistically, I would say $400K in cash, and another $400K in the bank would be a good start.

3/11/2012 7:32:18 PM

You can start modest, a sub 100k house, and cash on hand to do renovations with.

3/11/2012 8:45:33 PM

good luck in this market. if you have the money to buy and sit on it and you have the requisite construction knowledge and good subcontracting connections, you may make a little bit. I don't think you need $800k or anywhere close to that in all honesty unless you are starting a business to just flip houses and plan on sitting on them a while. You could buy your first home and stay three years to avoid an ass load of taxes and sell it at the end of three as you renovate it at your own pace. I had one buddy do it straight out of college because he had saved about 20k and had a good job coming out. not to be negative or shit on your dreams or anything but most of the people on TV either have money or spouses with money and do it on the side of another profitable job, or they have tons of experience and industry knowledge.

3/12/2012 3:52:04 AM

this my friends is a steal.

priced at 52k....worth 90-100k with paint and carpet and some other fairly minor tlc

It will probably go in to multiple offers.

http://tra.mlxtempo.com/DotNet/Pub/EmailView.aspx?r=1120942396&s=TRA&t=TRA

3/12/2012 1:14:03 PM

would you recommend handpicking a migrant workforce?

3/12/2012 1:16:47 PM

I would buy some buckets of paint at lowes or home depot and some rollers.

Some laminate floor from lumber liquidators or some budget carpet and installers, and some light fixtures and appliances.

3/12/2012 1:21:27 PM

The bedroom carpet in the pics looks like it might be relatively new. I can't tell what kind of flooring is downstairs. Those stairs look sketchy though.

What are the homeowner's dues for that place? The MLS listing says $0, so I'm assuming that just means they didn't know the actual number.

3/12/2012 2:42:23 PM

$220 - includes exterior maint, pool, & tennis

The first floor has the slab exposed with some kind of glaze or paint on it, it definitely needs some flooring to be marketable.

3/12/2012 3:46:11 PM

When people look at a house now the realtor will generally tell buyers when it was last sold and for how much.

In this market if it sold six months earlier for $50k less, then they'll usually assume that they're getting fucked and will look elsewhere.

3/12/2012 4:16:34 PM

That's really a non-issue.

Even a poor realtor will know the difference between $50k and rundown versus some substantially higher number with all the repairs and reasonable (aka not pricing it out of the neighborhood) upgrades done.

Very few of them are going to give buyers the straight info-dump of the last sale without any reasoning behind the difference in the then and now numbers.

3/12/2012 4:46:40 PM

^^ yeah that is not true.

That information is actually on Zillow now for all to see anyway...

Many buyers do not want the hassle of renovating a home, they will still pay more for move in ready.

3/12/2012 5:53:20 PM

Quote :

"You can start modest, a sub 100k house, and cash on hand to do renovations with."

Yeah, but one little house at a time isn't really getting into the biz though.

3/12/2012 8:37:36 PM

If you're skilled enough to do renovations yourself, you could probably make more doing work on other people's homes without all the risk/hassle involved with buying and selling properties.

3/13/2012 1:19:46 AM

^yuppp

3/13/2012 1:44:06 AM