“After joining the Protégé program, reading all of Bobs' books, listening to all the real estate instructors through Protégé, and attending his seminar and others he recommended, we set out to make offers in our hot marketplace. First we tried the strategy of buying entry-level homes, which were selling for over list price. We realized we had to change strategies in our marketplace to succeed. We purchased a mid-range fixer-upper with no money down, using our home equity line. The property cost $750,000, 10% below market. We immediately went to work rehabbing it, gutting the interior to create a great room feeling and enlarge the public areas, and upgrading the house from its 60s original look. Think avocado green and harvest gold with old brightly-colored shag carpeting. The landscaping was dead... it was a tired house. Working with a contractor who understood our vision, we took 4 months to upgrade everything, investing $200,000 from our home equity line. With 10% down payment, our out-of-pocket expenses total $305,000 including monthly finance costs. We have the home on the market for $1,295,000 with an offer in hand and should NET over $325,000 for 6 months efforts. Not a bad return for neophytes! We're now on a hunt to find another in our area as we have built an outstanding team of contractors who see our vision. We are also looking at outside investors who want to play this game with us. Robert and Mark gave us the "kick" we needed to JUST GET GOING... ”--Stephanie H & Jack H - Total Gain: $15,637,509
“My Purchases (1) 4/10/03 Anthem Country Club - Las Vegas, Nevada (SFH: 3bd/2ba/view/club facilities/guard gate) Purchase Price: $272,000 Current FMV: $355,000 (2) 5/02/03 Hidden Valley - Valencia, CA (SFH: 3,060 sq. ft./5bd/3ba/pool/tennis/view) Purchase Price: $473,000 Current FMV: $695,500 (3) 10/15/03 Las Vegas, Nevada 12,00 sq. foot commercial property (2 houses on lot/storage facility) Purchase price: -0- [take over payments from ex-wife] FMV: $225,000 (4) 6/15/97 Woodland Hills, CA (SFH: 2,500 sq. ft./ 3bd/3ba/city lights view/ Purchase: $365,000 Current FMV: $625,000 ”--Louis V - Total Gain: $13,332,628
“This is an extract from a book I contributed to "New Zealand Real Estate Investors Secrets, How 10 New Zealanders became millionaires from Residential Property and how you can too!" Enjoy the read. “When I left school and got a job in 1978 my father’s advice was to start a savings history and get some life insurance. He said it would achieve a couple of things. Firstly, it would establish a savings record with a financial institution. Secondly, it would give me the opportunity to borrow money from the insurance company to buy a house and finally it would give me some security in the future if I should die and have a wife and kids. So like all good kids I took my Dad’s advice. The next question was how much insurance should I buy? The insurance agent tried to sell me $50,000 or $100,000 worth of insurance, however, this was too much for me to comprehend and relate to so I could not accept that. At that stage a reasonable three bedroom house in Oamaru was worth $10,000. So I took out $10,000 worth of life insurance and started paying my monthly premiums. The insurance did help us buy a house later on but eight years later the same $10,000 houses were worth $35,000. With hindsight I should have bought a house. In 1983 I was working in the forestry in the Nelson area as a Logging Supervisor. I had just graduated with my New Zealand Certificate in Forestry. My father had always said "when you leave school get a job and then get a qualification", so I had achieved one level of success. However, I could not balance my chequebook or pay off my $500 credit card. One of my lower skilled contemporaries (how is that for snobbery) had been saving with a Building Society for a number of years and he won a ballot that allowed him to borrow for a mortgage to buy a house. At this stage I could not understand how he slept at night with such a large debt! My next step was to go and talk to the pay officer - he was the one who dealt with money and paid people in the forestry, so I assumed he would know the most about money. I told him I had a small deposit and that I was thinking about buying a house. He asked me how much I had. I lied and said about $5,000, and added that I wanted to save another $5,000 to get a decent deposit. He asked me how long it would take for me to save $5,000, and I said about a year. He said that unfortunately house prices will have gone up $10,000 in the time I would have saved only $5,000! Oh well - forget about that idea I thought - too hard. So I did forget about that idea and carried on trying to balance my chequebook and pay off my $500 credit card debt. I met Catheryn (my wife to be) shortly after that and we decided we had had enough of our jobs and so decided to head overseas for a year. As we were both from good Catholic stock it would have been improper for us to travel the world together without making a long term commitment, so prior to leaving we got engaged and set a date to get married and then headed overseas. We both had $3,000 cars and we sold them to buy our air tickets and clear up all our debts before we went, including paying off the balance of my $500 credit card. When we arrived in Heathrow we had enough money to buy our air ticket home and live for two weeks. When we got home ten months later we had enough money to live for just two weeks. We had a great time overseas for ten months, working for five months and traveling for five months around Europe and England. Whilst I was away I got a first hand view of the effects of the draconian tenancy laws in England. When we arrived in London we were met by one of Catheryn’s friends who said she had a place for us to stay and it was close to town. When we got to the flat we found it was a squat. We were squatting in the basement flat of a five story terrace house and the landlord lived on the top floor! We were able to squat because the girls had got the flat legitimately and then found problems with it; loose cupboards, poor ventilation and a number of other trivial things. They got a health inspector to inspect the flat who gave them a report of about ten things that were wrong. The girls gave the landlord notice that they were not going to pay any rent until the property was tidied up and then they changed the locks so he could not get in. It was great for our finances but a wrought all the same. It was close to town being one block from Madam Tusaud’s, the next street over from Harley Street, and a ten minute walk to Bond Street. It was paradise for us being so close to town and not paying any rent. Unfortunately, it didn’t last because the day we got back from the Beerfest in Germany we found all of our belongings out in the street in black plastic rubbish bags and we had to find another flat fast. The unreal thing that we found out later on is that if we had taken the proper steps when we found our gear outside we could have gotten back into the flat and had the landlord prosecuted for throwing us out. The cost of ignorance is high! Now we had to find a proper flat and we were amazed at how hard they were to get. The bonds and rent we paid in advance was nearly £1,000 for a £100 bedsit because the landlord could not afford to take the risk of renting to people with no money. During this time we noticed heaps of terrace houses that were vacant and boarded-up. We enquired why they were not let out as there was such a shortage of homes. We were told that the owners could not afford to let them because the Tenancy Laws were so draconian against landlords that once tenants got in, they could not get them to pay rent or evict them. It was cheaper to leave the property empty! I understand that the laws were later changed to make it fairer for landlords and to encourage more landlords to invest in properties and rent them out. When we returned to New Zealand in 1986 we had the idea that we would get married, save for one or two years and then buy a house. As we travelled down the country from Auckland to Dunedin and spoke to our friends it became clear that in New Zealand at the time the best way to get a house was to be poor and get a Housing Corporation loan and buy a house immediately while we had no money and no jobs - we qualified as poor!. Before we got married I spoke to a good family friend who was an accountant and he gave me a big dose of reality. He said - "You have just come back from overseas, you are getting married, you do not have a job, or any money - you won’t be able to buy a house". This devastated me completely and put any idea of home ownership out of the question. When we discussed this with Catheryn’s father and the prospect that we would need to rent for a couple of years, he said "don’t worry about it, just go and buy a house." He didn’t offer us any financial support but offered confidence in his ‘matter-of-factness’ that it was possible and we just needed to go and make it happen. Once we got married Catheryn went back to work as a Radiographer and my job was to find a house. I spent all day looking at houses and doing odd jobs to keep myself busy. I found an ideal house for us that showed some potential. It was an old villa split into two flats. The owners lived on one side and the other side was rented to an old single guy who had lived there for the last 16 years through four different owners. He paid $80 per week. The house needed major work - you took your life into your hands just walking across the verandah. When I showed Catheryn the house she didn’t even want to stop, it was so rundown with a rusty chain link fence held up with rotten posts and a gate falling off the post, obviously well lived in but not well cared for. The house was on the market for $42,000 and so we started the purchasing process by offering $33,000. We did all the negotiation through our lawyer John Dowling... Matthew and Catheryn have gone on to purchase 15 properties and become landlords. ”--Matthew & Catheryn - Total Gain: $8,054,541
“This was my first property that I was able to assign and flip to another investor for $3,000 and also be able to add my commission on it for another $1,500. I found this property through the Letter of Intents that I had be submitting, the duplex was listed at $75,000, it was a distressed property that had the potential to have a monthly cash-flow, each unit could be rented out for $650/mo.The current tenants were quite a few months behind in their rents, therefore there was no safety deposits or down payments to be transferred. I got it under contract for $48,700 and could be retailed after repair costs for $90,000. Thanks to Ethan Willis' group of mentors including Nate Stodderd who was able to help incorporate a key clause of noncircumvention which empowered me and my knowledge about my assignment. To top off those mentors, Todd Dotson as well as Chris Cates have Ultimately done an Aboslutely Incredible job in training hands-on. The "Checks TRULY Don't Lie" and being able to train in the "trenches" was the BEST thing EVER.”--Tauna T & Hui T - Total Gain: $3,127,300
“While reviewing a website for FSBO/Foreclosures, I came upon a small ad for a 4 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath colonial in an area I'm interested in. When I called the seller, he said he already had a contingency offer on it. I said that if I liked the house, I could pay cash in about 45 days, no contingency; with that, he said "come on down! Let's talk." The home is immaculate, elegantly wallpapered, model home show condition. It's a 4 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath Colonial with a 2 1/2 car garage in a wooded cul-del-sac area. It has a nice 12x18 wooded deck, new siding, roof/garage door (the garage has lots of wooden shelves and work area), upgraded kitchen, gas fireplace, natural gas, walk-out basement, and rough-in plumbing for a full bathroom. The house has several bay windows, newly asphalted driveway, and lovely landscaping. The sellers allowed me to buy it about $30,000 under market, and lock in the price today, even though settlement won't be until next April 2004 (they're building a house in Myrtle Beach, SC). This should allow me to gain an additional $15,000-$20,000 in equity. They'll even let me show the house to prospective tenants before settlement. Additionally, they're leaving a lovely mahogany bedroom suite, Christmas wreaths custom made for the windows, etc, with the house. What's exciting is that they're not even requiring any financial hold on the property (I'll probably give them $1,000 for escrow). The money for my 5% down will come from a HELOC from an investment property I own with about $70,000 equity. The rent (about $1,800) should provide a positive cash flow, since I'll probably do a 1 or 5 year interest only financing! ”--Barbara S - Total Gain: $2,492,835