Checking Out Other Investors Mistakes: A Case Study!

I have been looking at what other very successful R/E Investors are doing, posting and trying to Teach by creating Educational Networks of their own. I have come across past DG Students in this category: Here's a current situation from one such past DG Student who claims extreme success. I am not doubting it at all, but note this Big Mistake, which any of use could make if we get anxious. This particular Investor puts out a little weekend competition, one might call it, by offering a Bird Dog of x-amount of money if you can get one of your Buyers on board for his property. Not a bad idea. He's very ethical and so, from my Buyers list of 19, All Cash, I picked one I thought would work out the best. I did NOT have the information on the property in presentation form as we are taught/we do. So, to protect my own reputation I just called my end Buyer and gave him a heads up.
Then I passed his info the the R/E Investor. After the weekend had passed I had never heard back from the Investor. Later he contacted me and said "he didn't get to or MY buyer didn't get to him by the deadline of Monday night." Now let me be clear here: They never connected at all. Also, the Investor never got back to me about that until I repeatedly e-mailed him through the week and on Friday he finally e-mailed me back. Not very professionally handled on his part. And he's pushing to be and Educator.

The following week I get another "challenge" from him and this time all the particulars of a good presentation are included, including the address of the property. "Now that's more like it!" I thought. And then I ran the numbers: It was a short sale and he was asking for $40,000. The presentation including Rehab, Insurance, all the numbers, added $10,000 thereafter to the Buyer, and then he was saying it's FMV/ARV and ALL the associated costs was valued at $85,000. I KNOW the area well this property is located in. Nice neighborhood per sey, BUT on the edge of a huge Crime Area. And the pictures of the house showed a Chain link fence, a Steel Security Door and Barred Windows! This is why I have steadfastly avoided not just the crime area for doing deals, but about two miles away from it in some areas. In particular, in this area gang members use the North/South corridor streets to go in and out of their own area. Just a month before there was an altercation on one such street, less then a mile from this house, and the gang member was shot & killed. NOT an area I'd suggest to my Buyer as a good neighborhood, or represent as an easy area to rent out, as unfortunate as these situations are for home owners! This Investor should have known better when he purchased. And the most important foopaw is that the FMV/ARV is no way near his assessed value, Max value in that neighborhood is about $66,000. That's $19,000 under what he'd tell an end Buyer.

As a DG Student, this is the kind of mistake one might expect I'd make. But, with the DG Family to watch my back, good training, the coaches and countless hours in studying, and most importantly listening to what I've learned from various Webinars, I'm consistently being reaffirmed on how good our training really is.

As Dean said in his last blog, it's not luck. It is time consuming and if that is hard, then ok, we'll call it hard. I'm new, struggling, frustrated and running out of money. BUT, no way I'm stopping. I have nothing else and I don't want to do anything else. I might end up homeless before I do my first deal, but I'm not giving up. And despite all the hardships and frustrations, I'm enjoying what I'm doing. I will be successful because of what Dean has given us and because of all of you who share. This is more then a good network we are involved with: It is a GREAT network! I've met with many successful Investors in the greater Phoenix area and I consistently see that despite their successes, their mistakes are ones we don't fall into. We might fall into others, time will show me, but it amazes me how people OVER VALUE properties because they are anxious. So if you are an experienced investor and don't get much out of your sphere of influence, take note from this newbie: Don't get anxious when you see the quantity of properties and inventory drops for a month here and there. Just stick to the basics! You - and I - will be fine. I hope this rings home.