lkward13's journal

Sandra, I really appreciate you taking the time to read my journal and even commenting on it. I also read yours even though I don't post on it. I find it very interesting and inspiring. Thanks for all the help you provide to not only me but to everyone on this site!

The past few days have been busy, but great. I had to write a speech to give in my speech class (haha who would have guessed?). I decided to do it on fantasy football. I wrote the speech over the course of the last couple of days, and presented it today. My teach ate it up. I am going to assume I made a great score on it

I haven't done too much reading the last couple of days because I have had to write the speech and instead of reading yesterday I went to look at some properties. I will have plenty of time to read on the 20 hour bus ride I have this weekend. That's each way, so 40 total. Man is it going to be a long ride, but the great thing about it is I have about 27 other people to make the trip with. It can be one hell of a time.

As I mentioned above, earlier I spent about an hour and a half driving around in about a 5 block radius of a university downtown Oklahoma City. I found a couple of prospective properties to look at. I completely forgot to call back a realtor that returned my phone call last night, but I'll try to do it tomorrow. The great thing about driving around was that when I called one of the listing agents I told her that the house I inquired about was priced too high in my opinion. After I told her that she ask for my criteria, and sent me a list of about 19 multifamily properties within a few blocks of the university. I have only briefly gone over it, but there looks to be some potential winners on there. I am going to go over it tonight and run some numbers to decide which ones to send back to her for more information.

Tomorrows objectives:
Relax
Read
Learn

Today I didn't get much real estate stuff done.

I had class and took a nap between class an practice. It was great! haha.

I did go through the list of 19 properties that agent had sent me. I e-mailed her back with about 8 properties I believe that I had questions on. Most of them were already leased out and such. Only a few of the ones I was interested in were not leased, and may be a rehab project. We'll have to see. I sent her quite a long list of questions about the properties and I can't wait to see her reply about each one.

Tomorrow I leave for Ohio until Monday, so I will really only be able to check my e-mail and maybe make a few posts every once in a while. I did get another book to read on the bus though so that will be helpful.

Objectives for tomorrow:
Read read read
Be bored on a 20 hour bus ride

Today was pretty good! I had class this morning and then I hung out with my old roommate for the majority of the afternoon. We went to Barnes and Noble and picked up another real estate book to read. I finished the Gary Keller book over the weekend and have 2 more to get under my belt. I am extremely excited to read both of them. The one I picked up today is called the "Real Book of Real Estate" by Robert Kiyosaki. I need to finish both of them before Dean's next book comes out.

The agent I had been emailing about the properties replied to all of my questions. There are some good prospective ones and I'm going to try to setup a couple of showings for Friday because my fall break starts tomorrow and I don't even have practice until Monday. I'm extremely excited about that!

Today another agent sent me an e-mail with a list of properties to look at. There were over 100, but only because she didn't have my criteria so she sent me a lot of properties that were not in the area I wanted. I looked over them and found a couple to inquire about. Still waiting on a reply from her. It feels great to finally have a couple of agents that are complying with me. I can't wait to get out there and see those properties.

Objectives for tomorrow:
Dominate a test
Practice
Relax
Read

It's been a crazy few days. I've been extremely busy working and enjoying my fall break. I've pretty much only gotten a little bit of reading done the past couple of days. I have had a blast hanging out with my friends each night though. The weather is beginning to get much colder here. Not real cold, but a noticeable difference.

My book I'm reading is another good one. Come to think of it though, I don't think I'll ever find a real estate book I don't like. I have spent some time trying to think of financing. I've come to the conclusion that if I do try to take hold of a property for rental I will ask my parents to co sign on a loan with me.

My girlfriend's father gave me an address to go look at today, I will try to do it tomorrow or Sunday. The house is vacant and he wants me to go look at it to and try to determine the value. He has spoken to the owner and determined his value, and he wants to see how well I do at it. I'm pretty excited about this!

I spoke to that agent and we are going to go look at those properties sometime next week. Either Tuesday or Friday. Hopefully Tuesday but we'll have to see. I hope everyone's deals are going great!

Objectives for tomorrow:
Read at work
Watch OU Texas
Try to go to that vacant house

Today was a grand ol day haha. Got my contemporary moral problems test back and I got a pretty good grade on it. Both classes went well today and I came home to do a lot of reading. Right after reading I took about a 4 hour nap. I know what you're thinking, and yes it was great. Then I pretty much studied up until practice time because I have two tests and a quiz tomorrow morning. Not the coolest things ever. In fact, I'm still studying right now for both of them. Looking like a few hours of sleep for tonight, but maybe I'll get another nap in haha.

I called that realtor back to setup a day to go look at the houses near the university. I believe we decided on Friday. I know I've been saying that I have been going to do it, but things have been pretty busy with school and work lately. I must admit that I was also a little scared to set it up because I have never gone to multiple houses at the same time and walked through each of them. But hey, there's a first time for everything. I've got to take the leap at some point and it might as well be now. I'm looking forward to getting my tests done with, and then I'm for sure going on that nap.

Glad to see so many great people writing on the forums and I love reading all the journals. Success Fest seems to be going great right now. I haven't read all of the articles yet, but I do have them saved to my computer. This week I'm hoping to see Joe's interview;although, I wouldn't mind listening in on improving my cred. Or getting some credit for that matter. Everyone have a good day tomorrow!

Objectives for tomorrow:
Test
Read
Find more properties
Study

Luke,

Thought I would check in with your journal and I have been catching up!

Looks like you are doing great! How exciting about the progress with the new agents, and hope looking at properties goes well! You'll do great! It's fun to walk through properties, so get ready and leap!

I have been nervous about the agent deal even though I have one...it's another LEAP that I definitely need to make, because it's not going to get any easier! (mainly more nervous about the buyer and/or hard money lender coming through in time with the agent contract)

I look forward to hearing about what you think of these agent properties and your meeting Friday! Exciting stuff!

Cheers!
Louisa

Luke,

Just caught up on your journal and it sounds great! I am 19 also, but you seem farther ahead than I am! Keep it up man you seem to be doing an awesome job on sticking in there.

Its great to see people like Jeremy and you doing this too, all my friends think I am crazy haha. Lets keep each other motivated so we can become some of the youngest retirees ever

Keep it up!

Thanks a lot for the comments guys! I love reading both of your journals, they help keep me motivated! I hope everything is going great for you guys! I'm going to catch up on your journals tonight.

Wow I didn't realize it had been a week since I posted! It was a crazy week at school for me. Last week I had 5 quizzes and 3 tests. I stayed up til at least 3 every single night studying and then crashed after class. On top of all that I had to go to practice every day. I did find a little bit of time to workout and read my books. Also I looked at properties a bit. I was too slow on the foreclosure I wanted to go see, but you win some you lose some.

Even though in a recent post I said I was scared to go ahead and meet with the agent and go look at multiple properties I finally set up a time. We are going this Thursday to look at 4 properties and I am positive I'll have a list of more. I kind of just want to get my feet wet for now. Although, I full intend on making offers on the properties. I just need to make sure this agent is comfortable making the offers I want. Also, I am going to take my friend with me because he is somewhat interested in real estate even though he wants to be a lawyer. I told him if he specialized in real estate and contract law then I could use him in my power team in the future. That would be pretty cool.

I can't explain how excited I am to go to the properties this week. I am finally getting out there and doing more than just talking and reading, and repeating the process. I've got to get out of my comfort zone and it is going to be done. No doubt about it.

Everything I've read over the past six months has told me that being successful has everything to do with a person's mindset. I've always had the mindset that I will be rich and successful one day, but not this extent. I finally feel like I know how I'm going to do it. A funny thing happened to me the other day. Another friend of mine and I were joking around about how successful we are going to be. In the end of the conversation I told him once I got rich I'd help him along the way, in turn he said not if I get there first. I said "You're on, first to a million." The funny part too me wasn't the jokes about who would win a race to a million dollars. To me it was the fact that it wasn't even a question in either of our minds whether or not we could do it, it was just a matter of when. I think that's something that Dean's books have helped me with and I won't stop for anything.

I thoroughly enjoyed writing this journal today. It seemed to get a lot out.

P.S. - We won both of our games this weekend and are on a 9 game winning streak. Even though it will end this weekend possibly since we are once again playing the number one team.

Objectives for tomorrow:
Read and relax
Get my checklist and preparations done for Thursday's showings
Do as much real estate stuff as I feel like doing haha

is awesome! Like you said, it wasn't the million dollars part, but the fact that you know it is not a matter of "if", but rather only a matter of when. Keep that conversation close to your heart, mind and soul!

I'm going to ramble for a little, so my apologies for hijacking your journal for a moment, but I want to share this similar story with you! Your bet SOOO reminds me of a conversation I had with a friend of mine awhile back that I will indeed never forget. I had just graduated college. I am from Dallas and wanted to go to another city, just for a change...get out of the Texas heat and start the "working world" in a fun, new city. I flew to D.C. and Atlanta for interviews and accepted a job in Atlanta. I signed a lease on my first apartment, which wasn't much to speak of, seeing I had an entry level job, on entry level pay, but I was on my own and I loved it. I got in a routine of going to work, working out, then coming home and making pasta and grilled chicken (the only thing I could make) and sitting on the floor of my apartment while catching up with TV news until I purchased a couch and furniture after a few paychecks.

Anyway, my first job was short lived (6 months) due to a corporate buy out. My second job started of course with an interview....with one of the "big five" or four, or whatever it is or was at the time (these days, no one probably knows what I mean, but then, it was a big deal)....I was thrilled to have the opportunity to work there. I prepared for this interview like I had prepared for the biggest exam of my life. I had gone through 2 rounds of interviews, and this was the 3rd round, and it was a phone interview with the Partner in the firm that I would be working for. The only reason it was not in person, was because this Partner was in Aspen staying at a private resort and vacationing for a couple weeks, so he was not going to be in the office. The cool thing was, I was thrilled it was a phone interview, because I could literally have my notes all in front of me. I had studied about every interview question that could ever be asked and had even written a couple of essays for a couple possible "big questions". So he asked away and I answered....he was extremely personable, but also asked tough questions. I was absolutely thrilled that the very last question he asked was one that one of the Partners standing next to him said "ask her this"....and it so happened to be one answer that I had all written up in an essay and had even practiced delivering (not reading like a script of course! I felt like it was meant to be! I did get the job. And actually, that same Partner and I are very good friends to this day...he attended my wedding last year. There is not one other professional relationship stemming from work, that has meant as much to me as his friendship.

OK, now to my point...I remember recounting the interview to a friend of mine from college who was in law school at the time...and how in the interview I kept thinking....wow, this guy is smart, accomplished, on the ball and sipping wine on the balcony of this private suite and resort in Aspen (he had described the scene around him briefly...only to apologize for any background noise from guests, but not in an arrogant way...very humble guy), and here he is casually interviewing me before this party he is attending, etc...and in telling this to my friend....he said "you know Louisa, that is where we are going to be someday ..." and both of us talked about and knew "it was just a matter of time". I LOVED that my friend said that to me, in that way. Because it is exactly what I was thinking. I definitely thought it about my friend and it was a huge compliment to me that he thought it of me. And most importantly, we just BOTH knew that was the case.

It has been 12 years since that conversation. Life happens. Bills need to be paid, people move, friends change, people marry, career passions change and life ebbs and flows. But my drive, desire, dreams, knowledge and ambition ALL remains the same. It is why I cannot and will not just "settle" and have not settled in my life on something that will not get me "there" I am not "there" yet of course, but I KNOW I will be. And Dean's books and this site continues to feed my KNOWING. Not just giving me hope. But encouraging the "knowing" of "it is just a matter of time".

My friend? We are not in as close touch anymore (but just writing about him inspires me to write him!). He is in New York City working for a pretty prestigious investment firm...working crazy hours, probably making decent money, but he never comes back to visit us (college friends). I imagine it is "time is money" and just him being wrapped up in the day to day in NYC. He may consider himself "there"...I don't know, but all I do know is that when you are "there", you are also in touch with the people you most care about (because you have the freedom with your time to do so!) and when you are not "there", you are hiding a bit from who you are and where you are in your life (at least when you get to be 10+ years out of school, this is what I have found in my experience...time makes it easier to hide). Anyway, I still consider him to be a great friend. I'll have to write him and remind him of our little conversation sometime.

You've got a jump on us...you had the conversation when you were 19! I hope you win and get to your first million first!!

Sorry for the long post! Just had to share.

Look forward to hearing about your property day with your agent on Thursday.

Cheers!
Louisa

I'm glad you liked my story! I don't know why that conversation had such an impact on me, but it really did! Thanks so much again for taking the time to read my journal! I really liked your story as well. Maybe you can help your friend get out of his "there" and into real estate.

I 100% agree with you that Dean's books have that certain charm that keep everyone motivated. Some of my friends laugh at me, but I think in the back of their minds they know it will happen for me. Then I have my other friends that want to see me do it first before they believe it isn't too good to be true. Boy am I willing to prove to them this stuff will work!

I kind of have a dream that I can "work" with my friends all day and have a blast doing.

Thanks for your reply on the post. Yes, maybe I can work on my friend. He is probably one of those that you mention that will have to see me do it first

I finally posted a little on my agent meeting.

So just checking in on your Thursday walk-thrus with the agent. How did it go? Anything interesting?

Happy Halloween!
Louisa

It did go well, thanks for asking! I'm going to post on it in some detail tomorrow. We had two games in St. Louis this weekend so I've been out of town since Thursday evening. I'm sitting on the bus right now (amazing how technology allows this bus to have wireless internet). More to come tomorrow!

I spent this weekend in St. Louis playing some hockey. It went all right, we lost both games making our record 9-4 with all 4 losses to this same team (they are undefeated). I left for St. Louis on Thursday evening just an hour or so after my showings with the agent I've been working with.

The showing went very well. We only got to see 3 properties because the listing agent on the 4th property I wanted to see did not get back to us in time to go see it.

The first property was in pretty nice condition. I briefly spoke to the tenant and she said she had no complaints and the only suggestion she would make is possibly putting a window unit in the front room because it can get extremely hot in the summer. The garage looked like it could use some paint, but it was easily in good enough condition for use. I liked the home and am going to email my agent an offer today. I'm thinking I am going to offer a higher amount requesting seller financing and then another with a lower offer that would require me to find another way of financing. Either was has its upside that is pretty obvious.

This next property was actually humorous. From the listing on the MLS the property looked to be in good condition. Unfortunately, the picture must have been an old one. From the outside it looked horribly kept. As soon as we got there I had in my head that I wasn't even sure if I wanted to bother with the property. My friend and I picked the left side of the duplex to see first. When we knocked no one came to the door for about a minute or two, but we could hear a small dog barking. An odd man finally came to the door and cracked it about 2 inches, he just stared at us. My agent asked if he knew we were coming, and without a response he shut and locked the door. We all laughed as we walked away because it was obvious even if I did want to look at the property it would be more trouble than it was worth.

Third, I asked to see a property that I feel is overpriced, but still wanted to check it out because I knew my agent would like it since she is the one who has it listed. The duplex was a lot nicer than I had expected. I still don't know if it would be worth the asking price. I need to do more research on calculating property value of income properties. My agent told me that she did not think that the owner would be willing to budge much on the asking price, and that it was actually taken off the market as of the 31st. So I may be able to make an offer still, but he we'll have to see. I'm not quite sure if I want to. I spoke to one of the tenants that had done their own painting and design in their side. Their side looked great, and the other side was just empty looking even though it was not vacant. I believe that tenant had just moved in. Any suggestions on how I should calculate the income value? I'm unsure if I have been doing it correctly.

Overall it was a good experience, and I enjoyed it. Going with an agent was not nearly as nerve wracking as I made it out to be. I'll definitely be going on one again soon.

There was another 8 unit property that my agent had emailed me about recently, but when she checked back with the listing agent it had been under negotiations and she said to check back after the 30th. I just looked at the MLS listing and it still said active so I am definitely going to ask about it again. I can't wait to submit this offer on the first showing though.

Hope everyone had a great weekend! Off to do some homework and reading/watching football.

Objectives for tomorrow:
Read
Quiz
Anything RE related

Today was a pretty good day! Got a much needed nap in and did some quality RE stuff I'd say. I don't have a lot to write about today other than that I finished another RE book in class haha. I'll probably start on my Robert Kiyosaki book tomorrow morning or afternoon!

Today I asked my agent to go ahead and get some more information on a couple of properties. I asked for the following:
Annual profit and loss statements past 2 years
A years worth of monthly profit and loss statements
Rent Roll including term, deposit, and payment history
Tax returns- 2 years
All Leases: entire copies plus any addendum or riders.

Then I asked about another 8 unit property that was supposed to be under contract by the 30h of October and it hasn't gotten done. So it is still available. Howeve. it did get lowered by $10,000. The owner is now requiring a Lender's approval letter prior to even showing the property. Per the realtor, since there are more than 4 units, a commercial loan is required. She has heard that the banks are requiring at minimum 30% down. I'm going to look into it a bit more and possibly talk to my parent's about this one.

Objectives for tomorrow:
Read
Practice
Master cap rates

man, my life on a bus in college --choir concert traveling at 55 concerts per year would have been SO much different had we had wireless on a bus. Technology IS amazing!

Just catching up with your journal here...funny on the second property you saw. Awesome on the multi-families and/or units you are talking about.

So I need to get better at evaluating those too. I know there is a video in the mix of looking at commercial property FMV too. And I'm sure there are threads here with formulas for that...especially with the cap rates.

One good rule of thumb which I'm sure you may have heard on rental units in general is the 1% rule. If you can get a 1% return on your investment annually, then you've got a good investment (this is of course after calculating vacancy and annual repairs to determine TRUE cashflow). So in other words if you purchase a $50,000 property, then you should net $500 a month in rent (again, I believe it is with $500 being a true "cashflow" after expense type of number, but I could be wrong).

Anyway, keep us posted on what you learn and your analyzing of your properties.

I am sure you'll enjoy the Kiyosaki book you have...I love all his stuff. And his Cashflow game is the best! Just started playing it with a meet-up group here...great little networking tool too.

Cheers!
Louisa

Luke and Louisa,

You both are great! Those stories remind me of how all of my friends just know I am going to become successful, I ask them why and they cant explain it lol. But I still take it as a huge compliment.

Luke keep looking at those properties! Are you interested in starting off by wholesaling them? Or did you actually want to rent them out?

Yeah I have heard the 1% rule and because I was curious if that rule applied in my area I ran some calculations on places that I've seen list. And yes, it is correct haha. So far I'm only about 50 pages into the new book, but he has mentioned the cash flow game. I'm pretty interested to read some more about it.

Thanks for stopping by as usual!

That's great that your friends have so much confidence in you! I'm sure that definitely helps keep you motivated. As far as the properties go I would actually like to keep them rented. I would like to find a property that basically cash flows well enough to pay my rent where I live. I did however speak to my dad last night about possibly setting up a 25:1 system with my parents' neighbor/friend who is a Realtor.

Pretty good weekend! My hockey team went 2-1 even though we should have won all three. I played pretty well and got a good amount of ice time as well. I didn't get much real estate stuff done this weekend besides reading 100 pages in Kiyosaki's book.

I am still waiting for a response on the rent rolls and things from the owners of those two duplexes. I'm sure my agent will get them to me as soon as she gets them.

A duplex foreclosure I had my eye on a month or so ago fell out of contract a few days ago, and the bank lowered the price $10,000. I am going to call the listing agent and schedule a walk through for sometime this week.

While sorting through Craig's List today I noticed another multifamily property that is turn key or fully leased in the OCU (downtown university) area. I will also call on that one tomorrow.

I decided that the 8 unit property may not be of interest to me anymore because it would be a lot to tackle for a first deal.

Looking forward to tomorrow!

Objectives for tomorrow:
Read
Call on those properties
Work on a speech

Yay for the weekend! haha

We are at Iowa State playing this weekend so I'll be out of town again, but still got all of my books with me and I did some research online on the bus last night. Just a bit though, it's way too much fun too just hang out with the team and watch movies or whatever else is going on.

A couple of days ago my agent finally got a response from the owners on the rent rolls and things. I've taken a small look at them, but I'm going to take them over to my parents' house or my girlfriend's parents so that they can help me look over them. Sometimes I'm just not sure what I am looking at, but I shouldn't ever be afraid to ask for help.

Another agent called me this morning asking me if he could help me look for some properties. I gave him my criteria and things like that so he should be sending me some properties in the near future. I'm looking forwards to getting them.

I enrolled in all of my classes for next semester today, and I'm pretty excited about it because I enrolled in a RE class. We'll have to see how that pans out.

Gotta go for now!

Objectives for tomorrow:
Win our game
Read

Objec

Oops double post

It was quite a long weekend. We lost one and won one. Which is pretty good because we are ranked 10 and they are ranked 5. So a split on the weekend felt really good.

Real estate things haven't gone too far recently, but I am going to try to take some full strides over Christmas break here that starts in 3 weeks. We get an entire month off so it will be great! I did read some this weekend and every book I read feeds my love for it.

I finally got to discuss that duplex foreclosure with my dad last night, and he said he was interested in it! He said we needed to figure out how much the repairs would cost and see if it would be worth pursuing. So I am going to actually get off my butt and call the realtor tomorrow to set up a showing. Man I cannot wait to get my feet wet in my first deal! I know it will happen eventually though! Hope everyone's month is going great!

Objectives for tomorrow:
Read
Set up a showing

It seems like it has been forever since I posted on here.

We are in Ohio this weekend, but I don't have much time for anything but hockey. We left at midnight Thursday night/Friday morning. 18 hour bus ride, but that's what the movies and tv's are for. Read a bit of my real estate book, but I also have a ton of homework to do this weekend because of days I am missing for school.

This past week I finally got my agent to read the 25:1 plan I'd like to try. And my dad wanted to go see the foreclosure this weekend with me; however, he forgot I was going to be out of town. So maybe I can try to make it in the next week or so even though I'll once again be busy. I'm really excited that my friend wants to try to do it with me. Hopefully we can make it to the December REI club meeting. That would be great, and would probably provide us with a lot of great connections. I'm going to try to call a mortgage broker that my agent would like for me to speak to on Monday. I've got to get some homework done now so I'll try to update Monday night.

Have a good Sunday!
Objectives for the next few days:
homework
win
call lender
read

Wow has a lot happened in the last 3 weeks. Unfortunately, I don't want to type it all out haha. Basic rundown.

Finally got my realtor 100% on board
Taught my friend quite a bit about wholesaling
Started from scratch on my buyer's list because I had to reformat my computer
Had finals and they all went pretty well. Still maintaining a 3.5 for now lol
Just had my agent e-mail me a list of properties. She sent 161 properties.
My friend and I narrowed it down to 35.

We have setup a meeting with our agent for Friday to discuss the contracts we need to use and what we would like to put into our offers. I think she is highly interested in what we would like to do because she is having us meet with her and a couple of other people from her office.

Tomorrow my investing partner and I (best friend) are going to analyze all of the properties we narrowed down and will come up with some offers. Hopefully by friday we will be putting them out, and with any luck we will receive an acceptance from at least one.

As far as my buyer's list goes, from 0 we have gotten up to 32 buyers and 1 contractor who will notify his investors he works with anytime we have a property. Two of my buyers are willing to help me with whatever they need, and if we allow them to mark up our price a bit they will market our properties to their list as well. I've been pretty surprised with the kind of help people are willing to give, but it sure is great.

Objective for tomorrow:
Go over contracts with partner
Adjust what we need to
Come up with offers