Joyce's Journal

Welcome to the DG website and congratulations for taking action and starting your journal. Dean's books are great and are packed with an abundance of information and strategies. Good luck with real estate investing. Believe and Achieve! - Joe

Hello Joyce I see we kind of joined around the same time and alot of your goals are relative to mind. The action steps you set up are great and I believe should benefit you greatly. Just your one journal entry has helped me in finding out what my next step should be, so thanks for the help, and I wish you well in your investments I believe you will accomplish all your goals especially with those action step!!!!!! GOOD LUCK

Thank you go for your welcome and encouragement.
I see that you are highly active in this forum. How long have you been in the real estate investing business?

Good luck to you too! I'm glad I could help - Surprising as that sounds to me!
Here's to an extremely successful real estate investing career! Cheers!!

This is my research and if anything here is erroneous then PLEASE correct me.

I've noticed in this forum that a lot of people are talking about bird-dogging/ assignments / finders fees as a way to start off with no money down/and with some questionable credit situations. So I decided to do some of my own research to get my head around it. Since I'm a big believer in learning as much as I can from many sources, I googled it and found some good information. (obviously Dean has the best info - there is no debating that). Some of this information I found is old -- but I don't think that the concept has changed in research methods.

Dictionary
bird-dog (bûrd'-dôg), v. Also birddog. To observe, follow, monitor and/or seek out with persistent attention.
(source: dictionary.com)

In real estate:
Bird-dogging is someone who identifies a good real estate investment opportunity and puts the property under contract with the sole intent of assigning that contract for a fee to an investor to repair and resell.

Investor frustrations:
I've been reading online that many investors are frustrated with New Bird-dogs that don't have a good understanding of this business and are out-bidding professionals for a property without taking into account all costs associated w/ rehabbing & selling the property. They don't do proper due-dilligence in figuring out every detail to forward on to the investor.

Bird-dog frustrations:
The Bird-dogs assign a good contract to an investor, who tells you they can close, and then turns around and assigns your contract to someone else that can't close. The deal doesn't close and no one gets paid. (More research on this to follow)

BIRD-DOG DUE DILIGENCE

Steps to analyzing a property:

A. Get comps of recent solds in subject properties neighborhood (6 months)
B. Find out average DOM of neighborhood solds (days on market)
C. Use the lowest or average selling price per square foot to estimate the selling price
(to see if there is enough room for a profit)
D. Estimate repairs accurately (within 20%)
E. Know Holding Costs
(The investor needs to knows how much it will cost them monthly if the house does not sell. If the average Days on Market is 90 days then the investor will have to figure that as a cost to them (in loan payments if applicable))

Purchase price
+Assignment fee
+Repair costs

Example of worksheet:

Max Selling Price: $150,000.00
(if house sells right away)
Acquisition Cost: -$7,500.00
Title work, insurance, loan fees & assignment fees
Repairs (estimated) : - $9,000.00
Four month Average. Hold Cost : -$4,900.00
Min Profit (15%) : - $22,500.00
Misc expenses (5%) : - $7,500.00
Cost to Sell (5%): - $7,500.00
If listing with an agent + closing costs
Max Purchase Price : $91,100.00
Additional (Not covered by loan) expenses : $7,500.00

(Source: http://dhlc.blogspot.com/2004/11/bird-dogging-101.html)

As in life there are no shortcuts to anything -- skipping due diligence process on Bird-Dog research is not a shortcut I will ever take.

There is still so much to learn..............yikes....feeling overwhelmed

I have enjoyed business and read books for a number of years. My wife and I purchased Dean's book "Profit from Real Estate Right Now" several months ago and were lucky enough to attend Dean's live Edge Event in April. We are learning each and every day and having so much fun n real estate and on the DG website. Good luck on all your deals. Believe and Achieve! - Joe

Thank you so much for this information Joyce. Just what I have been searching for. I too am new to this and appreciate all of the help on this site. Much success to you. Thanks Again!
Andrea