Katriska's Journal

You took the first step. Making a plan. Be proud of that...
That is a good idea to write down your expenses and see where the money's going. You'll probably surprise yourself at how many changes you can make in that area. Good job on building your credit, too.
You're headed in the right direction.

Even if you don't get into the Real Estate right now (which I hope you can still spend a LITLE time at), I think with Dean's book and the info on the site, you will be able to look at even your own housing situation with more knowledgeable eyes. It's a skill that will be useful always.
Keep checking out those lease/options, rent-to-owns, FSBOs you could work with, and don't be afraid to ask some landlords if they'd be WILLIng to do a lease/option. Some may be wanting to sell and just don't know about lease/options. YOU can enlighten them.

I wish you and your husband well. I hope the new business thrives and brings him (both of you) much joy. And I'll be praying that the opportunity will arise for you to get out of all those "commute" hours and give you the freedom to put your time into something that you enjoy, and something more profitable (hint, hint REI. lol)

God bless,

Rina

It just surprises me that I allowed myself to get into so much debt. I guess you're not thinking when your life is is rushing right past you. I have to little girls I have to think about. If I didn't have them the first thing I would tackle would be most of my debt, but we NEED a place to stay and I NEED to get a car. I took my kids to daycare once when it was really cold and two hours later it started snowing. I was thinking WTF? We're in Houston... Of every time it rains and hurricane, it snows TODAY the day I decide to take my kids to daycare on the bus.

You say FSBOs.. I didn't think about that. Maybe I can call my friend up and ask him about them.

So, I previously responded to an ad for a house selling for $155,000. I know I could afford this. I broke it down on how the person could go into a rent to own contract with me based on just about 5% giving her the benefit of a doubt. I came up to $800/month for the rent payment. She responded with:

This kind of situation would not be possible for me. I currently pay almost $1300 a month for the mortgage, insurance, taxes and interest on my loan.
If you paid me $800 a month, that would only pay for a portion of me owning this home. You have to remember that owning a home also includes taxes, home owners insurance, and interest. I would not be making any money each month as you stated and I would be paying for you to live in my home. I am looking to sell my house because I drive 2.5 hours a day for work and I work 12-13 hour days. So that leaves me 8 hours to sleep, eat, work out, and do things around the house.

So unfortunately, as much as this sounds like a good deal/idea, financially this would not be beneficial for me.

How would I respond to this?

It sounds like she would REALLY like to move. Do you know how much she owes on the place? Is it possible she might seller-finance a PORTION of the purchase price, say somebody's down-payment? Then if YOU can find a person who wants this home and already qualifies for a loan, you may be able to assign this property to them. You've got a willing homeowner that just wants to make the numbers work for her to get out of there, so I'm SURE she wouldn't care at all if you "assigned" the deal. It's just a matter of starting to find a couple of potential buyers, and seeing how much she'll come down on her price. I know you're looking for a place for yourself, but you could make a few bucks off deals like this in the mean-time WHILE you continue on your search for the deal that you need to move into something yourself. But if she won't budge, move onto the next. Looks like a lease/option won't work in her situation.

Rina

I asked how much the woman had left on her mortgage. She states that she's only had the house since September 2007 and has not really paid down the mortgage so she just about owes 100% on it. Would this be a dead end deal or what? Another thing, would I be able to use the instant equity exchange with this because she claims she's selling the house at what she paid for it and no extra? I'm still waiting on those comps from my friend.

I think Rina has a point. I think you looking at FSBO, Owner Carry. I think you should look for a duplex or triplex. If you do this with a owner carry you could be making money and having a roof over your head.

I'm new and don't really understand how the numbers work but it sounds like a win win situation.

I think it would be great if you looked into a duplex, it doesn't mean you will settle there for life. But if you can find a cheap duplex you can stay in one unit for a few years, and rent out the other unit and then eventually be able to sell and move into a home you really want.

I am tired of my hiatus. I have gone through so much over the past few months. Moved from house to house living with different family members and finally I found my own place to stay. I am now in an apartment been there for almost 5 months now and getting tired of wasting my money on rent. So here I go again. So you all think I should into buying a duplex or triplex? I have also been working on my credit for the past 4 months. I've managed to get it up a little bit. I finally knocked off that public record so I'm hoping it should be smooth sailing from now on. I'm just hoping that with my credit situation I can finally find some type of financing for my own home. I looked into owner financing and they've been asking for 10K to 20K down for 100k to 130K homes. I don't know where I'm going to get that kind of money.

I've been trying to put my monetary obligations in order to have an idea on what my debt to income ratio is. So far half my year salary is going to, school loans, two car payments, car and renters insurance, daycare, phone bill, and electricity bills. Notice I said my income. My husband was recently laid off from work yet again because of no work. If he could find something right now that would be great for the two of us. He wants to start his own catering business but I feel he's a bit scared because of the state of the economy. I don't blame him.

On another note, I drove past a sign for a FSBO on a 3/2/2. I think I may go by the sign today and inquire about it. Its close to where I live. Hopefully I can strike up some kind of deal with this owner, especially if they're desperately trying to sale. I don't mind a fixer upper at this point. I would kind of be excited by it, and do the work myself and save lots on the repairs.

I also talked with a Mortgage broker this morning that deals with mainly FHA loans. He sound like a really nice person. We're also teaming up to see what I can do as far as getting a mortgage loan through the gov't. If I can do that then I feel anything would be possible. He stated that they really don't look at credit score, they moreso look at what's on the credit for the past 12 months and if you have a good explanation on why certain blemishes are on your credit the may waive it. He also said looking at my credit history we would be able to determine what things I could get taken off and get the loan before the Dec 31 deadline for the 8K tax credit. I bet a lot of people are looking for homes now to take advantage of it. If this guy is good, I will probably ask him to help me with my future plans.

Anyway I'm signing off for now. Will probably update a little later today on what I find out. Bye

I didn't get to check out that FSBO I wanted to look at because it was about to rain and I had to hurry and get the kiddos home. I did however spot a vacant house next to the daycare. I think I'm going to look into it tonight to see what's the deal on it. I saw an orange sign posted on the door. I wonder what that meant (it definitely wasn't a for sale sign).

First I like to mention that I finally purchased Dean's PFREN. But this is not the catcher. We've been having issues with the apartment complex we have been living in. Well we've been here for 4 months and they haven't been living up to their contract with repairs and things. Our A/C (or duct-work or whatever it is) has not been functioning correctly and here in Texas we have been experiencing triple digit temps. Well we've contacted the lease office 5 different times, the first time they said nothing was wrong even though there was a noticable difference in temprature between the living room and rooms. It was so bad that we had to keep the A/C at 50 degrees in order to get some type of coolness in the living room and not have sweaty guest; image our electricity bill. Anyway, I contacted them a second time and still nothing. Long story short. The living room is still a hot box and the master bedroom is freezing. We have to close the vent sometimes in the master bedroom and put two floor fans in the living room. Not to mention I'm paying $900/m for this place. There are other things wrong with the apartment such as the master toilet, the shelves in the closet and the drainage in the guest bathroom. Each and everytime we contact the leasing office about our problems, either the maintenance workers have done a (pardon my french) half-assed job fixing it, or totally ignored it and said nothing is wrong. Guess what, we are the tenants with the least amount of problems.

A couple of days ago a transformer blew and half the apartment complex was without power. That's when I got to meet the neighbors. There were so many stories about how many problems they were having and I find out that non of the apartments have any insulation which is why we're having heating and cooling issues. One woman stated that her apartment stays at 100F most of the time and she bought a bunch of floor fans. I feel that is unacceptable. A few of the neighbors are leaving this week and I find that half the apartment complex is vacant and the management has changed 3 times in the past two weeks. Guess what I'm doing now? I'm looking around for a new place to stay because I feel I can do better than this.

That leads to my discovery. Well I said I didn't want to do the lease to own thing but with my current credit situation it seems like the only thing I can do to own a house. So I called an RE and he sent me 5 properties today. I looked at them and something made me ask him how long have the houses been on the market. The first house has been on the market for 1023 days; 2 years and 8 months! I was flabbergasted. Its a 4/2.5/2, 1710 going for 100K. I'm like WTF, can I get this house with owner financing? Can I get them to go down on the price. Gosh, where can I find comps, should I asked the RE to do it? Man I feel like I could do something here. I looked up how much some of the houses sold and one right next door (or across the street) sold for 68K.

What do you guys suggest? Man I wish I had Dean's PFREN right now. I don't even think I can do owner financing because they would probably want 10% down and guess what? I don't have that.

What to do what to do?!!!

He said the one house I was looking at they pulled off the market! I wonder why. He said it wasn't sold or anything but it was pulled off the market. Is there anything I can do?!

I just checked this property on zillow.com. It still shows its actively on the market. I also have the RE agent that's selling the properties contact information. I wonder if I should contact him myself or what? I don't even know what to think now, becuase if the guy I've been talking to lied to me about the property then.. I don't know.. decisions decisions...

in me started looking at the property that I'm really interested in and I searched it on the County Appraisal website. GUESS WHAT?! Its bank owned. Now there's a motivated seller if I don't see one. I am so excited. I wonder why the bank pulled it off the market. Anyone have any ideas? Maybe I should contact the RE agent tomorrow and see and tell him I saw it Zillow. I wonder what he would say?

I came up on a property that is going for 29K they estimated that it would need 17K in rehab work. I contacted the RE agent on it and he got back with me today. He says the owner is 5K behind in her taxes and she said that she'll take 2K up front and I'll have to catch her up on her taxes and she'll owner finance the property for me. I don't know. The skeptic in me says no, but the adventurous person in me says take it. The thing is, I don't have 2K to give her up front and I feel like I'll be doing her a favor by catching the back taxes up on her. I wonder if there's something else I can do with this property. Its in a bad part of the neighborhood but with the rehab it would be worth 60K. I figure I could refinance the property use that money to invest in some other property and then rent that out to some people and accept section 8.

My questions are:
Should I take it, give her the 2K and take up the taxes?
Where would I get the 17K to rehab the property?
Is it worth it?

I think me and my husband can rehab the property ourselves. We have a friend that works for Lowes that could get us discounts on the materials. I'll have to do this on a weekly basis until everything's done.

I was also thinking about staying in the house myself, but the problem is, I find out that it'll need roof repairs and probably some a/c units since there's no a/c in the property.

I finally got my RFREN book today! I am so excited. This next week I'll spend reading this book and I hope to get some really good knowledge from this book.