The Creative Investor - Retailing Houses as an Investor!

Would an extra eight to ten thousand dollars help you out this year? If you answered yes then you should be retailing a house. I don't know how many times I have been asked by a new investor where to start or what to do first. If you currently have a job and eight to ten thousand would help you out, then you should be retailing.

Retailing is the process of buying, fixing and selling a single family house to an end buyer who wants to live there.

Why start with retailing? Well, when you wholesale or flip a contract you only make a few thousand and you have to follow up on a ton of

leads to find a good one. ( I get about 150 to 250 calls a week for wholesaling and flipping) Secondly, you have to hope you bought it better than all the professional full time investors who have twenty four hours a day to look at deals. As you can see the odds are against you.

Now what if you only had to look at ten to fifteen houses to get a good deal. Take that deal and force the appreciation of the property through repairs. Even if you didn't do a great job, you are left with at worst with a good rental property that needs no work and you own for less than 75% of it's fair market value.

Now, if you are selling the property you should be netting about eight to ten thousand. How many times a year do you need to do that to make a difference in your standard of living. This is why I think retailing is much better than wholesaling or renting, because when you get a check it is a substancial amount of money. This gets your mental attitude toward real estate much more upbeat, because you can see substancial progress for your effort.

When you rent, you might make $50 to $100 per month, but you have all kinds of problems. More importantly, with only a few properties you don't feel like you are getting anywhere fast. Don't get me wrong, if you have a hundred units $50 to $100 starts to add up.

Let's face reality through, most beginners don't buy one hundred units. They buy a couple, get aggravated because there is not enough cash flow and quit .

Retailing, provides a preset plan. You get in, and get out!!!!! You achieve tangible, measurable and most importantly results that you can spend. Ask yourself, could I do just two retails in one full year?

When I decided to sale the Tanning Salon and the Car Wash in 1999. I set up my next plan with retailing as my ultimate weapon to acheive Financial Freedom. It has done that for me and it can for you.

I have been able to retail MY own properties at a rate of 2-3 a year. With the money that I make on the sale of the single family, I am able to buy and rehab a multi unit without the burden of a mortgage. I am currently in the process of closing on a duplex that I was able to purchase through the sale of a SFR I purchased in Jan 2004. I will be doing a reverse 1031 on this property due to the fact that the house I purchased in January was FROZEN. It took a month for the house to thaw, so work was delayed. So I am closing on the duplex before the SFR is sold. I paid $28,048.64 for both properties. I have the SFR listed at $69,900.00. I currently own all of my multi units free and clear due to retailing SFR's.

I hope someone can use this information to benefit them.

Laurie Ann Waltz
President
Nu Image Real Estate & Development