Investing In Real Estate With Lex Levinrad

How Much Money Can You Make Flipping Houses? That is one of the most frequent questions I get about fixing and flipping. In this video I talk about the profit potential from fixing and flipping houses, and I show you the checks that I just received from my most recent flip (which was sold just a few days ago). This house was purchased for $110,000, I spent around $25,000 repairing the house, and I sold it for $175,000. I was also the listing agent on the sale. The net profit on this fix and flip was a little over $34,000. The interesting thing about this example, is that I purchased this house from a wholesaler for $110,000, but he purchased it from Hubzu for $100,000. You can see me in front of this houses on a previous video post (the one with the Hubzu sign). So a wholesaler made $10,000 flipping this house to me, and then I made another $34,000 fixing and flipping the house. The wholesaler had zero risk, he didn’t need to borrow any money or take any risk at all to make that $10,000. If you are fixing and flipping houses for a living, then wholesalers can be a very lucrative source of finding deals. Case in point, if this wholesaler had not emailed me this houses, then I would not have purchased it. If you are fixing and flipping (or wholesaling) you should constantly be marketing to find more deals since you need to have deals in the pipeline and the more houses you flip, the more money you make. When marketing for deals you should tap into as many sources as possible to find deals. We utilize Pay Per Click Marketing, Bandit Signs, Direct Mail, Facebook Ads, Postcards, Yellow Letters and of course wholesalers to find deals. I would estimate that more than 50% of our deals still come in through wholesalers and students in our Partnership Program. Remember that wholesalers and bird dogs can be your best friend if you are a rehabber. The wholesaler needs a cash buyer so that they can make a quick profit and the rehabber needs a good deal that they can fix and flip. Think about that synergy for a second and ask yourself when was the last time you went to one of the local real estate investor meetings in your area? You could be missing out on huge opportunities to meet other investors who could be bringing you deals or buying deals from you. If you are starting out and you are short on cash then wholesaling is the best way to get started. The reason is simple. You don’t need any cash (or credit) to look for a house online. And if you find one and you flip it to someone then you are making money without having to put any money into the deal. All you need to do is find ONE house and flip it to someone and if you make a decent profit of $10,000 on that first deal, there is a very good chance you will soon want to quit your regular job. That is why I always recommend to new students that they first learn how to wholesale and flip houses before they jump into fixing and flipping. Remember wholesaling has ZERO risk. When you are looking at a potential fix and flip deal and trying to decide if there is enough profit potentail for you to buy the house then a useful tool that can help you is the Rehab Property Calculator which I created for my students. You can access the calculator at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/rehab-property-calculator/ The Rehab Property Calculator is also available as a free download in the app store (both Android and iPhone). Just type in “Rehab Property Calculator” in the store and you will find it. If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link below: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp which I referenced in this video please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/

On this podcast episode I discuss bidding on online auction sites like Hubzu, Auction and Xome. Online auction sites that list bank owned properties (REO's), and short sales are an excellent resource to find good deals at wholesale prices. Many of these deals have enough profit potential for you to be able to wholesale the property to rehabbers or fix and flip the property yourself. For example, I recently posted a video of myself standing in front of a house with a Hubzu sign. That house was purchased by a wholesaler and flipped to me (for a $10,000 profit to the wholesaler). I then fixed the house (which cost $25,000) and sold it a few days ago for $175,000 and netted a profit of $34,000. (See tomorrow's episode of the checks and HUD's from this deal). So there was $44,000 of total profit in this deal. And it was on a free online auction site that you or anyone else could have bid on!. Before you bid on online real estate auction sites, make sure you know how they work. They are all different and have different bidding requirements. For example presently Hubzu does not require a credit card to register (but they did 6 months ago). Auction and Xome both require a credit card. This difference is huge because what it means is that if you bid on a property on Xome or Auction, your credit card gets charged for $2,500. Another issue on some of these sites is that they are feeding retail MLS listings into their sites (which are not wholesale deals). And watch out for the foreclosure trustee sales. These are not REO's owned by the bank. They are properties being sold at the county court houses and you should not bid on these if you don't have an attorney or title company running lien and title searches for you. Listen to this podcast episode to learn more about bidding on online auction sites. If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/ DON'T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE CONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: http://www.lexlevinrad.com http://www.facebook.com/lexlevinradrealestate http://www.twitter.com/lexlevinrad http://www.instagram.com/lexlevinrad http://www.linkedin.com/in/lexlevinrad http://www.pinterest.com/lexlevinrad https://plus.google.com/+LexLevinradrealestate DOWNLOAD A FREE COPY OF MY BOOK Download a free copy of my best selling book "Wholesaling Bank Owned Properties" at https://www.lexlevinrad.com

On this podcast episode I discuss bidding on online auction sites like Hubzu, Auction and Xome. Online auction sites that list bank owned properties (REO's), and short sales are an excellent resource to find good deals at wholesale prices. Many of these deals have enough profit potential for you to be able to wholesale the property to rehabbers or fix and flip the property yourself. For example, I recently posted a video of myself standing in front of a house with a Hubzu sign. That house was purchased by a wholesaler and flipped to me (for a $10,000 profit to the wholesaler). I then fixed the house (which cost $25,000) and sold it a few days ago for $175,000 and netted a profit of $34,000. (See tomorrow's episode of the checks and HUD's from this deal). So there was $44,000 of total profit in this deal. And it was on a free online auction site that you or anyone else could have bid on!. Before you bid on online real estate auction sites, make sure you know how they work. They are all different and have different bidding requirements. For example presently Hubzu does not require a credit card to register (but they did 6 months ago). Auction and Xome both require a credit card. This difference is huge because what it means is that if you bid on a property on Xome or Auction, your credit card gets charged for $2,500. Another issue on some of these sites is that they are feeding retail MLS listings into their sites (which are not wholesale deals). And watch out for the foreclosure trustee sales. These are not REO's owned by the bank. They are properties being sold at the county court houses and you should not bid on these if you don't have an attorney or title company running lien and title searches for you. Listen to this podcast episode to learn more about bidding on online auction sites. If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/ DON'T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE CONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: http://www.lexlevinrad.com http://www.facebook.com/lexlevinradrealestate http://www.twitter.com/lexlevinrad http://www.instagram.com/lexlevinrad http://www.linkedin.com/in/lexlevinrad http://www.pinterest.com/lexlevinrad https://plus.google.com/+LexLevinradrealestate DOWNLOAD A FREE COPY OF MY BOOK Download a free copy of my best selling book "Wholesaling Bank Owned Properties" at https://www.lexlevinrad.com

On this podcast episode I discuss bidding on online auction sites like Hubzu, Auction and Xome. Online auction sites that list bank owned properties (REO's), and short sales are an excellent resource to find good deals at wholesale prices. Many of these deals have enough profit potential for you to be able to wholesale the property to rehabbers or fix and flip the property yourself. For example, I recently posted a video of myself standing in front of a house with a Hubzu sign. That house was purchased by a wholesaler and flipped to me (for a $10,000 profit to the wholesaler). I then fixed the house (which cost $25,000) and sold it a few days ago for $175,000 and netted a profit of $34,000. (See tomorrow's episode of the checks and HUD's from this deal). So there was $44,000 of total profit in this deal. And it was on a free online auction site that you or anyone else could have bid on!. Before you bid on online real estate auction sites, make sure you know how they work. They are all different and have different bidding requirements. For example presently Hubzu does not require a credit card to register (but they did 6 months ago). Auction and Xome both require a credit card. This difference is huge because what it means is that if you bid on a property on Xome or Auction, your credit card gets charged for $2,500. Another issue on some of these sites is that they are feeding retail MLS listings into their sites (which are not wholesale deals). And watch out for the foreclosure trustee sales. These are not REO's owned by the bank. They are properties being sold at the county court houses and you should not bid on these if you don't have an attorney or title company running lien and title searches for you. Listen to this podcast episode to learn more about bidding on online auction sites. If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/ DON'T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE CONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: http://www.lexlevinrad.com http://www.facebook.com/lexlevinradrealestate http://www.twitter.com/lexlevinrad http://www.instagram.com/lexlevinrad http://www.linkedin.com/in/lexlevinrad http://www.pinterest.com/lexlevinrad https://plus.google.com/+LexLevinradrealestate DOWNLOAD A FREE COPY OF MY BOOK Download a free copy of my best selling book "Wholesaling Bank Owned Properties" at https://www.lexlevinrad.com

We have found that the biggest obstacle to our students buying their first house to fix and flip is having a reliable contractor. We have even found that students sign up for our coaching program just to have access to our contractors! Having good, reliable contractors to work on your houses that you plan on fixing and flipping is very important. On the previous podcast, I spoke about the importance of knowing how to estimate the cost of materials and the costs of labor. If you know how to estimate the cost of materials, then you can figure out the cost of the labor. The best way to learn the cost of materials, is by taking a trip to your local Home Depot or Loews store. We have a Home Depot Bus Trip at our Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp which is held twice a year in South Florida. When you go to Home Depot (or Loews) Take a note pad, pen and calculator with you. Allow yourself around 2 hours to go through each aisle. Go aisle by aisle, and make a list of all of the components for each room of the house. It can be helpful to have a sketch of the house from the property appraiser web site (bring that with you). If you have accurate square footage you can calculate how much tile, paint, and laminate flooring you will need. If you have a measurement of the kitchen and bathrooms, then you can calculate how much your cabinets and counter top will cost and how much bathroom tile you will need. Take pictures of each item that you would be purchasing. If you don’t already have a house in mind, then just use a house you are thinking about making an offer on, and take the sketch from the property appraiser with you so that you have square footage to work with. When you get home from your Home Depot or Loews trip, organize all of your pictures along with the Home Depot or Loews SKU number of the products. Save them all in one document that you can access and share easily with others. We save ours in Dropbox and in Google Drive and we make a PDF Version. Once you have the total cost of materials, you will be able to separate the cost of labor when you get an estimate from a contractor. For example, if a contractor quotes you $20,000 to do the work on the house, if you know that the materials cost $8,000, then the labor component is $12,000. If you know how long the job will take them, then based on their estimate you can calculate their hourly or daily labor rate. In the above example if labor is $12,000 and the contractor says that they will do the job in 4 weeks, then the labor cost is $3,000 per week. If the contractor has no helper then you can calculate their weekly and hourly rate. Understanding the cost of the materials is very important since you cannot calculate labor if you don’t know how much the materials are costing you. Many of our students have asked me for a list of the materials that I personally use in the houses that I fix and flip. Here is a list of the material list that I personally use and share with my contractors (along with the Home Depot SKU numbers). Click on the Link Below To Download A PDF Version of the materials that I use on my fix and flips. https://www.lexlevinrad.com/materials-that-we-use-for-fixing-and-flipping-houses/ If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/ DON'T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE TO MY PODCAST AND PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW CONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: http://www.lexlevinrad.com http://www.facebook.com/lexlevinradrealestate http://www.twitter.com/lexlevinrad http://www.instagram.com/lexlevinrad http://www.linkedin.com/in/lexlevinrad http://www.pinterest.com/lexlevinrad https://plus.google.com/+Lex

We have found that the biggest obstacle to our students buying their first house to fix and flip is having a reliable contractor. We have even found that students sign up for our coaching program just to have access to our contractors! Having good, reliable contractors to work on your houses that you plan on fixing and flipping is very important. On the previous podcast, I spoke about the importance of knowing how to estimate the cost of materials and the costs of labor. If you know how to estimate the cost of materials, then you can figure out the cost of the labor. The best way to learn the cost of materials, is by taking a trip to your local Home Depot or Loews store. We have a Home Depot Bus Trip at our Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp which is held twice a year in South Florida. When you go to Home Depot (or Loews) Take a note pad, pen and calculator with you. Allow yourself around 2 hours to go through each aisle. Go aisle by aisle, and make a list of all of the components for each room of the house. It can be helpful to have a sketch of the house from the property appraiser web site (bring that with you). If you have accurate square footage you can calculate how much tile, paint, and laminate flooring you will need. If you have a measurement of the kitchen and bathrooms, then you can calculate how much your cabinets and counter top will cost and how much bathroom tile you will need. Take pictures of each item that you would be purchasing. If you don’t already have a house in mind, then just use a house you are thinking about making an offer on, and take the sketch from the property appraiser with you so that you have square footage to work with. When you get home from your Home Depot or Loews trip, organize all of your pictures along with the Home Depot or Loews SKU number of the products. Save them all in one document that you can access and share easily with others. We save ours in Dropbox and in Google Drive and we make a PDF Version. Once you have the total cost of materials, you will be able to separate the cost of labor when you get an estimate from a contractor. For example, if a contractor quotes you $20,000 to do the work on the house, if you know that the materials cost $8,000, then the labor component is $12,000. If you know how long the job will take them, then based on their estimate you can calculate their hourly or daily labor rate. In the above example if labor is $12,000 and the contractor says that they will do the job in 4 weeks, then the labor cost is $3,000 per week. If the contractor has no helper then you can calculate their weekly and hourly rate. Understanding the cost of the materials is very important since you cannot calculate labor if you don’t know how much the materials are costing you. Many of our students have asked me for a list of the materials that I personally use in the houses that I fix and flip. Here is a list of the material list that I personally use and share with my contractors (along with the Home Depot SKU numbers). Click on the Link Below To Download A PDF Version of the materials that I use on my fix and flips. https://www.lexlevinrad.com/materials-that-we-use-for-fixing-and-flipping-houses/ If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/ DON'T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE TO MY PODCAST AND PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW CONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: http://www.lexlevinrad.com http://www.facebook.com/lexlevinradrealestate http://www.twitter.com/lexlevinrad http://www.instagram.com/lexlevinrad http://www.linkedin.com/in/lexlevinrad http://www.pinterest.com/lexlevinrad https://plus.google.com/+Lex

We have found that the biggest obstacle to our students buying their first house to fix and flip is having a reliable contractor. We have even found that students sign up for our coaching program just to have access to our contractors! Having good, reliable contractors to work on your houses that you plan on fixing and flipping is very important. On the previous podcast, I spoke about the importance of knowing how to estimate the cost of materials and the costs of labor. If you know how to estimate the cost of materials, then you can figure out the cost of the labor. The best way to learn the cost of materials, is by taking a trip to your local Home Depot or Loews store. We have a Home Depot Bus Trip at our Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp which is held twice a year in South Florida. When you go to Home Depot (or Loews) Take a note pad, pen and calculator with you. Allow yourself around 2 hours to go through each aisle. Go aisle by aisle, and make a list of all of the components for each room of the house. It can be helpful to have a sketch of the house from the property appraiser web site (bring that with you). If you have accurate square footage you can calculate how much tile, paint, and laminate flooring you will need. If you have a measurement of the kitchen and bathrooms, then you can calculate how much your cabinets and counter top will cost and how much bathroom tile you will need. Take pictures of each item that you would be purchasing. If you don’t already have a house in mind, then just use a house you are thinking about making an offer on, and take the sketch from the property appraiser with you so that you have square footage to work with. When you get home from your Home Depot or Loews trip, organize all of your pictures along with the Home Depot or Loews SKU number of the products. Save them all in one document that you can access and share easily with others. We save ours in Dropbox and in Google Drive and we make a PDF Version. Once you have the total cost of materials, you will be able to separate the cost of labor when you get an estimate from a contractor. For example, if a contractor quotes you $20,000 to do the work on the house, if you know that the materials cost $8,000, then the labor component is $12,000. If you know how long the job will take them, then based on their estimate you can calculate their hourly or daily labor rate. In the above example if labor is $12,000 and the contractor says that they will do the job in 4 weeks, then the labor cost is $3,000 per week. If the contractor has no helper then you can calculate their weekly and hourly rate. Understanding the cost of the materials is very important since you cannot calculate labor if you don’t know how much the materials are costing you. Many of our students have asked me for a list of the materials that I personally use in the houses that I fix and flip. Here is a list of the material list that I personally use and share with my contractors (along with the Home Depot SKU numbers). Click on the Link Below To Download A PDF Version of the materials that I use on my fix and flips. https://www.lexlevinrad.com/materials-that-we-use-for-fixing-and-flipping-houses/ If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/ DON'T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE TO MY PODCAST AND PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW CONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: http://www.lexlevinrad.com http://www.facebook.com/lexlevinradrealestate http://www.twitter.com/lexlevinrad http://www.instagram.com/lexlevinrad http://www.linkedin.com/in/lexlevinrad http://www.pinterest.com/lexlevinrad https://plus.google.com/+Lex

We have found that the biggest obstacle to our students buying their first house to fix and flip is having a reliable contractor. We have even found that students sign up for our coaching program just to have access to our contractors! Having good, reliable contractors to work on your houses that you plan on fixing and flipping is very important. On the previous podcast, I spoke about the importance of knowing how to estimate the cost of materials and the costs of labor. If you know how to estimate the cost of materials, then you can figure out the cost of the labor. The best way to learn the cost of materials, is by taking a trip to your local Home Depot or Loews store. We have a Home Depot Bus Trip at our Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp which is held twice a year in South Florida. When you go to Home Depot (or Loews) Take a note pad, pen and calculator with you. Allow yourself around 2 hours to go through each aisle. Go aisle by aisle, and make a list of all of the components for each room of the house. It can be helpful to have a sketch of the house from the property appraiser web site (bring that with you). If you have accurate square footage you can calculate how much tile, paint, and laminate flooring you will need. If you have a measurement of the kitchen and bathrooms, then you can calculate how much your cabinets and counter top will cost and how much bathroom tile you will need. Take pictures of each item that you would be purchasing. If you don’t already have a house in mind, then just use a house you are thinking about making an offer on, and take the sketch from the property appraiser with you so that you have square footage to work with. When you get home from your Home Depot or Loews trip, organize all of your pictures along with the Home Depot or Loews SKU number of the products. Save them all in one document that you can access and share easily with others. We save ours in Dropbox and in Google Drive and we make a PDF Version. Once you have the total cost of materials, you will be able to separate the cost of labor when you get an estimate from a contractor. For example, if a contractor quotes you $20,000 to do the work on the house, if you know that the materials cost $8,000, then the labor component is $12,000. If you know how long the job will take them, then based on their estimate you can calculate their hourly or daily labor rate. In the above example if labor is $12,000 and the contractor says that they will do the job in 4 weeks, then the labor cost is $3,000 per week. If the contractor has no helper then you can calculate their weekly and hourly rate. Understanding the cost of the materials is very important since you cannot calculate labor if you don’t know how much the materials are costing you. Many of our students have asked me for a list of the materials that I personally use in the houses that I fix and flip. Here is a list of the material list that I personally use and share with my contractors (along with the Home Depot SKU numbers). Click on the Link Below To Download A PDF Version of the materials that I use on my fix and flips. https://www.lexlevinrad.com/materials-that-we-use-for-fixing-and-flipping-houses/ If you are brand new to real estate and want to learn more about how to fix and flip houses then please register for the free fixing and flipping houses training at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixandflipwebinar For more information about the Fixing and Flipping Houses Boot Camp please visit this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/fixing-and-flipping-boot-camp/ DON'T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE TO MY PODCAST AND PLEASE LEAVE A REVIEW CONNECT WITH ME ONLINE: http://www.lexlevinrad.com http://www.facebook.com/lexlevinradrealestate http://www.twitter.com/lexlevinrad http://www.instagram.com/lexlevinrad http://www.linkedin.com/in/lexlevinrad http://www.pinterest.com/lexlevinrad https://plus.google.com/+Lex

One of the biggest challenges for new investors who are looking to get into fixing and flipping houses, is the fear of not having a good contractor to do the work for them. I have seen this fear stop investors dead in their tracks, even when they have a good house, and the money lined up to buy the house. The fear of not knowing a contractor that will do the work or how much it will cost will prevent many new investors from pulling the trigger and moving forward on the deal. Don't let this fear of paralysis analysis stop you from doing your first fix and flip. The best way to overcome fear is with education and knowledge. Start out today by learning the basics of estimating the material costs by taking a visit to your nearest Home Depot or Loews Store. Allow yourself around 2 hours for this exercise and make sure you take your notepad and a calculator. Go through each aisle and take note of the material components that you will use for each room in the house. Write down the costs of flooring, cabinets, faucets, counter tops, toilets, vanities etc and go through the store aisle by aisle to make sure you don't miss anything. Make sure you take pictures of all of the items with your smartphone. Save all of your notes into Dropbox or Evernote or Google Drive or somewhere where you can easily access the information in the future. Once you understand the cost of each component of your materials costs you will be able to add up all of your materials and have a good understanding of the total cost of your materials. Knowing the cost of the materials is 90% of the battle because once you know the cost of materials, you know how much you are being charged for labor when you get an estimate. Your job, is to shop that labor estimate! You can download a copy of our "Repair Estimate Cheat Sheet" at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/estimating-the-cost-of-repairs-for-fixing-and-flipping-houses/

One of the biggest challenges for new investors who are looking to get into fixing and flipping houses, is the fear of not having a good contractor to do the work for them. I have seen this fear stop investors dead in their tracks, even when they have a good house, and the money lined up to buy the house. The fear of not knowing a contractor that will do the work or how much it will cost will prevent many new investors from pulling the trigger and moving forward on the deal. Don't let this fear of paralysis analysis stop you from doing your first fix and flip. The best way to overcome fear is with education and knowledge. Start out today by learning the basics of estimating the material costs by taking a visit to your nearest Home Depot or Loews Store. Allow yourself around 2 hours for this exercise and make sure you take your notepad and a calculator. Go through each aisle and take note of the material components that you will use for each room in the house. Write down the costs of flooring, cabinets, faucets, counter tops, toilets, vanities etc and go through the store aisle by aisle to make sure you don't miss anything. Make sure you take pictures of all of the items with your smartphone. Save all of your notes into Dropbox or Evernote or Google Drive or somewhere where you can easily access the information in the future. Once you understand the cost of each component of your materials costs you will be able to add up all of your materials and have a good understanding of the total cost of your materials. Knowing the cost of the materials is 90% of the battle because once you know the cost of materials, you know how much you are being charged for labor when you get an estimate. Your job, is to shop that labor estimate! You can download a copy of our "Repair Estimate Cheat Sheet" at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/estimating-the-cost-of-repairs-for-fixing-and-flipping-houses/

One of the biggest challenges for new investors who are looking to get into fixing and flipping houses, is the fear of not having a good contractor to do the work for them. I have seen this fear stop investors dead in their tracks, even when they have a good house, and the money lined up to buy the house. The fear of not knowing a contractor that will do the work or how much it will cost will prevent many new investors from pulling the trigger and moving forward on the deal. Don't let this fear of paralysis analysis stop you from doing your first fix and flip. The best way to overcome fear is with education and knowledge. Start out today by learning the basics of estimating the material costs by taking a visit to your nearest Home Depot or Loews Store. Allow yourself around 2 hours for this exercise and make sure you take your notepad and a calculator. Go through each aisle and take note of the material components that you will use for each room in the house. Write down the costs of flooring, cabinets, faucets, counter tops, toilets, vanities etc and go through the store aisle by aisle to make sure you don't miss anything. Make sure you take pictures of all of the items with your smartphone. Save all of your notes into Dropbox or Evernote or Google Drive or somewhere where you can easily access the information in the future. Once you understand the cost of each component of your materials costs you will be able to add up all of your materials and have a good understanding of the total cost of your materials. Knowing the cost of the materials is 90% of the battle because once you know the cost of materials, you know how much you are being charged for labor when you get an estimate. Your job, is to shop that labor estimate! You can download a copy of our "Repair Estimate Cheat Sheet" at this link: https://www.lexlevinrad.com/estimating-the-cost-of-repairs-for-fixing-and-flipping-houses/

On this podcast episode I discuss the importance of understanding full retail value when calculating the After Repair Value. As an investor it is very important for you to understand what a house would sell for once it has been fixed up. In order to know this, you need to understand the difference between full retail price on a property that has been completely remodeled with granite counter tops, nice cabinets and stainless steel appliances versus a house that is at retail price in great condition but occupied by the owners and that has not been remodeled. The difficulty for new investors is understanding how much to offer on a house that is in less than perfect condition. For example, a house that has not been renovated in 20 years and has a tenant living in the house. How much should you offer on that house? Listen to today's episode to learn how buying the exact same house can have different exit strategies for different investors depending on whether they are planning on keeping the property as a rental property or fixing and flipping the property for a profit.

On this podcast episode I discuss the importance of understanding full retail value when calculating the After Repair Value. As an investor it is very important for you to understand what a house would sell for once it has been fixed up. In order to know this, you need to understand the difference between full retail price on a property that has been completely remodeled with granite counter tops, nice cabinets and stainless steel appliances versus a house that is at retail price in great condition but occupied by the owners and that has not been remodeled. The difficulty for new investors is understanding how much to offer on a house that is in less than perfect condition. For example, a house that has not been renovated in 20 years and has a tenant living in the house. How much should you offer on that house? Listen to today's episode to learn how buying the exact same house can have different exit strategies for different investors depending on whether they are planning on keeping the property as a rental property or fixing and flipping the property for a profit.

On this podcast episode I discuss the importance of understanding full retail value when calculating the After Repair Value. As an investor it is very important for you to understand what a house would sell for once it has been fixed up. In order to know this, you need to understand the difference between full retail price on a property that has been completely remodeled with granite counter tops, nice cabinets and stainless steel appliances versus a house that is at retail price in great condition but occupied by the owners and that has not been remodeled. The difficulty for new investors is understanding how much to offer on a house that is in less than perfect condition. For example, a house that has not been renovated in 20 years and has a tenant living in the house. How much should you offer on that house? Listen to today's episode to learn how buying the exact same house can have different exit strategies for different investors depending on whether they are planning on keeping the property as a rental property or fixing and flipping the property for a profit.

One of the best ways to locate real estate deals is by something called “driving for dollars”. Many of your competitors may be mailing post cards and yellow letters, or paying for expensive pay per click campaigns on Google or buying Facebook Ads. Some of your competitors may even be using automated dialers to cold call expired listings, for sale by owners or targeted lists that they have acquired. Those approaches all work great (and we use them all). But let me ask you a question. How many of your competitors are actually getting into their car and driving around looking for deals? The answer is not many! How do I know this? Because I find deals all of the time that are right in my backyard! Almost every single time I get in my car, and go driving through my target markets, I find deals. Almost every single time! Investors have become spoiled and lazy. It is easy to overlook this old approach of “driving for dollars”. But it works. Driving through any neighborhood and noticing vacant, boarded up properties, houses with damage (like fire damage), and FSBO signs is not something you can do sitting in front of your computer. And all of your competitors are….. (in front of their computer). If you want to find the smoking hot deals. The ones that can make you profits of $30,000, $50,000 or more then you should start driving through your target market more and looking for these types of houses. And when you find them, there are real estate apps out there that you can download on your smartphone that could really help you locate sellers. I really like these two apps listed below (I use them both) Both of these apps do almost the same thing but with some variation. SEND FUSE > http://getsendfuse.com/ Send Fuse is free to join and only $1 a postcard to mail. You get a sequence of 6 postcards that you can have go out to owners of the property. All you need to do is text the address to your send fuse number in your phone and the postcard sequence begins. You can also add users to your Send Fuse account so you could recruit some bird dogs and offer to pay them $1,000 for any deal they bring to you, and have them download the app on their phone (with your account). I really like the ease of use and the fact that there are no fees at all. This app is very easy to use and I recommend it to my students. DEAL MACHINE > https://dealmachineapp.com/ The really cool feature about Deal Machine is that you can take a picture of the property and add it to the postcard. You can literally take out your smart phone and take a picture of a vacant, boarded up house. And then using the app you can have a postcard sent to the owner (with a picture of their house) asking them “Is this your house?”. That is a very smart way of getting the owner’s attention and it works really well. The response rate is way higher than a typical post card. The other really nice feature of Deal Machine is that you can look up the owners info right there and even get their phone number in some cases. Deal Machine let’s you try their service out for free for 14 days and then they charge $49 per month which is really a very small charge considering what the app does. Imagine if using this app you made $30,000 profit on one house! Use this code FTCYXN to get $5 of direct mail credit when you sign up. If you are already out driving for dollars, do yourself a favor and have some bandit signs made up and keep a few in your trunk. It wouldn’t kill you to put a few bandit signs out and have some sellers call you. Even better, hire your kids or someone else and pay them $1 to $2 per bandit sign that they put out. And don’t forget to send out direct mail. It works! Start out by mailing a list of absentee owners since this is the easiest list to obtain. Even if you can only afford to mail out 500 postcards a month, make yourself a commitment that you will mail 500 a month for at least 6 months. If you only get 1 deal out of that mailing over th