Growing

You guys, I have some super exciting news.

But first a story.

Back when my aunt was pregnant with her first child, she decided to tell us kids when we were over on a Sunday night. She gathered the whole family into the living room and then started a speech, which she quickly cut off. She turned to my mom, nervous, and said “you tell them!”

My mom, shocked and caught off guard, smiled and looked around the patiently waiting room. She said “our family is growing!!”

I think we had a look of shocked horror on our faces as we started to pepper her with questions.

“Whattt?!?!”

“Growing?!”

“You’re pregnant???!?!!?”

“We are having a brother or sister?!!!??!”

She quickly realized what had happened and corrected, “NO, no, HEATHER is having a baby.”

Relief washed over my siblings and I, as we became excited for a new cousin. I was probably a lot more excited than my brothers, but what can you expect of preteen boys?

That tiny baby is now 15 and learning to drive.

But, this memorable saying has stuck, and has been used time and time again throughout the years.

So with that in mind…..

Our family is growing!!

-As in we are adding more houses to the mix!-

No more babies, or pets. Four kids, two dogs, and a carnival fish who is thriving at 6 years old are enough for me. (Side note: Orangie is the best fish I’ve ever seen)

But income properties? Keep them coming!! This is the kind of growing that we will continue to do!

Trust

Let me talk about trust for a minute here.

We are scheduled to close on the Miller house TODAY! This (I believe) will be a great little rental and doesn’t need a whole top-to-bottom renovation like The Palace. It was priced below market, and we were able to walk through, and put an offer in, within the first 24h it was on the market.

MY HUSBAND HAS NOT BEEN THROUGH THIS HOUSE.

My business & life partner, has not stepped foot inside this property.

How crazy is that??

He trusts me enough to be okay with me buying whole houses based only judgement (experience), research, and market analysis.

This is literally my dream job, finding and fixing houses.

He is the one who makes it happen and lets me live out my dream.

Yes, these properties benefit us as a family, but without his steady income, and more importantly, his support, this would not exist.

So. Thankful.

I will post a price/cost breakdown once it’s rented and the numbers are final for each of the homes, for those who are interested.

For Sale

There is a house (well several, if I am being completely honest) that we have been keeping an eye on as we drive back and forth to The Palace to do work each day.

Josh went and door knocked, talking to a few of the owners and/or occupants on Wednesday night of various properties in the neighborhood that we have been tracking. At one house I had seen three junk removal trucks.

The next day? (Yesterday)

There was a for sale sign in the yard when we drove past in the morning.

I called the listing agency, they weren’t able to give me any info because “it wasn’t on the market yet.”

Little E and I did some work at The Palace, pulling nails out of the ceiling joists so that it will be ready for drywall, now that the framing and electric are set on the first and second floors.

As we were leaving I saw the next-door neighbor to the “for sale” house out staining their front porch so I decided to stop and ask a few questions.

Neighbors can have the best insight into a property. It doesn’t hurt to reach out and ask.

I also put in a call to my realtor to see what they could find out about that house.

The neighbor, turned out not to be a neighbor, but a friend who was helping them out. He used to build houses in San Fransisco and knows how to do basically everything, an experienced contractor. I got his business card and E and I headed for home.

As we were driving, our agent let us know that it was newly listed, and that he could meet to walk through it. Now.

I turned around and went to meet him at the house. Our amazing go-to-guy was at The Palace up the street so I put in a call to see if he would come and walk through it as well with us.

We were the first people through it!

This area is ridiculously hot right now, time is of the essence.

(There was a house one street over that has a nearly identical floorpan but has been renovated, listed late last week. I thought it was way overpriced, and had to pick my jaw up off the floor when I saw that it was pending.)

The listing said that they would consider offers until 10/14 but reserved the right to accept an offer at any time… they wanted to drum up competition.

Having our go-to-guy right up the street, and having a searingly fresh idea of what these repairs would cost, was a difference maker.

This house is so much more solid than The Palace was when we first got into it. Nobody has messed with the electric, plumbing, or structure.

Don’t get me wrong, it is also a “full gut” per the listing and has water in the basement, mold galore, and several dumpsters worth of flooring/ceiling/kitchen/bathroom to remove. Plus roof, windows, gutters, HVAC, and some electric work. A diamond in the rough.

BUT! I know this going in.

And more importantly, know that I can fix it. Within a conservative budget that works for us.

Josh was called on speakerphone and we talked through it.

I looked at our agent and asked him to get in offer in.

He did it again!!

Here I am, putting offers in on houses, that he hasn’t seen. So much trust.

He’s not thrilled with the numbers for it (2/1) BUT, I have been through it. I see that it is a (3/2) or even a (4/2.5) if you do the basement.

This right here, this is where you build equity into a home.

Untapped potential.

We got our docusign on, and waited. Not sure of when we would hear back.

Opening Night

Last night our realtor’s office had an opening night celebration for the new offices that they moved into.

While there, our realtor gave us the good news that OUR OFFER HAD BEEN ACCEPTED!!

Our property family is growing again!

I don’t think this feeling will ever get old.

I had prepared myself for the offer to not be accepted, a few weeks ago we had walked through house that was pending by the time we tried to submit and was pretty sad about it. So this time I went home and told myself we didn’t get it, but it is okay because we have a few at auction coming up.

But, you guys, we did get it!

And only because we were able to get in there so quickly, and have a realtor who has our backs.

There were multiple offers on the table, and even offers that were higher than ours. But we are rock solid with no contingencies. Our realtor vouched for us that we are the real deal.

The seller wants a quick close with no hassles, we can do that!

So here we are at the party,

two houses under contract, neither of which Josh has been inside.

I am living out my dream being able to flex my design muscles, and my real working muscles to make my visions come to life.

We are growing our portfolio, and I feel like I am growing as a person in knowledge, skill, and experience.

And in the end? We will have some rock solid BRRRR investments, and can do it all over again after refi.

It has taken years to get to this point, but I feel like we have found our groove.

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This property still needs to be named but I will follow up with a name, pics and our journey over there was well!

Teamwork makes this dream work.

Happy Weekend!!