Working with Real Estate Investors

OJ Simpson, the Real Estate Market and You

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-09-15T15:45:10-07:00

What does OJ Simpson have to do with the real estate market? Absolutely nothing, but I just wanted to get your attention. In the current real estate market, it's all about getting the attention. Let me tell you a quick story. I had an investor friend of mine, who had purchased a home in Riverside, California around December of 2006. His intention was to bring it up to code and then sell for a $40,000 net profit after costs. Due to unforeseen, circumstances, he took longer than his usual 2...

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How to Lower The Risk of Your Deal From Falling Apart

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-06-09T07:56:58-07:00

The guys over at Lending Clarity have posted an informative five-part series on the what to do to minimize your deal from falling apart. Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five

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The Reality of Rehabbing

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-06-08T11:48:02-07:00

Reality shows most often than not are not reality and that rings true for real estate reality shows like Flip This House from A&E. By now you have probably heard about the trouble's A&E is having with one of it's flippers (or is it floppers?), Sam Mr. Leccima . It has been alleged that Mr. Leccima has not been as honest as he has been portrayed. According to Fox News Atlanta, Mr. Leccima and A&E have duped the public into thinking the homes that were featured were actually fixed and sold in...

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Fix This House? No. Fix This Show

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-06-05T06:50:24-07:00

I'm sure by now you have heard about the recent troubles of Atlanta businessman Sam Leccima and A&E"s Flip This House. It seems that Mr. Leccima has been scamming the both the viewing public and allegedly A&E as well. Some of the alleged hoaxes were that Mr. Leccima: Did a poor job of fixing the propertiesDid not sell the homes as advertisedUsed his friends a stand-ins for potential buyers. You can view the entire news story here at the Fox News-Atlanta website. The truth is that this...

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Beaten to the Punch-Again!!

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-06-04T22:33:38-07:00

Those of you who read this blog, have heard me rant about how most real estate agents do not understand the differences of working with typical client and a real estate investor. I've tried to give advice here and there, but Chris Smith at Equity Scout has taken the words right out of my mouth. In one post he pretty much summarized what I have been trying to do in three months. Oh well... I am not ashamed to give credit where credit is due. Chris has done an excellent job in creating a...

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Speculating Is Not Really Investing

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-06-04T22:21:52-07:00

Chris Smith, at Equity Scout has written a wonderful piece comparing real estate investors to real estate speculators. For those of you who have the experience, can you tell the difference when acquiring clients who are interested in investing? How about you newbies, can you tell who is headed for trouble and who will make money? If you can't print out the table, Chris has created and keep it in front of you as sort of a cheat sheet. Happy selling.....

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It's Just Not the Sellers. It's the Real Estate Agents Too.

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-06-03T12:55:40-07:00

May was a productive month for me. I took care of some lingering issues that had been going on with my multi-family property and I saw around 15 potential profitable deals go by the wayside. Now don't feel sorry for me. In fact I am quite happy it happened this way because I am beginning to hone my skills in working with real estate agents. At first I thought the problem was the sellers. I thought they were expecting too much out of the current market. But you know, some of the problems...

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Here's A Niche That Is Helping Some Realtors Build Their Business

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-05-06T10:25:36-07:00

Gay buying power has led to the creation of a substantial niche real estate market, which has helped turn Puna into something of a boom town. Witeck-Combs Communications and Packaged Facts, a division of MarketResearch.com, projected the total buying power of the U.S. gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender adult population at $660 billion in 2007. That number, which represents a 19 percent increase over 2006, has surpassed the buying power of the Asian and Native American communities and is on...

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I Wonder If This Is The New Zillow?

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-05-02T06:31:23-07:00

Berg Properties a Chicago, Illinois real estate company now offers interactive market trends graphs for homebuyers in the Chicago area. Like Zillow, I am sure there may be inherent errors in the system, but it's still a good tool for anyone who wants to better determine current real estate market conditions. The trends that are tracked are: average days on marketmedian pricemedian inventorymediaan price per square foot. The data is provided by a third-party service that scours the Internet...

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Realty Times-NAR's Second Homes Report Shows Investors, Others Still Buying

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-05-01T16:55:44-07:00

Editor's Note-While I'm pleasantly surprised to read the results of the NAR report, I still believe there will be a bumpy road ahead in real estate. Not surprisingly, the National Association of Realtors' annual Investment and Vacation Home Buyers Survey showed that homes purchased for investment or perhaps speculation slowed in 2006, but eyebrows may bolt upwards upon hearing that second home purchases set a new record -- up from 2005, what many call the end of the so-called housing...

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Thirty Traffic Generation Tips

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-05-01T16:45:00-07:00

Since blogs are big in the real estate world, I decided to post useful tips from the guys over at Daily Blog tips. Now, without further delay, the Thirty Traffic Generation Tips Keep track of blogs and leave comments on them. A good way to keep the conversation going is to install a MyBlogLog widget and visit the blog of people visiting your site.Nothing creates long-term traffic more than value. Consider writing posts with resources or explaining how things work. Useful things get linked to...

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Loan Fraud, Lease-Options and a Lawsuit

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-05-01T09:44:34-07:00

A three-month long investigation by television station KCRA 3 out of Sacramento, California has uncovered millions of dollars of fraud. A retired Sacramento woman, along with seven others is accusing VFM Investing Group, Freedom Capital Mortgage and real estate agent Jennifer Huang into duping them into buying home, which they could in turn lease options. The plaintiffs were to purchase homes and the defendants would then provide the "pre-screened and pre-qualified" tenants. The plaintiffs...

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Do You Email New Listings To Fellow Realtors?

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-29T13:11:00-07:00

Editor's Note-Good marketing tip from Jim Mazziotti of Exit Realty in Bend, Oregon Fellow Realtors....I need your help. You see, I am a Principal Broker and Owner of a real estate company in Bend, Oregon. I am constantly working for my clients to make sure that their listing with me receives the very best EXPOSURE possible. I use the traditional methods to "get the word out" on every one of my listings....and the one I value the most is the very one who is actually working hard to STOP ME...

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Do You Work With Real Estate Investors or Real Estate Speculators?

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-29T11:45:33-07:00

I was reading the Active Rain Real Estate Network, like I often do and happened to read the Marketing REO Properties... Why Bother?! post from an agent out of Wichita, Kansas. The author basically stated that she marketed REO properties the same way as a regular listing and had found success. It was generally a good post. The comments though were another story. Phyllis Mathouser out of Exterer, New Hampshire wrote: I have my first REO listing and although I treat it just like my other...

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Why Every Agent Should Be Like Mike

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-27T17:03:28-07:00

The true measure of a great real estate agent comes not from how many sales he closes, but from how many he doesn't. Now before the you-know-what hits the proverbial fan let me explain. I have been contemplating investing in my backyard for sometime now. The area is fairly new and there is an abundance of inventory. As a matter of fact there are plenty of homes that have been listed for more than 100 days. Though I have been investing since 1998, I have never invested in a down market and I...

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Take A Ride on The Real Estate Roller Coaster

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-26T21:39:15-07:00

The guys over at Speculative Bubble have created a virtual roller coaster of the road we have taken in house prices. The prices are adjusted for inflation. It's worth hanging on until the end to realize just how big a drop the market can take. This graph here is even more telling. Good Work!

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Marketing Tip-Do You Know What Your Prospect to Customer Ratio Is?

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-26T20:51:55-07:00

How Many Prospects Does It Take To Generate One New Client? Every real estate agent or any business for that matter has a conversion ratio. The conversion ratio refers to the percentage of prospects who become your customers. If your marketing skills are astronomical you may have a 2:1 ratio. (In other words it takes two prospects to generate one new customer) Or you may have a 50:1 or even a 500:1 ratio. It's hard to predict what your specific ratio will be, since the ratio depends on many...

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After Spending Big to Strike It Rich, Some Speculators Coming Up Broke as Market Cools

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-25T19:35:51-07:00

Editor's Note: I wrote about Casey Serin a few weeks ago. His story is not uncommon among real estate speculators. Learn from it and steer your clients away from making the wrong decision. Sacramento, Calif., not far from where prospectors sought quick riches in the gold rush more than a century ago, another speculative boom is going bust. This time, however, it's not the lure of precious metals — it's real estate. "The market was hot, and I decided to give it a shot," said Casey Serin, a...

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Targeting 100 Plus Market-Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-25T15:19:42-07:00

Editor's Note-I promised this article on Sunday, but things have been a bit hectic. According to Zip Realty, there are over 668 homes for sale in my zip code. Out of those 688, Redfin says there are roughly 100 that have been listed for over 100 days. Things aren't moving as fast as they used to. My next door neighbor who has listed his home for over 100 days, has just dropped the price from $599,000 to $500,000. They want to move out of state and they are desperate to sell. Things are...

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The Dow Jones Breaks All Records and It's Time For Real Estate Agents to Celebrate

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-25T14:06:48-07:00

Today the Dow Jones industrial average rose past 13,000 for the first time in its history and now its time to celebrate. Why? Think about it. All the real estate speculators who migrated to real estate after the last bear market are now going to begin to speculate on stocks rather than real estate. The herd has just thinned itself out. I know you may lose some clients, but you would have lost them anyway. If they were speculators rather than investors, then they are more than likely losing...

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Targeting the 100 Plus Market

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-22T18:01:33-07:00

I've never invested in a down market. I was lucky enough to began my real estate ventures nearly 10 years ago. I was in my late 20's and I purchased a 2 bedroom with 2 full bathrooms in Long Beach California. The condo was a REO property and I picked it up for a measly $60,000. Long Beach was just starting to come out of the real estate crash of the early 90's and I was a naive young investor. That same condo would be listed for nearly $300,000 today. Little did I know that within a year the...

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The Housing Bubble Blog-We Have To Pay The Price For The Great Gains

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-22T17:11:17-07:00

The Press Enterprise reports from California. “Inland home foreclosures this year have increased more than ninefold over the same period a year ago, driven by flat appreciation and sagging home sales. Ana Ibarra and her husband, Guillermo Macias, adore their five-bedroom house in a new tract of executive-style homes in north Fontana.” “But Ibarra said the couple doesn’t have enough money to furnish the house. Ibarra said she and Macias, a 30-year-old commercial plumber, together earn about...

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Broker Agent News-The Sub-Prime Crisis and How it Affects You - Part One

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-21T14:46:48-07:00

Have you seen the headlines? Top national news story a few week's ago: New Century Financial Corp., the second largest sub-prime mortgage lender, is broke. They can't pay the creditors who are demanding money and rumor is that we'll be hearing about bankruptcy soon. Even the New York Stock Exchange has suspended trading for the company, once a giant among lenders. It finally happened. The sub-prime market was being pushed to its edge for months - by lenders with unethical predatory tactics -...

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Branding is for McDonald's Not For Agents

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-21T14:47:16-07:00

Branding is for McDonald's Not For Agents Most agents have a limited marketing budget and must maximize every marketing dollar to ensure that every dollar you spent will bring back more money in return. The "What is Your Brand" article over at Realty Times seems to think differently. The author states that "we must spend our time and money developing and maintaining" your brand just like the masters Nike and McDonald's. This is just plain wrong. Nike and McDonald's have millions of dollars...

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Don't Let Your Clients Fall Prey to the Gurus

noreply@blogger.com (Fred De La Riva) — 2007-04-21T14:47:49-07:00

You just never know what you find on the Internet. And in the case of this article by Dominate Preforeclosures , the stuff you find is basically worthless. For instance the author claims that he made over $50,000 dollars in five weeks by buying a home from a couple who was in financial trouble. After negotiating to buy the home for $145,000, the author was able to secure a loan from a private lender for $175,000. After rehabbing the property, he was able to sell it in two days for $230,000...

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