Hi Everyone,
Apologies for the delay on this. My back was giving me problems on Thursday which restricted me to laying in a recliner most of Thursday, Friday and intermittently over the weekend, bemoaning my existence. Unfortunately, I only caught a small portion of Thursday's meeting as I could not stay very long.
That said, it was a real treat to get a presentation from both Anil Dham and Dan Harvey, two DIG superstars. Anil showed us a 9 unit deal he recently completed in Royersfod (I think). While I didn't catch the whole thing, I did pick up a few things:
1. Some of his decision making on installing one unit in the basement vs. two.
2. A floor paint that is durable and does not seem to get dirty (I need to know what it is specifically)
3. That he left money in the deal--this was important for a couple of reasons to me. Almost all of my deals have not required me to leave money in the deal. I buy it with hard or private money, fix it up, rent it out, and refi it, pulling all of my money back out. Over the past few years, however, this has not been the case for many of my refis. In talking with many investors, the cash out refis are becoming less frequent. Creativity on deals moving forward will be more important than ever. Whether it's utilizing seller financing, or partners with money, we will need to think about more ways to make deals happen so we don't run out of money. On my recent project with Jon and Jim Welsh in Ambler, we used the same type of financing as Anil, using one loan for the purchase and rehab that started as interest only and converted to full principal and interest after a designated period of time. While we had to put money in the deal, we received an acceptable interest rate of 7% and no refi to pay for. We used Harleysville Bank and I believe Anil used Victory, where he got a rate in the fives!
Dan Harvey offered us a presentation on the ups and downs of being an investor. It was appropriately timed for me, personally, as I'm having a difficult time at the moment. Unfortunately, I could not stay for his entire presentation as my back was barking at me and I had to retreat to my recliner. He did throw out some golden nuggets for us of lessons he's learned over time, which I'll loosely regurgitate here.
Learn a niche and get very good at it.
Once you become successful in a niche, stick with it.
If you veer far from your niche, you could get yourself into trouble.
Cut your losses early on a bad deal. Limit your time on bad deals so you can focus on the ones that will make money for you.
If anyone can add more to either of these presentations, it would be welcomed.
On the networking side of things, I was talking with one of our newer members Logan, who utilized DIG's network of people to help him analyze a deal. While it turned out not to be a deal, he was able to figure this out with the help of our members, who are always happy to help a fellow investor out. It's one of the main reasons this group is so great. It's what stuck out to me when I first joined and is the main selling point I offer to others.