It's beginning to sound like McDonald's, in conjunction with their PR announcement of 50,000 jobs in one day, has also put to work a group of paid shills like Neenissti (registered last month I might add) to spin this fairy tale along. Hydroblunt is right, there are far too many gaping holes in this story to make it believable. Putting the skepticism aside for a moment, even if half true, I re-iterate my earlier point that all of it was a function of the tail end of the biggest credit bubble in history. Easy lending, rapidly rising real estate valuations, etc, etc..It was ponzi finance at its finest. Going forward, absolutely zero chance to make this work without a ton of initial capital and the capacity and/or patience to wade thru some seriously turbulent times.
Neenisti; How did your friend get the occupancy permit for the foreclosures? 5 of them even? It cost a lot of money to bring it up to code. New electrical, new plumbing, siding, roof, windows. Then sheetrock, plaster, painting, moulding, possibly sprinkler system, possibly hardwood floors, etc... Even if your friend is buddy buddy with the bank's ceo; the construction loan can't cover all the material cost. And with the mortgage too.. how did he manage the cost with a McD's job? Also how many hours was he working at mcdonalds? Not trying to be confrontational, just looking for the holy grail within the golden arches.
Yup, I'm a shill for a fast food company that sells processed chemicals. And it a total impossibility to rehab one home into 2 or 2 into 3 or 4 or 5 or to then leverage them to turn five $150+K properties into a million dollar franchise. Yup, impossible. It's impossible to trade for a living too so why are are you on a fantasy site like this anyway. Computer technology is a myth. The sky is falling and the check is in the mail. Your posts are proving my point that ingenuity is dead. and so is common sense in this forum.
Anyone who thinks its cheap to go out and flip houses better think twice, I know many people in the industry and they have seen prices skyrocket, and I am not talking in the last year or so, prices have gone up greatly in the last 10 years. To do a simple bathroom from start to finish is going to cost you more than $15k..... I have a friend right now who is doing his bathroom over, a small simple basic bathroom, the contractor and one day laborer is costing close to $600 a day, go price up a contractor and see how much they get a day to work, they make more money than some people who have masters degrees!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You are a genuine crackpot, in every sense of the word. You have yet to answer most of the questions posed by people who have a sense as to how business actually works. Instead, you continue to pour on the fantastical details of this rags to riches story as if you were a paid spokesman for some late night infomercial. True to form, you take an outlier and give the impression that this is very common path for Assistant Managers at McDonalds. Yes, you are a shill, own up to it.
Most of you are relating metro real estate prices and procedures to rural real estate which is no comparison. Not even close. Foreclosures don't always need a ground up rebuild. You don't buy something that costs more to rehab than you are going to recover out of it. There are thousands of properties available around the US right now at bargain prices that are perfect for flipping or renting. It is a buyers market. There is one sitting in Round Lake, IL right now that is a 4/2 for under $40K in a neighborhood of $100K to $180K homes. My friend said the rehab costs would run around $25K. Too far for me but for someone it would be a good project. You know, just drop it. It will never be a tool any of you would be able to pull off because you don't have the where-with-all or initiative to put that much hard work or effort into the task anyway. If it were possible to take a $40K property and turn it into a $100K property in 6 months of your spare time, most of you would consider that wasted energy not realizing that over 5 years you've created a decent revenue stream paying off most of the equity in those properties. I think my buddy is a freak. He loves doing these projects. I did just one up on Lake Michigan a number of years ago and it about killed me. I made a great return on it but I won't ever do another one. Some people are just packaged to put that amount of effort into a project. I know it can be done because I saw it work for him. I know it isn't impossible. On the same note, I would have never been able to accomplish what he did. This is why I say I'm proud to call him my friend. It is inspiring.
To do that sort of thing you either have to be experienced in the trade itself or be connected to people that can do the rehab work at reasonable prices. It's simple business sense, but most people don't seem to possess it. i.e. why would you go out and buy a bunch of properties to rehab and flip if you don't know your costs to rehab beforehand? Probably because guys like Neenissti were on late night television talking about their remarkable friend who went from flipping burgers to owning his mini empire in a short time.
Yeah, good idea, buy a property in Round Lake, IL, home to mostly illegal immigrants who have minimal employment prospects. It's 2011, not 2001, sorry but you are out to lunch.
Yup, live in the city and get hosed. It's no wonder you can't fathom someone making a living managing a restaurant and rehabbing homes. My neighbor just built an insulated/heated/cooled all steel 3 car garage on a slab with a workshop and bathroom for $19K.
I'm out to lunch and you are clueless . . . we are quite the pair. I don't live there. I don't live anywhere close to there. I put it out there just as an example. If you are prejudice against Latinos that is your problem. Green backs are green backs. There are listing for foreclosures in every state. If you can't use a search engine, that might be the root of your ailment.