Congrats are in order to all the poker bloggers stepping up into the big time, including Drizz, Change100, Maudie, Amy Calistri, and JoeSpeaker. Definitely well-deserved and I hope all of you cool kids continue to knock the cover off the ball.
There's the selfish, jealous part of me that rolls over every time a poker blogger announces such news, which is pretty quickly silenced by me telling myself: "Umm, self, shut up, it's been many months since you've earned the right to call yourself a poker blogger. So, you know, put a stitch in it." Which I do. And all is well again.
Real estate wheeling and dealing may commence sooner than I'd planned. I spent a good chunk of my time off recently scoping out places and went to check them out with an agent a week or so ago. He grabbed a few extra listings that just came on via the MLS, one of which was a foreclosure. It's in a pretty crappy neighborhood but the house is actually in good shape, and would just need painting and new carpeting. 1600 sq. ft. 4/2 house that's been split into a duplex (3-1 on one side and a pretty small 1/1 on the other). Purchase price? $39,500. The agent was pretty baffled at the price, as it should rent for $700-$800/month pretty easily, and I could have a property management company deal with it and still show a little profit each month.
I'm probably going to miss out on this one due to not having cash ready to pounce, but it's encouraging in general to see stuff like that. The main house I wanted to see was encouraging, too, as well as equal parts scary. It's been on the market for forever, was listed by the children after the parent died, needs a whole crapload of cosmetic work and landscaping, as well as central air and heat installed and a new roof. It's in a great neighborhood, though, and on a huge lot. Basically it's a $125,000 house when fixed up that needs about $30,000 worth of repairs done. It's currently listed at $65,000, so the math works, but it's kind of an intimidating prospect, when standing there looking at the house in its current state.
4 comments:
Tough to comprehend those real estate prices! In Vancouver a postage stamp lot (33x122) runs about $900,000 and you don't get a house. A house is $100,000 to $600,000 more depending on quality and condition.
Thanks for the shout out Scurvy!
Underdog,
Your numbers are pretty much in line with what I'm hoping for, as I'm not looking to hit home runs with these and get rich overnight.
Although I'm not sure how you arrive at the conclusion that I make less if I do some of the work myself. Between refinishing the floors, painting, landscaping, and tiling bathrooms and kitchen, I'm shooting to knock out $10,000-$15,000 of repairs myself.
Obviously that labor isn't conjured out of thin air, but I'm guesstimating that I can do it for 1/2 of the cost if I hired it out. Back that out and I'm essentially making $5K-$7.5K for the 2-3 months of work I put into it, plus $20K or so in profit, assuming the house sells at $125K.
If I were doing some of the work myself and not able to do it at a substantial cost savings then yeah, you're right, I'd just be sinking extra labor costs into the deal.
Play some poker please.
Mansion $100k guaranteed. $50k shortfall the last two nights.
Post a Comment