Death Plunge!

I met up with my twin brother and his wife at a water park in Central Texas last weekend. All was going well until I ALMOST DIED! Check out the video below. I’m on the left. Trent’s on the right. We weren’t even phased by our near-death experience … Yeah Right! We were screaming like little girls!

Seriously, I don’t recommend that you do this. Even though it’s supposed to be safe, I don’t think it really is. There was only 1 cable on each side holding us up. And minimum wage employees strapped us in. Next time, I need about 20 cables on each side and 5 engineers securing me in the harness. But maybe I’m just overly concerned with living!

But something good did come out of this. When I got back into town, I decided to celebrate life. And what better way to celebrate than by offering the Vault at a 36% discount. I call it the Internet Special. Read more and order before it’s too late at www.myhousedeals.com/thevault.

See you there!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

How to Analyze and Buy a Property to Rehab, Part II

(If you haven’t read Part I yet, please scroll down and read it first.)

During this time that you have the property under contract and you haven’t actually closed on it yet, have it inspected by a licensed inspector. And then you can also have your own contractor look at it in case he didn’t look at it when you first inspected the property.  This is also a good time to send out your foundation company. They will often give free estimates. And they can catch things even your licensed inspector cannot catch because they specialize in finding problems with the foundation.

So if everything looks good with the inspection and the house repairs are still in line with what you initially expected and you can make a good profit on the deal, tell the seller to move out … if it’s a motivated seller. If it’s a wholesale deal, tell the wholesaler to tell the seller to move out.

Then get your financing in place because you’ve already committed to buying. Get your private loan or your hard money loan. You’ll need to fax to the hard money lender the application they require, which they normally process in a day or two and often has nothing to do with whether or not your credit is good. And also fax your hard money lender your sales agreement so the hard money lender can analyze the deal. Then the hard money lender will go look at this property and they’ll make sure it’s a good deal. And if it is, they’ll grant you the loan and make sure your money is there at closing waiting for you on the day that you plan to purchase the property.

If they find out that you’re over paying for the property, they won’t say, “Oh we can’t lend.”  Nine times out of ten, they’ll still lend on the property. But it will be less money than you expected, which will require you to come out of pocket a little.

Now another thing the hard money lender will do is get their documentation to the title company. So you don’t have to worry about that. And then the title company is going to organize all these documents, all the legal documents that people often get so scared about. The title company actually takes care of most of that or all of that depending on how you look at it.  Go ahead and close on the property and the hard money lender will wire the money to the transaction the day of or the day after closing.

But like I mentioned earlier, if you’re buying at a low enough percentage, then most of the time you will not need to bring money to closing. And if you do, it may be $1,000 to $3,000. And if you don’t even have that much money, you should be looking at wholesaling in the first place and not rehabbing, which is a separate topic. You can find deals to wholesale in the Motivated Sellers section of myHouseDeals.com, assuming you’re a member.

After you close on the property. The seller should give you the keys to the property either the day of closing or the day after or often times the seller will tell you, “I left the keys under the doormat,” which is fine.

Well, that covers the basic steps for buying a property to rehab! Now you’re ready to buy your first or next property from myHouseDeals.com. Get a 30-day free trial to access the properties by goinig to www.myhousedeals.com/freetrial now.

Happy (and profitable) investing!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

Rocky, Rocky, Rocky!

Hello again folks. We’ll have to pick up on the buy/fix/sell steps next week because I just can’t help but share pictures of my new addition with you. Everyone please say hello to Rocky! (You can see his pictures below.) Rocky is a tiny french bulldog that I bought a couple of weeks ago from a breeder in Utah. His name is Rocky because of his black eye and his “get what he wants” attitude.

Rocky has many hobbies, but he mostly enjoys peeing in the hallway, pooping in the kitchen, and chewing on my shoes. His other favorite activities include eating poisonous plants and black mushrooms when I’m not looking. Lovely.

Rocky also enjoys putting his flat nose into ant beds to see how many of them can crawl onto his face before I rescue him. Putting frogs into his mouth is also entertaining. He also has fun playing with, no scratch that, CHASING other dogs, especially the ones that are about 10 times his size. (He’s a very confident dog.)

Some of his recent accomplishments include learning how to sit. It only took 15 minutes of training. I’m such a proud daddy! He most looks forward to doggie school, which starts on Tuesday. Once he understands the basics from doggie school, he plans to become a member of myHouseDeals.com. He’ll start with wholesaling and work his way up to rehabbing.

So what does this mean for you? You better get your 30-day free trial to myhousedeals.com before Rocky starts gobbling up all of the deals! Go to www.myhousedeals.com/freetrial to start today.

Happy (and profitable) investing!

Doug and Rocky

P.S. Click on any of the images below to view larger versions of these pictures…

How to Analyze and Buy a Property to Rehab, Part I

The other day, a new investor asked me, “What are the steps to buying a property to rehab?” I immediately let her know that there’s no simple answer to this. This is a huge subject that entire boot camps have been devoted to. But I decided to give a stab at answering her question. So today I’m going to give you a skeleton outline of how this whole thing works. I didn’t have time to type it out, so I spoke my answer into a voice recorder and had it transcribed. So if this seems sloppy, just understand that that’s just how I talk! 🙂 From the transcription…

If you plan to buy a fixer upper, one option you have is spending a lot of money on marketing trying to get sellers to call you, whether you’re advertising on the Internet or you’re sending postcards to, let’s say, out of state owners.  Or the simple way that works well for most investors is logging onto myhousedeals.com and pursuing the wholesale deals and motivated seller leads in the member’s area. You can call on these properties to buy them. You can get a free trial at www.myhousedeals.com/freetrial.

If you plan to fix and resell these properties there’s one set of steps, and if you plan to wholesale these properties there’s a different set of steps. Today, I’ll just cover rehabbing. When you see a property you like on the website, you’ll want to pull comps either on your own or through a Realtor to determine what the after repair value really is. Don’t just go by whatever the seller says it is.

Now, on to repairs. If you’re looking at a deal on myhousedeals.com, pay attention to the the pictures. If the house is falling down and they say it needs $3,000 in repairs, then you can save a lot of time by marking that property off your list and moving on to the next. Pictures often say a thousand words.

You also want to look at their repair comments to see what they’ve indicated the repairs really are. If you’re still interested in the property, you’ll want to call that investor. Let’s assume it’s a wholesale deal. Schedule to meet them at the property so you can look at it. Or sometimes they’ll give you a lock box code for you to go at your own convenience and look at a property.

Now when you’re at the property, you’re trying to assess the actual cost of repairs. And you’re also looking at the neighborhood. But you’ll spend most of your time on the cost of repairs. And if you’re inexperienced at estimating repairs, have a contractor meet you there to help you do that.

After you estimate these repairs, go back to your office or home and calculate an offer price. Your offer price should be based on a formula. The formula goes like this. Take 70% times the after repair value based on your comps minus the cost of repairs. So let’s say, you think the after repaired value is $100,000. Take 70% of that. So you’re down to $70,000. And if you think the cost of repairs is $10,000, subtract $10,000 from the $70,000. So you’re down to $60,000 as your maximum offer price.

If you’re planning to hold this property as a rental, then it’s much more acceptable for you to make an offer more in the range of 80% of the after repair value minus the cost of repairs. So long as it still cash flows.

You want to make this offer to the seller either verbally or in writing. It’s up to you. I’ve always made offers in writing. Make a lot of offers and get a percentage of those accepted. It’s really a numbers game. Even if they reject your offer up front, a lot of times they’ll even come back to you later and accept your offer.

Once you’ve come to an agreement with the seller, either you or the wholesaler will complete a full sales agreement. You can often get these from your state. They will vary from state to state, although there are some generic sales agreements that are available. And a lot of those are available in books and tapes that you see that different gurus sell.

Once you find a sales agreement, here are 2 or 3 things to make sure to put in there. Number one is to give yourself a 10-day option period so that you can further inspect the property during that time to make sure that you really want to buy this thing. And during that period, not only will you further inspect it, but your inspector will. If you’re new especially, pay an inspector a couple of hundred dollars to go look at it for you because he can save you thousands if he or she finds a problem that you overlooked.

With motivated sellers you can put down as little as $10 earnest money. Often wholesalers will want more because they’re a little more savvy and they want to make sure you close on the deal. But it’s very common for motivated sellers to accept $10. And in the special provisions, put that your purchase is subject to inspection so that if you have to back out of this deal, you can indicate that it’s because you found additional items in the inspection that you didn’t initially see.

And as a buyer, put your name or your company and/or assigns.  That way, you can assign your contract to another buyer later if need be. And for a closing date, it’s typically best to put a date anywhere from 20 to 30 days out unless the wholesaler specifies the closing needs to take place sooner.

At this point, you actually have this contract and both parties should sign. Make sure that both you and the seller have a copy of the contract. And then fax a copy of the contract to the title company or attorney’s office, depending on which state you’re in.  Make the earnest money check out to the title company. And deliver it to the title company either the day of or the day after you execute the contract by having both parties sign.

Now the title company will open title. This takes about one week. By opening title I mean they need to check with the court house and make sure that the seller really does have the right to sell and that there are no other liens or judgments on the property that were unexpected…

———————–

Well that’s all for now. We’ll pick up on Part II of this topic next week. In the meantime, get a 30-day free trial to myHouseDeals.com at www.myhousedeals.com/freetrial, and get on your way to rehabbing your first or next property.

Happy (and profitable) investing!
Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

Pics from my trip to Montanta and Canada

I’ve been working extremely hard for the last few months, providing more deals and investor training to members of myHouseDeals.com than ever before. I decided it was time for a break. So last week, I went with some friends to the wilderness. We spent 7 days in Glacier National Park in Northern Montana and Waterton National Park in Canada. We had a great time and took plenty of pictures to prove it. I uploaded the best for you to see. Click on any of the images below to view pics.

Enjoy!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

P.S. While I was away, members of myHouseDeals.com received information on 253 wholesale deals and motivated seller leads. How many of those properties did you look at or buy? If you answer is zero, you need to get a 30-day FREE Trial to myHouseDeals.com right away. Just go to http://www.myHouseDeals.com/freetrial to start your free trial now.

The Nasty Truth about Finding Deals on the MLS

A big THANK YOU to everyone who emailed Elise over the last few days. She is recovering slowly and appreciates all of your encouragement!

Now back to real estate this week.

Other top investors and I agree that these are the most effective ways to find good deals in today’s marketplace: 1) Wholesalers, 2) Vacant Houses, 3) The Internet, 4) Referrals, 5) Out-of-State Owners, and 6) Pre-Foreclosures.

Notice that the MLS is not on the list. Here’s the hard-hitting reality…

If you’re looking to spend several hours driving around analyzing and inspecting over-priced ugly houses and making offers that never get accepted, then be my guest, and pursue properties listed on the MLS (Multiple Listing Service).

The bottom line is that when it comes to finding bargain-priced properties, myself and some of the top investors in America consider “MLS” to be a dirty word … or acronym … depending on how you look at it.

Way back in the day, this was a pretty good way to find properties. Now, it’s one of the WORST ways to find deals. It went from good to bad because in today’s market everyone and their dog has access to view the listings on the MLS. And when that many people have access to the deals, the prices get bid up too high. That’s exactly what has happened with the MLS. It’s called an efficient market. And efficient markets aren’t so great for real estate investors.

And if you plan to have Realtors comb the MLS for you, think again…

I advise that you don’t waste your time calling Realtors telling them that you buy houses and that you want a “good deal” and you want them to pursue listings on the MLS for you. If they don’t laugh in your face, they will when they hang up the phone. They get calls like this all the time. And they’re tired of getting burned by other investors who never bought a thing.

Listen, you can still get deals from the MLS. In fact, I still own a rental that I bought from the MLS. It was a bank-owned REO property. It was an OK deal. Nothing too great. But I could have bought 3 houses for the amount of time that I spent finding this one. It’s just a matter of using your time wisely. Remember, time is money!

While we’re on the subject of bashing the MLS, let’s talk about HUD foreclosures and VA foreclosures because these properties are on the MLS, too. Same problem. OVER-SHOPPED! Stay away. Save your time and energy. Let the rookies buy them up. Move on to greener pastures.

Some folks like to mail to expired MLS listings to convince these people to sell to them. But the problem is that almost all of these listings expired because the seller wanted too darn much money. Do you really want to pursue deals from folks who wanted too much money in the first place? I don’t. Tough crowd.

Do yourself a favor and stay away from the MLS when it comes to buying properties. But be sure to have a Realtor put your property on the MLS to sell it. It’s a GREAT place to sell! So yes, I do love the MLS after all, but just for selling.

Until next time, happy (and profitable) investing!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

P.S. Do you lack the time, money, or energy to find bargain priced properties on your own? Or do you simply want a wide array of investment properties to choose from? Then sign up today for a FREE Trial at www.myhousedeals.com/freetrial and get dozens of wholesale deals and motivated seller leads delivered to your computer screen each month.

A Real Tragedy at myHouseDeals.com

About 3 weeks ago, I posted a blog entry entitled “Civil War Erupts at myHouseDeals.com”. We poked fun at getting injured in a ficticious “battle”.

Unfortunately, just a few days later, someone really was injured. But not in battle of course. Elise Ramson was injured in a car wreck near our offices. For those of you who don’t know her, Elise is the Regional Coordinator for myHouseDeals.com in the NYC/Tri-State and Boston areas.

Here’s a picture of Elise…

The wreck happened while Elise was driving through a green light. She was about half way through the intersection when she was suddenly side-swiped by another car who ran their red light. Her car went off the road and would’ve plowed into a retail store had there not been a brick column there.

The perpetrator? A police officer. We found out later that he wasn’t even chasing anyone. He just wasn’t paying attention.

A few minutes after the wreck, Travis (software developer) and Alex (Chicago coordinator) arrived at the scene to find that Elise was trapped in her car. The drivers side door was caved in. They encouraged her to remain calm.

The cop called for an ambulance and the fire department. A few minutes later, the fire department arrived to cut her out of the car. And then the ambulance took her to the hospital. She remained conscious, although a little disoriented, throughout the whole ordeal.

The doctors released her from the hospital a few hours later. They said that she’d be “ok” and that she needed to rest for a while.

Here are pics of her car after the wreck. It was totaled…

 

Well, it’s been 2 weeks now, and she’s been in bed ever since the wreck. And all that resting hasn’t done much. She’s still severely injured. It hurts her to even sit upright. And even more to walk. She has a sprained back, sprained neck, a severely bruised knee, and a pinched nerve in her leg.

She is in constant pain. She’s on all sorts of pain relieving medications.  But at least she can find a pain-free position. She feels no pain while laying flat on her back. But laying flat on her back just gets old … really fast.

She’ll be seeing doctors and physical therapists over the next few days and weeks in an effort to recover more quickly.

She’ll also be working from home for a while. She’ll be laying in bed, in her pain-free position, with her phone and computer. So it’ll be business as usual for members in NYC/Tri-State and Boston. Elise will still be approving your wholesale deals and answering your member questions.

But frankly, Elise is tired and frustrated right now. She’s tired of the pain. And she’s frustrated with being restricted in her movements. She could use all of the encouragement and advice you can give at this moment.

So if you could do me a favor, I’d really appreciate it. Please email Elise with your words of encouragement and/or advice. It would really help her to get through this difficult time. Elise’s email address is elise@myhousedeals.com.

Thanks and stay safe!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

P.S. Elise’s advice: Look both ways, buckle up, and get a car with side-impact air bags. It’s tough to invest in real estate if you’re severely injured or dead!

You vote! Which is your favorite posting?

Let’s do something different this week. This is your chance to interact with this blog and vote on your favorite posting! Read through the postings on this blog and then click on the image below to vote and view the results. (NOTE: A new window will open) Enjoy! – Doug Smith, President, myHouseDeals.com.

Going to Prison is as Easy as 1-2-3!

Finally, something real estate related! Let’s get started…

One easy way to go to prison is by defrauding a lender or conspiring to defraud a lender. This is known as mortgage fraud.

There are many types of mortgage fraud. But one scheme in particular is more prevelant among real estate investors. And that scheme is described in the hypothetical scenario below.

Pay special attention to this story so that you’ll know to RUN when you see this in real life.

THE STORY

It all starts when Sammy Seller posts a wholesale deal on myHouseDeals.com with the following numbers:

ARV: $150,000
Asking Price: $100,000
Cost of Repairs: $20,000

After receiving a few calls, Sammy Seller decides to flip the house to Bobby Buyer. They agree on a sales price of $100,000. Sammy Seller is excited because that price is $10,000 more than anyone else offered.

Seems innocent so far. But then things make a turn for the worse when Bobby Buyer states that there are 3 conditions to the purchase. Sammy seller must…

 1. Write down $150,000 as the sales price on the contract.
 2. Give Bobby Buyer $50,000 “off the record” after the closing.
 3. Write down Cathy Credit as the buyer’s name. Cathy Credit is Bobby Buyer’s “associate”.

Sammy Seller agrees because the net result for him is the same and “whatever Bobby Buyer does on his end is his own business.”

Sammy Seller reasons that he will still get his $100,000 from Bobby Buyer. He just gets it in a different way … by collecting $150,000 at closing and then giving Bobby Buyer $50,000 after closing.

Bobby Buyer wants to structure the transaction this way because he can get a significant amount of “tax free” money from the lending company when he BUYS the property.

Bobby Buyer decides to get the loan through a friend named Billy Broker. Billy Broker is a mortgage broker who works with a few different lenders that you’re familiar with … Bank of America, Chase, Countrywide, etc.

But the loan won’t be in Bobby Buyer’s name. Bobby Buyer’s “associate”, Cathy Credit, will be the borrower. After all, Bobby Buyer doesn’t like to put his own credit at risk.

Bobby Buyer and Cathy Credit have a side agreement that Bobby Buyer will give her a $3,000 “thank you gift” for using her credit after closing. She’ll be a “credit partner” — also known as a “straw buyer” — in this case.

Billy Broker knows that to get this deal done and collect his processing fees, he must get a high appraisal … an appraisal for $150,000, even though the property is worth $130,000 or less in its current condition.

So Billy Broker calls up his buddy Andy Appraiser to do the appraisal. He says, “Hey Andy. Go appraise this property. I need it to come back at $150,000. Make it happen.” And Andy, says, “Sure thing!” because he doesn’t want to disappoint Billy Broker and cut himself off from future business.

The appraisal comes back at $150,000 as expected. Bobby Buyer catches wind of the appraisal … and smiles an evil smile. He sees green in his future.

Now it’s closing time…

The loan is for 90% of the purchase price on the sales agreement. Based on a purchase price of $150,000, that’s a $135,000 loan. Bobby Buyer brings the extra $15,000 of his own cash to complete the purchase. It’s funneled through Cathy Credit’s account, since she’s the buyer on the paperwork.

Bobby Buyer then gets $50,000 from Sammy Seller after closing. So, Bobby Buyer walks away from the deal with a loan balance of $135,000 (in Cathy Credit’s name) and $35,000 in cash. ($50,000 minus the $15,000 that he put down.)

Then, Bobby Buyer gives his “associate”, Cathy Credit, a $3,000 thank you gift for getting the loan in her name. And Bobby Buyer promises to Cathy Credit, “I’ll never miss a mortgage payment, so your credit is ok.” Bobby Buyer has now “profited” $32,000 ($35,000 minus $3,000.)

Bobby Buyer can use this $32,000 to do the repairs and make the mortgage payments. But he doesn’t. Instead, he keeps the $32,000 and doesn’t make any repairs or payments. A few months later, the house gets foreclosed on. This hurts Cathy Credit’s credit, not Bobby Buyer’s.

Bobby has since spent the money on a new Lexus IS. Bobby Buyer’s buddies (and his lady friends) think he’s cool, just like he wants. Little do they know he’s a loser/criminal/scum bag who steals from mortgage companies and ruins the credit of unsuspecting victims like Cathy Credit.

By this time, Cathy Credit has done several “deals” with Bobby Buyer. So her credit starts getting pounded with negative items from several loans. Bobby Buyer doesn’t return her calls. In a desperate attempt to get revenge on Bobby Buyer, Cathy Credit casts a voodoo spell on him. But that’s beside the point.

In the meantime, all of these defaulted mortgages under Cathy Credit’s name throw up red flags at the mortgage company. And more red flags go up when the mortgage company sends a Realtor or Appraiser by her (Bobby’s) properties to assess their values. And the values come back much lower than the appraisals from a few months ago.

The mortgage company decides that there was conspiracy to defraud the mortgage company. They don’t have time to deal with it, so they hand the investigation over to their attorneys.

And the attorneys come after Cathy Credit. And then the Attorney General gets involved. Cathy Credit eagerly points to Bobby Buyer. And then a simple title check shows that Sammy Seller was involved as the seller. Now he’s in this mess. And before you know it, the appraiser and mortgage broker get thrown into the mix, too.

By the time all is said and done, the seller, the buyer, the credit partner, the mortgage broker, and the appraiser lose money, their reputation, and in some cases, their freedom. And it’s all because they got greedy and ignored broke law.

In layman’s terms, here’s why they were in trouble…

Bobby Buyer had full knowledge of and actually coordinated the “off the record” transactions of $3,000 to Cathy Credit and $50,000 to himself. He was the mastermind of the whole scheme.

Cathy Credit purchased the property with the sole intention of getting $3,000, handing over control of the property to Bobby Buyer, and never making payments. She also had knowledge of and actually received one of the “off the record” payments.

Sammy Seller gave money to Bobby Buyer outside of closing. This was money that was not on the paperwork at the title company. So he knowingly hid information from the mortgage company and thus helped to defraud them.

Billy Broker had knowledge of Bobby Buyer’s actions and conspired with the appraiser to get an inflated appraisal.

Andy Appraiser knowingly appraised a property too high, which led the lender to believe they were making a secure loan when, in fact, they were not. Conspiracy to defraud the lender!

I won’t go into the details of the punishments for these crimes. All you really need to know is to stay clean and operate within the law. And don’t shuffle money pertaining to the sale between parties “outside of closing”.

To learn how to do deals the LEGITIMATE way, sign up for a free trial at www.myhousedeals.com/freetrial, and I’ll take you through a series of free members only teleseminars that show you how to make money in real estate, LEGALLY.

Until next time,

Happy (and profitable) investing!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

P.S. Go to www.myHouseDeals.com/freetrial now .

Civil War Erupts at myHouseDeals.com

“Is it maroon or is it brown?” That was the divisive question that was unexpectedly thrust upon the staff at myHouseDeals.com on Tuesday morning.

This simple question brought a halt to all business. For about 60 minutes, wholesale deals went unapproved, member questions went unanswered, and updates to the website … don’t even think about it.

It all started when Alex Soares, the regional coordinator for Chicago, walked through the front door at approximately 8:55 AM…

“Good morning Alex. Nice brown shirt,” exclaimed Lauren, the Houston/DFW coordinator, as she greeted Alex.

Alex thanked her and resumed walking to his office. “I absolutely LOVE that maroon shirt,” said Elise, the NYC/Boston coordinator. “Where’d you get it?”

Again, Alex responded, although a little puzzled by her color choice, and proceeded to his office.

Lauren overheard Elise’s comments about the shirt and commented, “Hey Elise, nice try, but it’s brown. Duh!” (Lauren was NOT in a good mood because she hadn’t had her coffee yet.)

Elise responded, “I may not be a fashion designer, but I know my colors, and maroon is maroon is maroon. And that shirt is maroon if I’ve ever seen maroon!”

One thing led to another and before you know it, the entire office was in on the debate. And they quickly chose sides. It was as if everyone had an unwavering opinion on this important matter, including me. Any idiot would know that this is a BROWN shirt!

The battle lines were drawn. Elise and Travis (programmer) were certain it was maroon. Lauren and I insisted it was brown. Alex was caught in the middle. During all the commotion, all he could think was “And to think, I could have prevented this. I almost wore pink today, but I chickened out.”

Alex was about to reveal his opinion of his own shirt. But then he saw a fang poking out of Travis’s mouth and quickly sealed his lips. He backed down even further when he saw the hair stand up on the back of my neck.

No need to worry. Travis and I ARE werewolves, but we only kill once or twice a month. And this was our off day. Here’s a pic of me in full form. (I know, very intimidating.) …

Back to the story.

What started as a friendly conversation had quickly developed into a verbal dispute. And the verbal dispute … into finger pointing … and then, into an all-out civil war. Let’s just say, we took this matter outside. Elise looks like she’s done this before…

Watch your skull Travis! Lauren looks sweet but she’s a scrapper. I’m dead meat…

The fighting continued, but a light drizzle led us back inside. (We’re aggressive, yet sensitive.) It was a short fight but a fight with many battle scars, both physical and psychological. The wounds are almost too gruesome to mention here, but I’ll do my best to illustrate …

Lauren stumped a toe. (It hurts just looking at it)…

Travis fell backwards in his chair. Some think he was pushed. (I can’t take it anymore!)…

Lauren stapled Elise’s hand. (Please, make it stop!)…

Alex got a paper cut. (I can’t look!)…

And I spilled coffee on shirt. (Heeeeellllppppp!)…

So if your wholesale deal wasn’t approved on Tuesday morning or your calls went unanswered, I hope you understand that we had “stepped away from our desk”. And that we did “return momentarily”.

We apologize for the inconvenience and promise that it won’t happen again because we finally reached a compromise. A peace treaty of sorts. The staff of myHouseDeals.com hereby agrees that the shirt is …

Brown-roon!

Although difficult to reach, this compromise was necessary. And business is now back to normal. We are back to providing you with more deals and investing tips than you can handle. And we are now much wiser because of this dispute. We finally realized that …

A myHouseDeals.com divided against itself cannot stand.

Until next time, happy (and profitable) investing!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

P.S. We want to know. Is it brown or maroon? Make a comment on this post and let us know what YOU think! (Brown! Brown!)

P.P.S. Now that I have your attention, don’t commit real estate fraud! You want to be rich and free. Not rich and in jail. I’ll talk more about avoiding the slammer next week. Yes, finally something real estate related!

“It’s Not Right!” cried Paris Hilton to myHouseDeals.com

This just in.

In an attempt to turn her life around and start a career, Paris Hilton used her jail time wisely to successfuly put a house under contract on Tuesday, June 12. (Apparently, the jail has a phone and fax machine.)

According to her publicist, Paris initally considered rehabbing and re-selling the property for maximum profits, but after discovering myHouseDeals.com, she chose to wholsale it for quick cash. “Wholesaling is like so hot right now,” explained Paris.

Here is a picture of the house…

Paris has chosen a unique real estate investing strategy. She will focus only on pink houses. But according to Paris, she’s somewhat flexible, “I’m like so open to buying houses that aren’t pink but are like still hot. But yucky houses are like so out even if they are pink.”

Her real estate investing career seemed to have gotten off to an excellent start. One call, one fax, and one house under contract. But things soon went awry. 

These are the facts as we understand them: Yesterday, June 13, at approximately 3:00 PM Central Time, Paris posted the property above on myHouseDeals.com as a Wholesale Deal. Five minutes later, Lauren Fowler, a regional coordinator for myHouseDeals.com, rejected the deal. The reason? It only had $10,000 in equity and $15,000 is the minimum.

Before Lauren could fully explain the reason for the rejected deal to Paris, Paris reacted in a highly professional manner, as expected …

When Paris caught her breath she cried,

“Lauren, it’s not right!”

She continued, “This is like, so whatever. That deal is hot and Lauren knows it. MyHouseDeals.com is like freakin lucky to have this deal, ya know.”

Earlier today, Paris commented on the situation, “I like so want to thank my fans right now for their support of me and my wholesale deal. I’m like learning and growing so much from this real estate thingey. Even though this is like total crap. It’s like, that house just needs carpet and paint and like some cute decorations or whatever”.

In a written statement, Lauren commented, “Her deal is being treated the same as everyone else’s deal. She is receiving no preferential treatment. And yes, that is a hot house. But not a hot deal. $15K is $15k. Those are the rules. And our members demand good deals.”

One upset investor commented, “We don’t care about no Paris Hilton.” Yet the investor continued to follow this story as it developed. It was if he was watching a train wreck and couldn’t look away.

Back to Paris…

Although Paris was outraged, she was also disappointed and depressed about her rejected deal. According to her attorney, Paris Hilton is “doing as well as she can. She is taking a break from investing for now. She’s focusing on clearing her mind by cleaining the facilities.”

Paris cleaning the prison grounds…

Although Paris’s first deal has turned sour, rumors are circulating that this isn’t Paris’s last real estate endeavor. Word has it that she is trying to get a “condo” under contract. Not many details are available right now. All we know is that it’s unit #26 in an unknown building…

Best of luck in your investing Paris. Sorry we couldn’t post your wholesale deal. And go get ’em on that “condo” deal!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

P.S. If you haven’t signed up for the 30-day FREE Trial to myHouseDeals.com yet, sign up now at www.myHouseDeals.com/freetrial.

Me Giving the Best Man’s Speech at Brother’s Wedding

My twin brother, Trent, got married a couple of months ago. I was the best man, so I gave a speech. The video of my speech is below. I got a little choked up at the beginning as I paid respects to three of my grandparents who have passed away. But I recovered and proceeded to poke fun at my brother for the next few minutes. Enjoy!

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

The Money Tree

As you may recall, my friend Robert was outraged last week when I took his Cadillac out for an “unauthorized” spin. And when he found the $20 bill that Wendel left in the car, he shouted, “Doug, Tell Wendel that if he wants his $20 bill, he’ll have to pry it out of my right fist!”

But that wasn’t the end of the story… 

The next day, Robert woke up in a better mood and was no longer “fightin mad”. He just wanted the $20 bill and anything to do with my little “test drive” out of his life. So he grabbed the $20 bill and threw it out his back door and onto his lawn. As he hurled the wadded-up $20 bill, he exclaimed, “I don’t want any reminders of that day. I’m over it!” Here’s a pic of Robert hurling the $20 bill…

I watched as he threw the bill, but I didn’t try to retrieve it because I didn’t want to bring up hard feelings again. I just let it rest in the back yard, figuring the wind would probably blow it away.

A couple of days passed, and life had resumed back to semi-normal. I was still living at Robert’s house because my house wouldn’t be ready for move-in until 4 or 5 days.  And I was still enjoying the ammenities that Robert’s income affords. One of those ammenities happens to be his swimming pool.

I enjoy swimming in his pool a couple of times a week. And usually, it’s pretty uneventful. But just the other day, during one of my swims, I noticed something peculiar. It appeared that there was a little bit of money sticking out of the ground. I thought that it must be the $20 bill. But I went to check it out anyways.

And I quickly realized that it wasn’t just a $20 bill. The $20 bill had turned into a real life MONEY TREE! I was amazed at what had become of it. Here’s a picture of the money tree that grew…

My first instinct was to take the money and spend or invest it. But then I thought, “Hey Doug, this is Wendel’s money. I should return it to him.” So I went to another one of Wendel’s rehab projects with plans to leave it on the front porch. While I was at his property, I called him and said, “Hey Wendel! This is Doug. You left a $20 bill in the Caddilac. Robert threw it onto his lawn. And it turned into a money tree! I’m leaving the tree on your porch for you to pickup next time you’re in the area.”

Here’s a picture of me trying to drop off the money tree… 

Wendel replied, “That’s great! But you can keep the tree Doug. I don’t need it. I already have a much bigger money tree. You see, MyHouseDeals.com is my money tree.” I replied “Very well, I’ll keep the money tree and try to make it grow myself.” Wendel wished me good luck, and we hung up.

Surprisingly, the money tree grew an extra branch while I was at Wendel’s property. But I thought nothing of it. I was already thinking of the different ways I could get this money tree to double in size. Here’s a picture of me thinking of ways to make it grow…

But I didn’t sit there and think for long. I jumped right into action. First, I tried watering it….

But no growth.

Then, I tried singing to it. I sang a few of my favorite Johnny Cash tunes. Here’s me singing “Ring of Fire”…

But still no growth.

Then, I took the tree to an attorney to get his opinion…

But the money tree didn’t grow. Instead, it actually got very weak and almost died! And so did I!

Out of frustration, I decided to take it to the bank and deposit it.

But when they told me that I’d earn under 2% interest on the money, I bolted outside and hollared, “I’m a real estate investor by golly. Members of myHouseDeals.com and I can beat 2% in our sleep!” I was frustrated, to say the least…

After all of my efforts, I still couldn’t get it to grow. So I did what I rarely do. I gave up. And I put the tree in the closet in our office.

And then Alex and Elise, the regional coordinators for Boston, Chicago, and the NYC/Tri-State area, had an idea. They said, “Hey Doug. We’re going to the Real Estate and Wealth Expo in Dallas this weekend. Why don’t we take it with us? Since it’s a money tree, maybe it’ll grow if it’s surrounded by people who are making money from real estate investing!” Always the skeptic, I said, “Fat chance!” But they took it anyways. Here are a couple of pics of them in Dallas last weekend…

Notice the money tree in this one…

When they came back, Alex and Elise informed me that the money tree was a big hit. Everyone seemed to love it and it drew them to our booth.  They also said that dozens of members of myHouseDeals.com stopped by to share their success stories. And every time they did, the money tree grew.

In fact, all of the chit chat about real estate investing and huge profits made the money tree DOUBLE in size. It was enormous. Look at it now!…

Talk about a huge money tree! It’s actually gotten so large that I cannot reveal it’s exact whereabouts for security purposes. Ok, I will anyways. The money tree is safely resting on Elise’s desk.

And the tree is growing daily as we get emails and phone calls from members who are buying properties and reaping huge profits from the deals on myHouseDeals.com. Here are just a few of the members who are profiting … www.myhousedeals.com/testimonials.asp.

The staff and I have enjoyed the money tree so much that we want you to have one, too. So we’ve placed a small money tree in the Wholesale Deals section of myHouseDeals.com and another one in the Motivated Sellers section.

Now it’s your turn to buy and profit from the properties listed on those pages, and make YOUR money tree grow! To sign up for the 30-day FREE Trial, just go to www.myHouseDeals.com/freetrial now.

But remember, if you want your tree to grow, keep it close to your wholesale deals and rehab projects but far far away from savings accounts … and especially attorneys!

Until next time,

Happy (and profitable) investing!
Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

Doug’s Day Out

Like I mentioned last week, I’m moving into a new house that I bought a few months ago. I’ve done a major rehab on it, and it’s SUPPOSED to be ready for move-in here in a week or so. We’ll see!

But until it’s ready, I’m homeless, so I’m staying in my good friend, Robert Hamlin’s house. But don’t feel too sorry for me. After all, it is a $1.5 million house! I keep joking with Robert that I’m just going to rent my house after it’s done and move into his extra bedroom. I think he’s starting to get nervous. 🙂

Living with Robert for a few days has had more perks than just hanging out in a nice house. You see, Robert’s a top Realtor here in Houston. #1 in gross sales at his company for the last 2 years running and #8 in the entire Houston metro area for 2 years running. And his success has afforded him another luxury that I’ve recently taken a liking to. It’s a nice ’59 Cadillac in mint condition.

Unfortunately for me, Robert’s really picky about who he lets drive it, so I’ve never even asked him if I could take it for a spin. Frankly, I don’t think he’d let me. But on Sunday of this past weekend, an opportunity arose for a little devious behavior on my part. Robert happened to be working. I wasn’t. This is my story.

Since Robert was out working and another good friend, Tim Mai, was hanging out with his wife and son … I was bored! Here’s me sitting at Robert’s dining room table.

Then I got an idea. Maybe, just maybe, I could take the Caddy for a little innocent “test drive”. I could satisfy my desire to drive the car, and Robert would never know about it… No harm, no foul. Here’s a pic of me plotting my drive in the car.

I drove around town for a couple hours, careful not to dent or scratch it. Things were going really well, so my confidence grew. And I thought … Let’s make a day of this. So I went golfing. Fore!…

 

After shooting well over a 100 in golf (as usual), I was frustrated. Oh, and hungry and thirsty too. So my best friend Shirley (by this point, I have named the car Shirley), went to my favorite hangout, Starbucks to relax…

And I had some coffee and an apple fritter. Ahhh, what a life!…

Then I said to myself, “Hey Doug. Why don’t you call a couple of members from myHouseDeals.com to see what they’re up to?” So I did. One of those guys was Wendel Jones. Turns out, he was checking on a house that he just fixed and sold. So Wendel and I agreed to meet up at the house. When I arrived, Wendel was proudly counting his money …

Yes, those are all $20’s … totaling $2,000. But Wendel told me that he made much more than $2,000 on the house. He actually made $31,800 in profits. So Wendel and I posed for a nice picture to show off his profits…

And then Wendel said, “This house looked awful before I rehabbed it. Do you want to see a before picture?” I said, “Sure! Why not?” So he showed me…

 

Wow! Talk about a MAJOR rehab! And talk about finding huge profits from a property that most people would walk away from in disgust. This just goes to show you that no matter how ugly a property looks, there’s a good chance that you can make huge profits from it when you buy it at the right price. Choose to be the guy or gal who makes enormous profits from an ugly house, not the one who tells all of his friends how “there aren’t any good deals out there”. 

After I caught my breath, Wendel proceeded to tell me. “Hey Doug, do you realize that I’ve bought many more properties from your website than just this one?” “Great!”, I exclaimed. “Tell me more.” And Wendel informed me that he’s bought 34 properties (both single family and commercial) from myHouseDeals.com over the last 2 or 3 years. And the profits from these properties add up to $607,500. So I said, “Heck! We’ve gotta get a pic of that!” So we did…

And no, Wendel’s not grabbing up all of the deals. In most markets, we deliver 30 wholesale deals and 15 motivated seller leads to you each WEEK.  That’s 2,340 deals per year. So Wendel has bought just .49% of the available properties in the Houston area over the last 3 years.

Then I said, “Congratulations again Wendel. Keep it up! But I’ve gotta get back to my friend’s house to return the car and take a nap. Wendel, I’m exausted!” So I drove home (fender bender free), and took a nap…

As I dozed off to sleep, I thought. Wow! What a day! I enjoyed the Caddy, the open road, a relaxing round of golf, goodies from Starbucks, and witnessed some huge real estate profits from a member of myHouseDeals.com. All this, and Robert would never know that I was even gone!

But unfortunately, luck wasn’t on my side.

Robert came home while I was sleeping on the sofa. And guess what! Inside the Cadillac, Robert found one of the $20 bills that Wendel was holding! It must’ve fallen into the car. Robert confronted me, “Doug where the heck did you go in my Caddy?!!!!” as he held up the $20. And I said, “I didn’t go anywhere. And how’d that get in there?” Here’s a pic of Robert confronting me…

But Robert wasn’t playing those games. He said, “I know you took it for a spin, Doug. Admit it!” And I stuttered, “Uhhhh. Ok, maybe I did. Uhhh. But Wendel Jones put me up to it!”

And it’s crazy, but Robert actually believed me and let me off the hook. (I may not be so lucky next time.) But Robert didn’t go so easy on Wendel. In fact, Robert exclaimed, “Doug, Tell Wendel that if he wants his $20 bill, he’ll have to pry it out of my right fist!” I said, “Ok, I’ll relay the message.”

Hey Wendel! My suggestion to you … go flip another house. It’s much safer — and much more lucrative –than coming to get this $20!

That’s all for now. Hopefully, next time you read this blog I won’t be living under the freeway!

Happy (and profitable) investing! 

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com

P.S. While this story is more for fun and entertainment, the part about Wendel Jones making such large sums of money from the deals on the website is 100% true. And it’s possible for anyone with a “can do” attitude and a will to succeed. It’s your turn to be the next Wendel Jones. Get your start today by signing up for a 30-day free trial at www.myhousedeals.com/freetrial. See you there!

Mourning a loss

It’s not all work work work around here…

About a month ago, I was in the mall when I noticed something that caught my attention. It was an ant farm that glows in the dark. On the box, they called it a “Space Age Habitat for Ants” that contains a “miraculous gel derived from a NASA Space experiment”.  And as any reasonable person would have done, I bought it!

Here’s what it looks like…

Cool, huh? 

Then I took it home and mailed off a card to buy some harvester ants from Canada. Apparently we’re fresh out of ants here in the U.S.  Fast forward about 3 weeks, and still no ants! I figured they lost my order. So I moved my ant farm into storage with the rest of my belongings. (I’m using storage while I move to my new house.)

And guess what! About 5 days after I moved the ant farm to storage, the ants arrived! But their ant farm was so far back in the storage container that I couln’t retrieve it without having numerous boxes and a huge sofa fall on my head. So I would have to find a way to keep them alive until I could get their “space age habitat” ready.

So I put them in a pickle jar. I poked holes in the top and put shredded wheat cereal (my favorite!) and some old ham (not so good) into the jar. I figured they could live for at least a couple of weeks in there. After all, they had all of the food they could ever need. I didn’t add dirt because I didn’t want them to get dirty and track that dirt into the “miracle gel”.

But I came into the office on Monday, and guess what! To my dismay … Half of them were dead. There were 20 total, so I only had 10 left. And I suspected that the other 10 would die soon at this rate. Since I still couldn’t get the ant farm out of storage and I didn’t really want to drive to the mall and buy another ant farm, I let the rest go free in the shrubs in front of my office! I figured they had a better chance of survival out in the wild than in my pickle jar.

Unfortunately, the 10 dead ants and the 10 living ants would never see their “space age habitat” … which I commonly refer to as “THE LAND OF MILK AND HONEY”. It’s really a shame. Their ant farm was going to be “ant heaven”. I’ll never forgive myself for ending the lives of 10 Canadian Harvester Ants and endangering the lives of 10 others. And really, I have no right to even ask for forgiveness.

What could’ve been for these ants…

But what I can do is pay my respects to them for the joy that they brought to my life and the lives of the staff here at myHouseDeals.com for the few days that they were actually alive. So today, we had a ceremony and burial for the dead ants. Here’s the toombstone for their mass grave…

 

The staff and I wore black to show our mourning of their deaths and the probably deaths of the others. Here is the staff trying to console me on the loss of the ants. Travis, the application developer, is on the left. Alex, the Chicago regional coordinator and the JV coordinator is 2nd from the left. Elise, the coordinator for Boston and the NYC/Tri-state area is 3rd from the left. Lauren, the coordinator for the Houston and DFW areas is on the far right. That’s me down on a knee in mourning…

I was inconsolable as they tried to remove me from the gravesite….

Just looking at that picture brings back painful memories. 

There is one ant that we’ll all miss in particular. His name is Antony Harvester. Here is his obituary…

Antony Harvester, 2 months old, of Canada, passed from this life Monday, May 14, 2007, surrounded by his fellow harvester ants, his owner Doug Smith, and the staff at myHouseDeals.com. Funeral services were held at 10:30 a.m. Wednesday, May 16, 2007, on the front lawn of the myHouseDeals.com office. Burial followed at at the same location.

Antony was well known and well respected by the other harvester ants in his colony. He is probably most known for encouraging the other ants to “eat some sugar and hang on tight” right before departing Canada on his voyage to Texas. It’s as if he knew it would be a long and bumpy ride, but a ride worth taking. His encouragement led to a 100% survival rate of the ants from shipment to arrival.

Antony was very active in his colony. Some of his accomplishments include…

• Named “Most likely to build functional yet aesthetically pleasing tunnels” by his peers in the tunneling profession.
• Semi-Finalist in the Canadian ant bench press competition. Antony bench pressed 31 times his body weight with perfect form. The average ant can only lift 20 times its body weight.
• Named to the list of “10 Sexiest Ants Alive” and by Ant Weekly, the species leading magazine. Pundits believe that his strikingly handsome exoskeleton led him to be included in the list.

Although Antony didn’t have a spouse or any children, he is survived by the dozens of other harvester ants that he inspired to live every day to it’s fullest. In these ants, and in the lives of the staff at myHouseDeals.com, Antony lives on.

Here’s a picture of Antony in his prime…

He will be missed. And so will the other harvester ants who recently perished in my pickle jar.

Memorial donations will be accepted in the form of you signing up for the 30-day free trial at www.myHouseDeals.com. 

Sincerely, 

Doug Smith
President
myHouseDeals.com