Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Real Estate Education Tip: Who do you listen too?

One of the most important questions you have to answer for yourself as you build your real estate investing business is who are you going to listen to and learn from?

This is especially true now with so many real estate investing gurus/coaches vying for your attention and screaming “me, me, me!”

I have found that there are 3 types of “teachers & trainers” in real estate investing, and only one type is always worth following:

Type 1 - Someone who has read a book or gone to a seminar on a topic, has never successfully done it, and is now going to teach you how to do it. I recommend my RLH response here: Run Like Hell!

Type 2 - Teacher has successfully done what you want to learn, is going to teach you, but is no longer doing it. Approach with caution: while you might be able to learn some good tips and strategies, you will be learning what got them where they are, not what they are doing right now to be successful. You won’t learn leading edge new stuff.

Type 3 - Teacher has successfully done what you want to learn, is going to teach you, and continues to do what is being taught. With this kind of teacher you get it all: what got them to where they are, what they are doing now to continue to grow, and what are the new next steps and strategies to keep you moving forward.

This is the kind of teacher with whom I will spend my time and money. By the way type number 3 has been my One-on-One Mentoring philosophy for over 20 years!

My recommendation: Learn from and follow only those who have done it, are teaching it, and continue to do it in their own businesses every day.

If you agree with my philosophy why not check out my mentoring program at :

http://www.JGage.com

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Creative Real Estate Investing: New Short Sale Formula

I received an e-mail today from a fellow investor asking me if I had made any changes to my short sale formula I use to submit offers to banks and mortgage companies; as a matter of fact I had and now I am sharing it with you my faithful newsletter subscribes.
I hope this helps you do many successful short sales.

Be well,

James Gage

PS: Don’t forget tomorrow at midnight ends my 50% off offer on my “Probate Investing Made Easy Package” normally priced at $37.00, but yours for $18.50 when you enter promo code 555 on the check out page :

http://jgage.com/probate-investing-made-easy.htm


The “New” Making a Short Sale Counteroffer

“Crunching Numbers “

The following is excerpted from proprietary material created by James A. Gage of Gage Consulting Group, LLC, www.JGage.com
Copyright © 2009, not to be reprinted or reproduced without the consent of GCG.

Although some of your initial offers will be accepted, you must also be prepared if the lender rejects your offer. Just because your first offer is denied does not mean that the deal is dead. This is now the perfect opportunity to learn precisely what you have to do in order to close the short sale.

The first thing you will want to do before making another offer is find out from the lender exactly why the first offer was rejected. Here are several key factors that may result in your offer being rejected.

1. They will not net the required amount needed to justify accepting your short sale offer. Simply speaking, your offer was too low!
2. The lender is adamant that they can do better waiting for a better offer or foreclosing on the property.
3. They do not agree with the terms of your contract or net sheet.
4. The loan is government insured and therefore they are protected against a foreclosure.
5. The investors of the loan are asking for more money to close out the loan.
6. You tick the loss mitigations rep off so bad that the last thing they want to do is help you.
7. The hardship was not proven enough to persuade the lender to accept a short sale.
8. The lender would like to explore alternative payment options with the homeowner instead of doing a short sale.
9. Your offer was much lower than what the BPO assessed the house for. This is another example of your offer being too low.
These are just some of the reasons you may get from the lender for your short sale being rejected but the main thing to remember is that you must at least probe and find the exact reason why.

I can confidently say that the main reason your short sale offer will be rejected will be because the offer is too low. Remember, the lender’s number one priority when doing a short sale is how much money they will net.
The best way to find out how much the lender needs to net is to just ask! Once you identify the right loss mitigations rep you can simply ask:

"How much do you need to net if we agreed to a reasonable short sale offer?"
Will the lender tell you how much? That is to be determined after you ask the question. The point is that you will never find out unless you throw it out there.
Even if you don’t find out initially, the next best time to ask is prior to the counteroffer.

You want to start and maintain a constructive dialogue with the loss mitigations rep where you are constantly probing for information that will determine what your best offer will be.
When I do short sales, I mainly develop my initial offer based on how much equity or profit I want to make with each deal. However, from time to time when I’m preparing a counteroffer I use a formula to help me come up with the most accurate guess on what I think the lender is willing to accept. If used correctly, this formula alone will more than pay for the price of this course 1000 fold.
Here it is...

Step 1: I take the estimated or actual BPO amount or the value of the house, based on the comps then multiply that number by 65%.

Example:
$175,000 (Estimated BPO value) X 65% = $113,750
Step 2: I then take the number I got and multiply it by 92%

Example:
$113,750 X 92% = $104,650
If this were an actual deal, I would use this final number or something close to give me my counteroffer amount. Although I have reason to believe that the lenders use a similar formula when they determine the amount they are willing to accept on a short sale, I cannot say that this is exactly it.

I do know that this formula does two things.

1. It gives me a calculated number to use for my initial offer or counteroffer.
2. It allows me to breakdown to the lender how I came up with my offer.

Be resilient yet realistic when making your counteroffers. Understand that it may not stop with the first counteroffer. You may have to counteroffer a 3rd or 4th time just to get the amount down to where the lender feels comfortable to accept. At times it may only be hundreds of dollars that you are negotiating.

If you are game for a strategic a methodical approach to negotiating your offers you can always use my 3 step approach to getting your offer accepted.

Step 1: The first offer will be used to get the number that you and the lender are negotiating down to tens of thousands.
Step 2: The first counteroffer will be used to either close the deal or get the number that you and the lender are negotiating within thousands.
Step 3: The second counteroffer will be used to either close the deal or get the number that you and the lender are negotiating within hundreds. Usually at this point, the lender is the most flexible and the loss is obviously not as great.
Another thing to consider when determining your counteroffer is if in fact it even makes sense to offer one. Sometimes the lender is non-negotiable and will only accept what they will accept. Period!

If this is the case does it make sense to continue trying to persuade someone who is not willing to work with you? You have to make that decision on a case by case basis.
The most important thing to remember when making your counteroffer is that the deal has to make sense for you. I’ve seen investors get their short sale accepted but fail to agree to an amount that is highly profitable.

Like I mentioned, I cannot determine the value of your time and effort. That is something that you must decide, but I can say that short sales are big money deals and if you are making offers that do not put a lot of money in your pocket you are probably leaving it on the table for someone else to enjoy.

To your success,

James A. Gage
www.JGage.com

http://jgage.com/probate-investing-made-easy.htm

Monday, February 16, 2009

Creative Real Estate Investing: Go where they aint fishin...

James Gage here with Gage Consulting Group hoping that this e-mail finds you and yours in good health.

One of my greatest mentors, who made a great impact on my life, was a gentleman by the name of Paul Gutierrez. Paul was an average Joe by today’s standards, hard working with limited education, but what he lacked in classroom hours he made up one hundred percent in wisdom.

He was the one that told me one day while we were fishing “ Jim, you gotta go where they aint fishin”...

That phrase has guided my investing strategy for over 22 years and I would now like to pass it on to you, so you too can also profit like I do from this simple phrase.

That being said...

What are you going to do to improve your real estate investing business in 2009?

I know that this is a question that many of us are asking ourselves this time of the year as spring approaches.
Many of us made New Years resolutions last month – are you keeping them?

Did you know that one of the best kept secrets to not breaking a new year's resolution?

Not making them!

WHY WAIT UNTIL NEXT JANUARY 1ST TO MAKE A COMMITMENT TO IMPROVE YOUR INVESTING IN THESE CHALLENGING TIMES?

Why not start this evening...You know February 15, 2009.

Get a jump on all the other people who are going to Wait until next year!

What I am about to reveal is a little used strategy to make money in real estate.

No...it is not Bankruptcy!

Yes...there are very few people using this strategy.

Yes...many of these properties ALREADY HAVE EQUITY!

Yes...you will learn a TON on how to expand this lucrative strategy.

Yes...you can implement this strategy as early as next week!

What is it?

PROBATE INVESTING MADE EASY

Discover The Proven Steps To Buy Property 50 -60 Cents On The Dollar even in a down market through Probates !

Nationally known real estate investor James Gage will show you :

How to buy property 50- 60 cents on the dollar
How to find properties
How to negotiate like a seasoned pro
What paper work is involved in the transaction
How to turn Probate property around in record time

with this jam packed CD Package – “Probate Investing Made Easy” .

James takes the mystery and uncertain out of this lucrative, leveraged real estate investing technique.

Before I let you go to read over exactly what this package contains, many individuals have called me and ask if I would put together a step-by- step affordable Probate package on Probate investing, well your wish is my command. I have put together a step by step compressive package on that very subject please visit the following link for more information:

http://jgage.com/probate-investing-made-easy.htm

but it doesn't stop there!

Normally priced at less then a few trips to Starbucks at $37.00, it is a great value if I do say so myself.
But for the next 3 days (February 15 - February 18 ) I am extending to you, my newsletter subscribers the astonishing price of only $18.50! That's a whooping 50% off my normal website store!

Enter promo Code 555 on you order/check out page to receive your discount.

So please visit the link provided for more information on this jam packed Probate Made Easy Package :

http://jgage.com/probate-investing-made-easy.htm

Don't forget promo Code 555

To your success,

James A. Gage
www.jgage.com


With this jam packed informational package you will never have to worry about how to invest with Probate properties again.

What you will learn with this powerful Probate package :

On CD 1 James, will teach you the ABCs of successfully Probate investing:

* How to buy property 50- 60 cents on the dollar
* How to find properties
* How to negotiate like a seasoned pro
* What paper work is involved in the transaction
* How to turn Probate property around in record time

On CD 2 you will receive James’s Power Point presentation that he uses to teach people One-On-One how to invest with Probates, This presentation will be a timeless resource for you to refer back to.

And as a bonus, you will receive the very letter that James uses to this day for contacting the individual(s) in the Probate process!

And of course like all of James's products you will receive much more.

http://jgage.com/probate-investing-made-easy.htm

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Creative Real Estate Investing: Fannie Mae raises loan limits for investors

Hello All:

Here is some breaking investing news...

Fannie Mae has announced on their website that the 4 loan limit has been removed, and, under certain circumstances, will allow an investor to have up to 10 loans.
This is great news for investors who are picking up foreclosures and keeping them for rental or selling on lease options.

Check out FNMA's website :

https://www.efanniemae.com/sf/guides/ssg/annltrs/pdf/2009/0902.pdf

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Creative Real Estate Investing: Stop Drinking The Kool Aid !

Hello All:

Did you read the headlines today? Chrysler sales plunge 55 pct; GM, Toyota also down !

Is it just mean or did we, the tax payers, just bail out the big 3? Why yes we did...
Answer me this, why on earth would anyone keep investing money into a losing business model; can anyone tell me the answer to this seemingly million dollar question?

But that is exactly what real estate investors have been doing in these challenging investing times. Let me explain...

For far too long during this cycle I have witnessed countless investors drinking the "Kool Aid" of these so called Gurus trying to convince individuals to hand over the hard earned cash to learn about a strategy that can not possible work in this economic cycle. I understand that people like to surround themselves with winners, but most are just glorified salesman and have no interest in your success - just your wallet.

Some may say that James Gage is jealous of those hundreds of thousands of dollars made in cramped hotel rooms for 2-3 days of work. Nothing could be farther from the truth! I have purposely structured my business model in such a way that I can work One-On-One with people while I continue to do my own deals. Not only doing I think that the individual mentorship approach is the only way for maximum success, but I believe that only one who chooses to teach another, anything, you must be actively involved in it while you are teaching that individual.

So that being said, join with me today and vow to stop drinking the Kool Aid in every aspect of your life.