Lots going on, and at one blog post per day, I’ll probably start getting behind…so here’s a general update on everything…
House #1: The Corn House
The Corn House is still under contract, and scheduled to close on March 4. The buyer is being somewhat of a flake…between fake phone calls to my listing agent (my wife) to ask questions as if she’s not the buyer under contract to visiting the house every single day (and dragging her agents with them), who knows if this deal is really going to close or not. I stopped getting my hopes up about this property selling quickly a long time ago, so I won’t be overly disappointed if the contract falls through, but I will be very, very annoyed about the fact that we’ve taken the property off the market for several weeks for this buyer.
On the bright side, her due diligence period ends on Wednesday evening. But on the less bright side, she still has another week and a half to secure her financing. So, we probably won’t know for sure what’s happening with this one for another week or two.
House #3: The Second Chance House
The Second Chance House is still under contract and scheduled to close next week (Monday). We’re still waiting for the appraisal to come back and for the buyer’s financing to go through final approval, and they have until the day before closing before their due diligence period ends. This means that up until just a few hours before closing, they will have the option to back out of the deal for any (or no) reason at all.
This one has gone smoothly so far, and I’m hopeful that we don’t have any late-breaking surprises. Especially considering that we’re going to have to start moving furniture out of the house even prior to due diligence ending (unless we wanted to literally do it right before closing). Personally, I think the buyers should be able to do a walk-through with no furniture, so I’m happy to remove it a couple days in advance, but if the deal falls through, we’ll be moving it all back in.
House #5: The DIY House
Rehab on The DIY House is going great. As I mentioned last week, the first week of progress was fantastic. Since then, we have completed both interior and exterior painting, landscaping (removed about a dozen dead trees and filled in the pond in front of the house), installed the kitchen cabinets, installed all the electrical (lighting, new receptacles, new switches, etc), and installed the new A/C unit.
Here are some pictures of some of the work that’s been done…
The transformation is fantastic, and once the bathroom countertops and tubs are refinished (tomorrow), the plumbing fixtures and appliances go in (end of the week) and all the flooring goes in (Monday), we’ll practically be done. The goal is to have the property ready to go on the market by the end of next week (Feb 28), which will put us ahead of the original schedule by several weeks.
In terms of budget, we started this one about $7,500 over budget. Barring anything unexpected, we’ve been able to recoup most of that, and are now very close to the $35K budget goal.
House #6: The Red Garage House
We started work over at The Red Garage House today. The new A/C unit has been installed, and demo is underway. By the end of the week, we hope to have the plumbing issues resolved, all the interior carpentry completed, and the exterior repairs and painting underway. It may be tight, but I’d love to get this one done in the next two and a half weeks, and either get it back on the market or get it rented, whichever we decide.
The house across the street (also an REO) was just closed on a couple days ago, and they’ve already completed exterior painting. While the owner doesn’t know it, I’ve decided that I am now on a mission to complete my rehab (and get the For Sale or For Rent sign in the yard) before he does. Kinda like when you walk up to two side-by-side ATM machines, and feel the need to beat out the guy next to you in completing your transaction (or is that just me? :-).
House #7: The Roach Duplex
We closed on The Roach Duplex yesterday. We’ve had a lot of traffic through there the past couple weeks, but no serious buyers. Part of the problem is likely the fact that I’m looking for someone with cash, and there is a shortage of those investors these days.
I’m highly considering owner financing this one (with a reasonable down-payment) and then just collecting checks for the next year or three.
For the time being, we’re going to throw a For Sale sign out front, and list it on the MLS and see what happens…
Why would you ever take a property off the market prior to it going under contract?
Ez –
Three things:
1) The property is under contract…but the buyers are currently in their “due diligence” period, meaning they can back out for any/no reason.
2) Once a property goes under contract, either agent has the ability to change the status on the MLS to “Under Contract.” So, even if we don’t do it (and we never do), the buyer’s agent generally does.
3) While we have the ability to change it back, if we are caught having a property under contract listed as “Active,” we’ll get fined by the MLS.
So, it’s really not our choice.
Hehe- I do the thing at the ATM, too.
Also if I’m on a treadmill, I refuse to get off before the person next to me. Makes for some long workouts sometimes. 🙂