1st workout, 2nd deal of '09!, stressin'

First and foremost I signed up at the gym last night and my first workout was this morning at 5:30am. YUCK! I felt uncomfortable and awkward. This is going to be a haaard routine to get in to, I must say. Pre-kids I used to work out a lot and even did the Chicago 1/2 marathon. I didn't do great, in fact my time sucked, BUT I finished and that was my goal. Fast forward 5 years and zero workouts, urgh, enough said.

I got another set of condos under contract. WOO HOO, right? I'm not so sure. My ace in the hole buyers that wanted to buy the "whole complex" are now saying they are not sure they want them. Personally I think they're pissed b/c I beat them out on the counter process but that's just a theory. Anyhoo, I now have 4 properties under contract and zero buyers. I'm not concerned about the single family properties, I think they will go fast but who knows? As a last resort I could rent but I do not want to go that route. I am really stressin' about the whole situation. The biggest problem is getting the 20% downpayment I need for the bank to close my loans. I'm really at a loss... my realtor claims she has people calling the office wanting to go through the properties but she always says that. Quite frankly I don't believe her anymore. Urrrgghh, hopefully I'll think of something! The only saving grace is that we close on the 2nd set of condos 3/13, 6 weeks! Yeah, hopefully we'll get something prior to that date. I need to start busting my ass getting the word out!

I've had a couple good counters recently but not low enough to take on right now. I'm going to keep making offers but LOW so I don't drive myself insane. I can drive myself crazy thinking about this stuff. Is anyone else like that?

I have a closing this Friday that looks to be on schedule. I'm actaully going tonight to pre-sign the documents b/c I can't make it to the closing. My husband scheduled an appointment on that day and I didn't want to reschedule.

I'll get you all updates when they come in on me getting buyers for my condos. I think I'm going to advertise "2 for 1" or something...

1st contract of '09!

So we won the counter offer for the 3rd set of condos! That little trick of upping the highest offer by $1k worked. We got the contract for $147,100 and I was willing to go up to $151k - nice. The buyer that bought the first 2 sets of condos (well, the 2nd is closing next Friday) already asked my realtor if we won the bid and my selling price. I will most likely sell at the same price, even though I paid more, and ask them to pay closing costs. AND, I will ask they close the same day as me assuming of course they actually give me an offer! We'll find out next week. I don't offer any of my properties until I have the signed contract back from the bank.

Last night I went to look at the 4th set of condos that went on the market yesterday. There is already a submitted offer so we're expecting another counter. We will be pulling out the counter offer trick again so hopefully that will be my 2nd contract in '09. You know it's funny. If my buyers didn't tell my realtor they would buy all the condos from me I don't think I would be putting in these offers. They probably would have won the contract(s).

The HUD property we were supposed to close on Monday is being postponed. SHIT!!!!!!! This is a first for me. I have always closed on time so I guess I shouldn't complain too much but I have a few people that want to go through the property. Now I have to put them off AGAIN! Urghhh. And, HUD will not give my realtor a new closing date. In fact, my mortgage gal didn't even know it was postponed until I told her. What a bunch of idiots. It has something to do with not getting the water bill or something? They only had 45 DAYS to get the paperwork together. Apparently they are too busy?!

Gotta run....

Flat Broke!

Well, unfortunately for me, I looked at my financials online today and we are flat broke! ha, ha. I have to laugh b/c what else am I going to do? I am going out of town this weekend (can't wait), my husband is going on a snowmobile trip during the week and next weekend we are taking the kids to the Dells. Now, is this smart? I would say not. Quite frankly, we don't have the money. I'm just shaking my head as I write this. I thought we had the money but with my husband being laid off we're just scraping by. I do have money in our business account but just enough for our EMD should we win the condo counter offer game. Ah well, we should be closing on the other condos in 2 weeks. If we can make it 2 weeks and IF we truly close on the condos. As always, I never count on anything until everyone has signed the correct documents & I get handed a check.

The property I talked about in my last post that "I want" came back with a multi-counter. It needed to be in today. We did the same thing as the other multi-counter but I don't think I will get the house : ( I'm only going up to $65k and if I'm bidding against an o/o I'm sure they will be going much higher.

I'm half way through the month and I'm not too close to having another property under contract. Well, maybe but with my goal of 1 wholesale/month I need something to pop. For me it seems like it's all or nothing - feast or famine. You know? With that said we are putting in another 5 offers next week.

Everyone have a good weekend!!

Pre-approval/Multi-Counter

Well, believe it or not Wells actually pre-approved us for a loan. Isn't that funny? I puffed up the numbers a bit, JUST a bit, to see if that would help. Apparently it did. My local bank would not set up a line of credit for us but she did write up a pre-approval for "cash or financing". So, it's kind of a cash offer. I'm not sure what she would do if they called for for proof? I guess I don't really have to worry about that since I'm also approved through Wells.

Anyway, we submitted the offer with no contingencies and 3 other people put offers in too. I know my buyer put in an offer but do not know who the other 2 people are? Anyway, my realtor has a new "trick" (at least it's new to us). Instead of putting in a number for a counter we are putting in, "Buyer willing to exceed any other counter offer by $1,000 not to exceed $151,000". Pretty cool, huh? She saw it on HGTV and called her legal hotline to see if it was truly acceptable. Sure is. The attorney knew exactly what she was talking about. We'll find out next week who won!

Still have not heard from the realtor on the property we put a best and final price on. It must be so low they will not even bother to counter?

We got another counter but we're still pretty far apart, about $20k. I'm waiting for them to drop their price dramatically. It's a nice house, I want it! : )

Just picked up my prize last night! Boy, is this gym nice! I'm really excited and am planning on training for a sprint triathlon. It's a goal. I like goals.

Condo buyers, Radio contests, Chicago, etc...

Let's see, where to start?! This past Friday was interesting... no, no offers accepted but another set of condos went on the market. Of course I submitted an offer right away but it seems WF wants a pre-approval letter w/ offer. This is not good. For some reason big banks do not want to pre-approve someone with a high DTI and a husband with poor credit. Hmmm, I wonder why? So over the weekend I was racking my brain on how to get past this problem. This morning I called my gal at the local bank to see if she had any "pointers" on how to get me approved. With the numbers she has she said there shouldn't be a reason they wouldn't approve me but she didn't know Wells guidelines. Then she thought out loud, "can you submit a cash offer?". I told her I could but they needed proof of funds, we already tried submitting w/o pof. She went on to tell me the gal on the commercial side of things may be able to set up a line of credit in order to submit a cash offer. Would that be wonderful?!?! Sooo much easier! I don't know if it can be done but I'm waiting for the day we can use a line of credit! When I hung up I called the gal on the commercial side but got her VM. Crap. She still hasn't called me back. In the meantime I called Wells to attempt to get pre-approved but had to leave him a msg too.

Why am I trying so hard to get these condos? For 2 reasons. First, the buyer who bought my other two sets of condos wants to buy the whole complex. I'm not sure what they plan on doing with them and I don't care. Second, this same buyer is ALSO putting an offer in on these condos. YES, he actually did his homework and found out who had the listing prior to it going on the mls. I'm quite impressed b/c I couldn't even find that information and I tried (not very hard but I did look into it). Apparently he has been calling this realtor for days, several times a day, trying to get into the property. He has annoyed the realtor which may or may not work in my favor? This is also why it would be great to have a cash offer b/c I could submit my offer with no contingencies. Niiice.

Now, before all this hoopla with the condos I won a radio contest! Ha, ha. I've been calling all week to win it and I DID! I rarely call in on these contests b/c I don't win anything but really wanted this. The prize was a 6 month membership to a local gym with 1 month w/ a personal trainer. I soooo need this, it is one of my personal goals. After having 3 kids I'm a little "soft". So you may see some blogging on working out/eating habits to keep myself accountable - Just ignore... ha, ha.

Again, no other offers accepted but did get a best and final. No response. Another bank faxed over a rejection saying they wouldn't even counter my low offer : ) I thought that was very nice of them - ha, ha.

This weekend I'm off to Chicago again but this time will be different. I'm meeting my girlfriends from college. No husbands or kids, just drinks and laughs and some "me time" (another one of my personal goals).

Okay, off to lunch. Hope everyone has a good week!!

Irritated!

So I posted a while back that I got 2 HUD properties under contract. Both are in good areas but one in particular I know will go quickly. I sent an email to my buyers list and had an interested party immediately (the condo buyer). I also put an ad on craigslist and found another very interested buyer. Both want to go through the property immediately and my realtor was on board to show it... until today. Apparenlty her broker had a fit when she was talking to him about how we would work the commission on this property. He didn't have the fit because of the commission but because she would be showing this HUD property prior to me closing. If you have been reading this blog for any length of time you may remember when someone turned me in to HUD for showing our Jefferson Str property prior to closing. HUD threatened to cancel my contract and keep my EMD, etc... Now her broker is paranoid that everyone is going to turn us in to HUD. Urrrghh. I read in one of Nate's posts that he keeps a door open so he can come and go as he pleases. I might try this next time around. I'm not sure I'm real comfortable with leaving a property unlocked but I'm not sure how else to handle this problem?!?! I'm pretty confident that I would have a written contract on this property had we shown it and been able to do a simo or double close on the 29th of January.

I'm bummed... This doesn't mean we won't get a contract on or about the 29th of January and close a bit later but it sooo much more a pain in the ass!! These HUDs are great little properties to buy (in fact we put in 2 more offers today) but they are hard to double close. Anyhoo, I'm putting in 3 more offers early next week. Hopefully I'll get another accepted offer here soon.

I spent some time last night reflecting on my personal/business goals for 2009. I thought I was done until I read Shae's post today. I am going to go through those questions to see if anything changes for me.

Talk to you all next week!