Gratitude

This is not a real estate related entry.  I haven't been keeping up to date with my site at all.  So much has happened since 2010 when I made my last entry....I'll save that story for another day.

     I am off and on sad watching my dad slowly wind down.  I'm also happy....laughing at his wit and humor, at him waking up with a joke to share, a kind word for his nurses, always thinking of how to bring a smile to the room. 

  "How's your pain today, Ted, on a scale of 1-10"?

"It's just enough to be miserable" he says....

     Dad is the last of the grandparents.  We've been through this journey 3 times before...I've had the honor of being with my mom and with "Papa" in their final moments.  I've always said it's a gift when your parents allow you to stay close, to bear witness, to comb their hair, feed them, watch their struggle to see their sheer will and determination.  With dad, to see his stubbornness slowly eroding but peaking out every so often.
     It's an odd place of limbo for us.  Should we stay? Should we go? When we're there we're thinking about here and when we're here, we're thinking about there...
It's a gift to help usher them into their next phase as they ushered us into ours.
     I know it's closing in...He weaves between sleep and wakefulness, between confusion and lucidity.  One minute very present, the next moving his hands like he's at work oh so long ago, talking about "calibrations" and "getting it right"  and "must solve this problem".  
     He stopped eating over a week ago except for the lemon sherbet that he loves so much...His nurses cant' believe his resolve, his resilience.  Oh, I can!  He's bounced back from disaster so many times before that I half expect him to be sitting up and eating, watching a favorite show next time I walk in...but I know it isn't that way this time. My heart is heavy.  Yesterday he grabbed my hand and said " I think I'm dying....I hope I'm not. I don't want to die"  I wish he weren't. 
     When I told him I had to go home for a bit to do some work and then return, he says "where am I going to go?"  
I love my dad.
I'm grateful for the gift.

Ignorance is an occupational hazard.

Today was an interesting day. I feel torn between sadness, anger and relief! The short sale that I've been working on for.ever died an untimely death today. It is probably something I could have changed if I had known then, what I know now, hence the name of this blog. My ignorance cost me a lot of time and effort. Oh...and a little bit of money.

Here is my story for newbies (like me!) to learn from and the experienced to marvel at.

This process began a long time ago. Back in June. I saw an ad on Craigslist for a house in a nice neighborhood being sold for way under its assessed value. So I spoke with the owner and went to look at it. $99K in a $145K neighborhood. Decided it would be a good house to wholesale if the seller would let me have it for what he owed. First he had to evict his tenants for non-payment. That process moved us into the end of July. We signed an option agreement, I marketed it and got lots of interest in the first few weeks of August but everyone said it needed to be sold for much less due to the work it needed. Estimates for work were all over the board...from $11K-$50K. Everyone has different eyes! That brought us to the short sale as an option.

Aug 17th: I asked them to send us a Short Sale packet. We pulled all of the necessary info together. not for the feint hearted!

• Letter in lieu of listing agreement,
• HUD1,
• fully executed purchase contract initialled by all parties,
• proof of funds,
• Financial information worksheet,
• hardship letter,
• last mortgage statement,
• last 2 year's tax returns,
• last 4 paystubs,
• last 2 bankstatements and
• the contractor's bid for repairs needed.

Faxed 42 pages off to the loss mitigation department at Wells Fargo. They set up the BPO, I went with comps and other info....It's a very nice neighborhood so it was hard to justify comps as low as this house needed!

October 13: I sent another packet off with additional substantiating photos and contractor's estimates. To no avail. They couldn't care less. Wells Fargo won't let you speak directly with your negotiator. Everything is via e.mail.

Oct.17: the bank countered my (agreeably low) offer of $48.1 with $75K. Huh? Have they smelled this house? So I countered at $62K which is really about where it should be. I was thinking $70 would be the most it should cost with closing costs to make it work. She shot it down and repeated $75K. I asked: If I came in at $64.9 would that be acceptable? A: NO, We're considering your file closed. End of discussion. hmmm.

Meanwhile, I'm still showing the house to investors. I have actively interested parties...(or so I thought!) I am having a hard time getting them to commit. (another lesson learned: why do I care? move on!) Arrangements are made to show the house again, to take measurements,etc.

Nov. 16th: I show up and GUESS WHAT! The bank has drilled out the locks, winterized and locked up the house. My key is worthless! (and they didn't call me...what were they thinking?)

There's a lot of indecision going on and we're in limbo. I can't show the house to anyone and I'm thinking it's over. Then I figure after much research...Hey..they can't lock out the owner of the house...they haven't even filed Lis Pendens yet! So I call the Bank. I NEED a key. A:You can't have a key. Me:The house isnt' yours yet, the owner should have a key. They have the team that secured the house call me. After much back and forth and round and round...I meet with him and get a new key. Back in Business!.

Mid Dec.: New key in hand, I talk with more investors and feel I should try again. The seller mentions that he might need to file bankruptcy. NOTE TO SELF: this is a critical juncture.

Jan. 5th: Get all new signatures and new paychecks,bank statements, etc. and send off another offer to the bank. I'm originally going to offer $68 and then I think to myself...Are you crazy?? I should be able to sell it for $72-$75 to a rehabber if I don't want to take on the rehab myself. (I'm actually still considering this at this time.) So I offer $64.4K.

Jan. 26th: I hear from the bank. (finally!) Offer rejected. Counters at $70K, acceptance or counter in 48 hours. Hmm I haven't even shown all of the interested parties the inside of the house yet. Can't get the paperwork signed in 48 hours plus I'm trying to work it out so I can have co-buyer on the contract. Ask for extension till Monday. It's granted.

Jan 28th: Quick open house. Ask the bank if they'd consider $65.9K. Yes..if he slashes a lot of the expenses they were going to pay to close. Okay, I can live with that.

Feb.1st: Can't sleep at night anymore. It's either my age or my current profession! I am anxious to get ahold of my lawyer to clear some things up and get the revised HUD1 to send over. I ask if seller should include bankruptcy in his hardship letter. Bankruptcy you say? You can't do a short sale once you've filed for bankruptcy.... and that's where the wind came out of my sails.

All of that time, effort, work for naught. Dang. That's why I say ignorance is an occupational hazard...when he mentioned possible bankruptcy...after ALL of the reading I've done I should have known that would kill the deal.

Live and learn. I have learned from this. I have met a lot of nice people who pay cash for houses. (that's good!) And you can bet I won't make that mistake again.

Why Real Estate Investing-Part#2

Well. I certainly have procrastinated on this post, eh? I have an excuse. (yea,yea) I have been busy! (aren't we all?) (see previous post!) Post #1 was kind of a "where have I been?" So post #2 should be a "where I am". I am probably unemployable at this point in my life. Not that I'm not capable. Certainly I would be worth hiring in some capacity but staying home has spoiled me...I like my own schedule. I like the freedom that that allows. (we have lots of doctor app'ts to keep..fit that into some body's 40 hour workweek) But I don't like not having the income. So...How can I take my skill set and my interests and do something that can earn some money? I love Rochester (maybe not so much in January) and it's houses. We have some beautiful neighborhoods/homes that have gone into serious disrepair...I love the end result of people's creative energy..seeing something created from not much. I like working independently. I like meeting lots of different people. For that matter, I like people. mostly. I love the idea of providing decent, clean housing for people that are trying to make it all work but are having difficulty making ends meet. I know where I want to go....it's in the getting there that I'm fuzzy and still working on the specifics. I'll save the "where am I going?" as my part #3. Back to the "where I am"... I'm working on rehabbing a house in "the Wedge". Cute little cape that Cori will live in for a few years and (hopefully) we'll make a profit when we sell it...I say "hopefully" because reining in expenses when remodeling an old house...not easy! I'll go into all of the details in another post! Too much for now! I'm also working on a short sale. A short sale is when a homeowner can not make his/her mortgage payments but the house is worth less than they owe on it. They are "upside down" on their mortgage so they try to work with the bank to accept less for the property that is owed. A homeowner gets into this situation in a few ways: i.e. in other parts of the country where there has been a rapid depreciation in home values, that can do it. Locally it's usually one of two things: The house has fallen into disrepair which makes it worth less than the original amount borrowed or the homeowner has taken out loans against the property or over leveraged it and they just can't get the $ needed out of a sale. If you know about short sales...you know this: they have a reputation to be a real PITA because they are time consuming, frustrating and you have to be very detail oriented. Which reminds me...I have to call the bank! :) Thanks for reading! Gail

Spark

People are a funny lot.
We are beaten down by the mundane
and submit willingly to the
nothingness of our busy days.
(It is so much easier that way)
Scurrying like squirrels to
tuck away their treasures.
We overlook what we really need to see...
(It is so much easier that way)
Who we really need to be...

Find the Spark.

Why Real Estate Investing & What's Blogging have to do with it?! PART#1

     I'm not much of a blogger but I've been told it could help my real estate business to get out there and be known, so here goes....
     I guess I'll talk a bit about my story.  Gail's History.  Way back in the day..after graduating from MCC (marketing) and RIT (fashion merchandising) I was hired by McCurdy & Co.  A nice family owned department store.  After some training I was assigned as an assistant to the Sleepwear and Robes buyer. Great lady. Don't know if you can name drop in blogs without permission so we'll leave it at that.  Then I went to Women's Sportswear in the same capacity. Another great boss! Next I was promoted to Intimate Apparel, sleepwear and robes! What a great job!  All jobs have their moments and this one was no exception but it was mostly wonderful.  Why else would I work for a mere pittance?  I got to travel to NYC 5 times a year, go to showrooms, meet great people, go to great parties, wined and dined by reps and all on the company's dime!  I even met Nadia Comaneci and Bart Conners!  The true best part about the job though was how independent we all were with our areas.  We truly made most of our decisions by ourselves...we ran our own "little business" within a business.  At this point in time we had 7 branches.  Then we acquired another family owned store in the southern tier and added 3 stores to our original 7.  Shortly after this I was "promoted" (not sure it really was a promotion...) to a larger, more diverse and more complex area:  Women's Hosiery and Accessories.  Whooboy.  Doesn't sound like much, right? But it included: hosiery, socks, exercise gear, hats, scarves, sunglasses, knitwear, slippers, women's gloves, belts, ponchos and other oddities like dickies.  McCurdy's was hitting a roadblock as so many stores were in the early 90's so they started to shift things around.  McCurdy's owned our "sister" store, B.Forman's.  Forman's catered to a totally different clientele.  High end merchandise. Designer clothing.  All different vendors and price points from what McCurdy's sold.  Around this time we were told we were combining buying responsibilities for both stores...we would keep our areas but buy at both the lower price points that McCurdy's catered to and the higher price points of Forman's all while maintaining both stores autonomy in the public eye.  Hmm. What do you think happened?  Can you say "YUCK"?  Yep....it wasn't fun anymore.  Now we were 13 stores with twice as many vendor reps to deal with and all new systems to work in as well as moving management around to supervise the new areas.  It was difficult.  We were going down.  Unfortunately McCurdy's was acquired by the Bon Ton in July of 1994.  Since my husband's work was our anchor, I didn't bother interviewing as we would have to move and that wasn't happening.  So...  Time to stay home with my 2 children.  Two years later, we had a third child and I was entrenched in motherhood.  Those little ones are now almost all young adults so it's time to venture back out in the water for a swim...

End of Part #1. 
If you're interested in Real Estate and would like to be on my buyer's list go to: http://www.got2moveon.com/ and sign up!   If you want to send an e-mail go to:  gailsmith001@gmail.com .