Thinking about your first flip? This is mine, in order. Eight short chapters with the numbers left in. Each one ends with what it cost me, so it can cost you less.
The short version. A 1908 house, bought in the 130s. Everyone said too far gone. The work ran about six months late, the buyer walked, and I still own it. One flip is my whole résumé as an investor.
2008. $3,000 down on a $40,000 condo. Five years and about $7,000 of remodel later it sold for $100,000. That rolled into the next house, and that one into the one I live in now. All three were homes. This log is about the fourth, the first I bought as an investment.
Keep this Getting in cost $3,000. Getting started as an investor took 17 more years. You can shorten the second number.
Two days before closing I walked the house with my phone out. Out front: "Let's see what we can do here." On the attic stairs: "Don't think we'll have room in the budget to touch." In the basement, under a rusted pipe: "Okay, that's not good."
By January the attic had heat, drywall and paint. By March it had carpet.
Keep this I said the attic wasn't in the budget, then finished the attic. Decide what you won't touch before you close, and write it down.
The day I closed, I texted the contractor: "The goal's under 3 months or I start bleeding cash." We settled on three. By the end of January the work was past that and not finished. All told it ran about six months late, and by my math that cost me close to five figures in carrying costs and interest.
My notes from January say "honestly, my fault." I had no detailed contract. Every investor I asked afterward said the same thing: the investor brings the contract, with deductions for late work written in.
Keep this Bring your own contract, with a finish date and a deduction for late work. My template cost me close to five figures and about six months.
Twenty-nine seconds. I open a set of doors, stand in the doorway with my arms out and say, "Look what I did. You'd be surprised how hard that was in this old house." I tagged it #tired.
Keep this In a house this old, small jobs take longer than they look. Budget their hours like big ones.
April, almost eight months in. I slide a pair of doors open and shut and ask, "Bookshelves or doors?" I get as far as "Imagine they'd be open most of the time, but" and say good night. That is the entire video.
Keep this Late in a job you stop being able to see it. Ask someone who hasn't stared at it for eight months.
I built the mailbox sign myself with a coaching call running. When it was done I turned the camera on and said, "I shouldn't be swinging a hammer. Still waiting for that day." Then: "Yet."
Keep this The owner's hours feel free and they aren't. Price your own hour before you pick up the tool.
In January I said on camera that I was prepared to rent the place out instead of selling it. In April, rained out and sitting in the truck, I said I hoped a family just starting out would get it. It listed and went under contract. Then the buyer walked.
Keep this The exit you plan is one option. Have the second one ready before you list. I'd said mine out loud in January, and it's the one I used.
The numbers, in ranges: bought in the 130s, all in the mid-260s, appraised at 290. On paper that is about $25,000, and none of it arrived as a check.
With the buyer gone I refinanced and kept the house. It's leased now. The refinance was supposed to take two weeks and took six. One of those weeks was mine: I let an email sit over the Fourth of July. I was learning AI while all this was happening, so I built a system that tracks every open thread. It closed with two days to spare.
Keep this My profit is still inside the house. Plan for the version where yours is too.
Next. Another house, with more of the paperwork handed to AI.
Rent collection and the books are what I'm automating now.
If you're a few steps behind me. If I could do this, you can. The biggest
barrier I hit was my own mindset, and I'd bet it's yours too. If you want a hand
or some guidance, message me. I'm happy to have that conversation and be a calm
place to think it through.
This is what happened to me. It isn't financial or legal advice.
Looking for the next one. Washington or Dakota County,
Minnesota — off-market or straight from the owner, and I'm the buyer, not a
middleman passing it along.
Message me and here's what you get: I look the place up that night, then lay
out your options — all of them, including the ones I don't make a dime
on. List it the normal way (highest price, but commission, months, showings, a
repair list). Sell it to me as-is (no agent, no commission, no repairs, leave what
you don't want — and a lower number, with the math shown so you can check it).
Carry the note and I pay you monthly with interest instead of all at once. Or
nobody here at all — if it isn't a fit for me I'll tell you who to call.
Then you pick, or you pick none. Nothing to sign, no walkthrough unless you ask.
Message me →
The daily ones. Each is whatever I was working out that morning, with what I'd have told you about it underneath.
Watch it on Instagram →
This one only exists there — Instagram stopped letting sites embed reels.
Opportunities for meaningful service to the world will come to me in unexpected ways.
That's my affirmation for today, and it's pretty easy to believe, because I have no idea what's happening in the future. But at least now, my brain and my pathway and neuropsychology is open to receiving.
If you decide on a good day what you're looking for, then you start to notice it when it shows up.
You'll forget this by Thursday. Follow and you won't have to remember it.
See it on Instagram →Watch it on Instagram →
This one only exists there — Instagram stopped letting sites embed reels.
I'm a tired dad. That's true.
But at the same time, I'm a dad, and I accept and I receive all that comes with that, because there's a lot of joy even with the fatigue.
Two words, "I am," and you choose how the sentence ends. If the tired version shows up first, then finish the sentence with the true one too.
One dad hack a day. Follow so you stop losing the next one.
See it on Instagram →280 older ones live on the Instagram.