163 White Birch

The house is pretty big, I think it’s right around 2,000 square feet and it sits on 1.19 acres of land.

One of the bigger challenges with this house is that it has a large unpermitted addition built off the back that we have to fix and bring up to code. On top of that we’ll be gutting out most of the interior to open up the floor plan, doing new electric, new plumbing, new boiler, new roof, new siding, new windows, new kitchen, new baths, etc…….

Rear View White Birch

As you can see there will be no shortage of work needed to this property.

The town of Leicester is located about 50 minutes east of Springfield, which is a bit outside our normal area, however this property was brought to us by another investor that had negotiated the short sale on it and was looking for a partner to help fund the deal and assist with the rehab. So we are partners on this deal.

Here is the initial video walkthrough we did of the house:

So that is Dominic, myself, and our partner Ray Tower.

This is our first partnership deal but we are looking to do more with other investors in the area, so if you have a deal in MA that you need help getting funded and rehabbed just let us know.

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Last time we were on the news it was for the work we were doing on our historic home on Bowdoin St. This time it is for the renovation work we are doing on some of the tornado damaged properties here in Springfield.

The story aired on CBS 3 last week.

Check it out below:

This story came together pretty quick. CBS contacted us on Tuesday and we shot the story Friday afternoon. They edited it and it went on the air that evening for the 4:00PM and 6:00PM news. Samantha Lavien with CBS did a great job with the story!!

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This is Dominic’s first post on our blog so please give him a warm welcome.

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Hey everyone,

It is a very cold Sunday here in Western Mass.  I’m sitting here thinking about what would be interesting for everyone.  Of course I thought about flipping houses.  As you most of you know we own a house flipping company called Hampden Homebuyers.  We have been doing very well the last few years and a big reason why is because we have tailored what type of end product we are putting out.  5 to 7 years ago we could get away with doing laminate countertops, white paint everywhere & maybe white appliances.  Back then it didn’t matter.  Houses were selling before they hit the market.

Times have changed.  The past few years have brought a buyer’s market and with that you have to put out a better product.  The days of white everything are gone for now.  We have improved our finished product dramatically.  Now we use natural colors on walls, granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, and we really pay much more attention to finish details.  Today’s buyers have options and they are weighing all of them.

So my words of advice are…

1.  Pay attention to the finish details.  If you can see it then the potential buyer can and will see it too.

2.  Spend a little more to stand out.  The difference between new white and new stainless steel appliance is less than $1,000 and the end buyer definitely notices.

3.  Don’t be afraid to try something new.  Use different wall colors from room to room.  NOT every room but you can do one color for bedrooms and one color for the rest of the rooms.  Keep them neutral and it will work.

4.  Stage your properties.  We just started staging our finished properties and we love it.  Staging can distract the buyer’s eye from less attractive parts of the house.  We use staging as a vision of what the end buyer could have.

5.  Of course price is always important.  We have only had a few emotional purchases where price was not the deciding factor but a typical buyer will look at the surrounding properties and solds to make sure they are getting a good deal.

That’s what I have for you all.  I hope you enjoyed my info.  Please check out our other sites, www.FlippingSmart.com and www.HampdenHomebuyers.com  If you like them let us know.  If not, thank you for visiting.

Have a great Sunday and a prosperous 2012!

Dominic Kirchner II

www.FlippingSmart.com

www.HampdenHomebuyers.com

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One thing I’ve learned from meeting many of the top people in our industry is that they all have spent tens of thousands, and in many cases hundreds of thousands of dollars on education and training. This education comes in many forms, from books and CD’s, to seminars, bootcamps and coaching programs.

If you are an experienced investor this education can help sharpen your skills and help you take your business to the next level. If you are brand new, investing in your education can help you greatly shorten your learning curve and help you avoid many costly mistakes.

When I first became interested in Real Estate Investing I attended a couple multi-day real estate investing conferences. These events brought together many different speakers that spoke about a variety of different real estate investment strategies. On top of the great speakers, I had the opportunity to network with 100′s of like minded investors of all skill levels from all over the country that were also attending the conference. I often credit my experiences at these conferences as giving me the knowledge and beliefs needed to succeed at flipping houses.

One such event is coming up that I think you all should check out. You are probably familiar with the website Biggerpockets.com. Josh Dorkin, the owner of Biggerpockets, featured our Blog FlippingSmart.com, as one of the Top 20 Real Estate Investing Blogs on the web….. so he definitely knows what he is talking about!!

Well, Biggerpockets is holding it’s inaugural live conference and trade show; The Biggerpockets Real Estate Investing Summit, happening March 23-24 2012 at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver. The conference is going to be chock full of knowlegdable speakers who are actively buying and selling properties every day of the week. Along with the  great speakers there will be endless networking opportunities with the other attendees. Many times the networking is the best part of these events.

Here’s what Josh had to say about the event:

This is going to be a ground-breaking event for the real estate industry — a conference designed for a national crowd of investors with no upsell, no back of the room nonsense, no “guru” BS!

As most of you probably know already, one of the reasons I founded BiggerPockets is that I wanted a place where I could discuss real estate without worrying that some self-anointed “guru” was going to constantly sell me their “secrets.” We’ve built an incredible community that is unmatched in the space, and which is run under the same founding principles today. This Summit is designed to do for live real estate investing events what our site did for the online space.

 

The conference is going to cover many different topics, including “Rehabbing and Flipping Homes”, “Using Hard Money”, “Investing While Working Full Time”, ” Raising Private Capitol for your Investments Legally” and “Building Your Business through Social Media” to name a few.

So… make sure you check out the summit. Josh is offering an early bird discount through Feb. 24.

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This is a 3 bedroom 1 and a half bath colonial located in Springfield.

The fire started in the first floor stairway and traveled up to the second floor. The majority of the damage was done by the smoke, the actual fire damage is pretty limited. The good thing is the fire didn’t spread up through the roof or burn through the exterior of the home.

Here are some pictures of the house:

Springfield MA Fixer Upper

Kitchen

Kitchen

Kitchen

Dining Room

Living Room with Melted TV

Front Hallway

Living Room

We are taking this house with all the contents so the next step is going to be the clean out.

Once we get it cleared of all the junk we’ll figure out what we’re gonna do with it.  We’ve got quite a few rehabs going on right now and some new purchases lined up so this may turn into a wholesale deal.

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We did a lot of work to this property including a new roof, new siding, new windows, new kitchen, three new bathrooms, new driveway, updated electric and plumbing, refinished hardwoods and fresh paint.

We also made some floor plan changes which included opening up the kitchen to the dining room, expanding the master bedroom, adding a half bath to the master and rearranging the bedroom closets.

Here is a look at the completed home:  (you can see the before pictures and video HERE)

Eton St Springfield MA

Springfield MA renovated Home

Eton St

Foyer

Foyer

Living Room

Living Room

Living Room

Dining Room

Dining Room looking into Kitchen

Kitchen Looking from Dining Room

Kitchen

Kitchen Looking into Dining Room

Stainless Steel Appliances

Kitchen

Kitchen with Gorgeous Hardwoods

Bedroom

Bedroom 2

Full Bath

Tiled Tub Surround with Body Jets Shower Panel

Master Bedroom

Master Bedroom

Master Bath

Finished Basement

Finished Basement

 

We’ve got beautiful dark stained hardwoods throughout this home, even in the kitchen.

This great home is 2,042 square feet with 3 bedrooms, 1 full bath, 2 half baths including a master bath, a large finished area in the basement and a 1 car garage.

Well that’s it for now, I want to wish everyone a happy New Year and a great 2012!

 

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Your email:

 

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Our guys were there all last week getting the demo done and prepping for the new roof to go on. We’ve got to completely rebuild the roof and we will be adding some new soffits and overhangs to the roofline.

Inside all the damaged sheetrock has been removed and we also pulled up all the damaged hardwoods.

We’ll be rearranging the floorplan a bit by removing the wall between the living room and kitchen/dining room area. We are also going to alter the current kitchen layout to make some more space and make the flow more functional.

Here’s some pics of the demo work:

Exterior

Living Room

Wall to be Removed Between Living Room and Kitchen

Master Bedroom Gutted

Dining Area

Living Room II

Kitchen

As we started taking up the hardwoods we found a lot of the subfloor underneath was bad, so we are going to be  replacing some large sections of subfloor also.

Well that’s all the updates for now. I’ll post some new pics as we get more exterior work done.

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Here’s my dog Teddy doing his best Santa impersonation:

Santa Claws

Best wishes to all and lets have an awesome 2012!!

P.S.  Remember, if you like our blog posts you can subscribe using the form right below:

or you can subscribe in the upper right hand corner under the heading “Subscribe to this Blog” , that way you get an email whenever we make a new exciting, awesome, informative and inspirational post!!!!