Thread: I Need Some Advice Guys!!!

Hello,

I'm in the Tampa Bay area for now and i'm very interested in the real estate business. I want to some day start investing in real estate but i'm not quite knowlegdeable to do so yet b/c i'm just starting out. With that being said, i joined a website called therealestatearena.com that gives me a starting point to start and from the info that i've been reading, i think i would be good for me to become a property locator for investors at first so that i would know what i'm doing when i want to invest and attain some skill and knowledge. Now these are the steps that the website told me to take:

1. Drive my neighborhood weekly and scout for the following info for the next few weeks to get comfortable with evaluating leads:

- Properties most recently sold, their approximate square footage and selling price.
- The # of properties currently on the market in that area, so that i can know if that # is rising or falling, basically the supply and demand for this area.
- Figure out the demographic makeup of that area. Are there more owner occupants or tenant occupants in my neighborhood? ( they said 75% or more owner occupant means that my neighborhood is likely to be good for retailing properties at or near full price to owner occupants. 50-75% owner occupied would indicate a less liklihood for retailing at top dollar but still potential retail or other strategies such as lease w/ option to buy. If the area is less than 50% owner occupied then chances are that area is not suitable for retail but ideal for rentals, wholesaling, and other income property strategies that rely primarily on tenants. My goal is to find that ratio.
- Look for motivated sellers, note realtors, investors, and investment companies while i'm out.

2. Once i have the neighborhood sales data, and have calculated a likely dollars per square foot average for that area, and know the owner to tenant ratio, and know the total # of house for sale is increaseing or decreasing, and know whether properties are selling quickly or slowly, and finally what properties rent for in that area, i would be ready to begin the process of evaluating potential leads.

Now i started this process yesterday and these are my questions.
1. How would i possibly know how many people are tenants and how many people are owners to find that ratio?

2. How do i develop a dollars for square footage average of my neighborhood? Do i call all the houses that are for sale or recently sold and ask the square footage and come up with an average #?

3. How do i approach investors and investment companies, knowing that i'm just starting out? Should i make sure i have good leads ( How do i know if i have good leads?) before calling them or just call and introduce myself first and see if they would be interesting in working with me? If you are a investor and/or company would you work with rookie locators?

4. Could i just call some of the realtors in my area and ask them these questions since they work my area? How would i approach a realtor who is the listing agent for a potential lead? Do realtors like property locators?

5. Am i going in the right direction with what i'm trying to do? If so are there better steps to take or am i doing this right?

6. Also the site said once i know the square footage of the property, i could use that along with my dollars per square foot average to determine a likely market value for a potential lead. How do i figure the market value of the lead exactly? Is the website Zillow good for answering some of these questions? Are they accurate?

7. Now once i have a lead, i would need to do a repair estimate for the home. What is the bet way to estimate repairs? Do i call a contractor and how much is a likely charge for their services?

8.Along the way within these few weeks should i call investors, realtors, appraisers, contractors to see if i can shadow them a few hours a week to get some experience? If you are any of the above would you do something like that, being a mentor?

I know that this post is rather long but i would greatly appreciate any answers to my questions because i want to be great at this. Thank you for taking the time out to read this!