Topic > Flipping a House: Real Estate Strategy - 1005

When working in real estate, flipping a house is one of the most profitable projects you can undertake. The premise of this idea is to buy a home that needs repairs, renovate it, and sell it at its newly appraised value. In high school, I worked alongside my mother to renovate a house in our small town of Trinidad, Colorado. The valuable lessons I learned during this entrepreneurial venture gave me insight into the inner workings of house flipping. What I have gained from this experience will lead to better decision making if I choose to take on another project. With a $150,000 budget, the most important things to focus on in a remodel include updating appliances, applying fresh paint, installing proper flooring, and renovating the exterior. Assuming the foreclosed home costs $110,000, I would allocate $20,000 of my budget for renovation expenses. This leaves a buffer of $20,000 to use as an emergency fund. First and foremost, it is essential that appliances are repaired. Appliances are the “age spots” of a home. Due to planned obsolescence, products such as refrigerators and dishwashers need to be replaced every ten to fifteen years. This leads to the innovation of new ideas during the production of the product. For example, when manufacturers launched stainless steel refrigerators on the market, the once popular white models with the convenient ice dispenser quickly became obsolete. This illustrates a simple rule: Investing in new appliances is one of the quickest ways to make a home look like the builders recently put the finishing touches on and packed up their tools. They immediately modernize the house. This is why new appliances weigh so heavily in a buyer's decision... middle of the paper... ional. Additionally, some of the money will be needed to hire a home inspector before the home is put on the market. The cost of this service varies but can be paid for with money from your emergency fund if the home inspector needs to make multiple trips to smooth out problem areas inside the home. After renovating the quaint little house on the hill with my mom, my feelings about the house changed dramatically. Before the project took off, I was hesitant to set foot in the building. The smell and poor lighting made it difficult to imagine a positive outcome, but once it was finished I was tempted to move too. This is the goal. By undertaking this second project, I would do my best to make the house I would like to live in without allowing myself to implement my personal style preferences. The result is a house ready to move in and open to visitors.