On the show today we talk… Credit Building Tips (and Inspection Tips) with Troy Fisher.

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Show Links:

– Lanika Home Inspection Services
– Cascade Investors Alliance

Show notes on Credit Building Tips (and Inspection Tips) with Troy Fisher

The Vantastic Life is…
– is back in Jerusalem Israel

Troy is a credit building ninja and home inspection expert! He’s also a crafty real estate investors and hard ass moderator for WAREI on Facebook. Fellow Coug!

You are super funny!

Julie
How’s it going?

Troy
You make me sound like a busy guy.

Julie
You probably don’t realize how people perceive you, and you are authentic.

Joe
What’s your life story?

Troy
Born on the island of Hawaii, but moved to WA and went to Juanita High. Then went to WSU because they have the latest admission for acceptance.

Julie
We should get together for Coug Football!

Troy
Yeah, we should have an apple cup thing at Jan’s church.

I got into real estate because he saw a rental house at college.

I like to say that I got an education in sex, drugs, and rock and roll.

Then I got into the fast food restaurant space. Where I quickly moved up into management. And was running a small franchise. BUT I don’t do really well with big wigs telling me what to do if I don’t agree with it.

Julie
Have you thought of having your own franchise?

Troy
It can be a great place to take some tax savings in real estate from your losses.

While I was trying to move up into upper management, I told the wrong guy that he didn’t know what he was doing, and that locked me out.

Then I got an opportunity in Las Vegas, and took it because I saw all of the cheap real estate down there. When I went down I found all of this great real estate, but my credit was bad, so I couldn’t buy anything.

Then my mom called me and said that she was coming into town and that we were going to make an offer on a property before she left.

We didn’t get that deal, but probably made an offer a week (on short sales).

So, we bought some four plexus, and learned a lot before moving back in with my mom (in California).

We were getting ready to sell everything, and move up in the real estate business.

We spent two years trying to get things under contract, and found that it’s hard to go from a fourplex to a hundred unit complex.

The hard part if the financing.

A fourplex is still a single family in a lot of banks eyes.

Julie
I’m glad you mentioned that because at our meeting in June we are having our meeting with Drew Kniffin to show you how to go from four to one hundred.

You need to have some failures.

Troy
Haha! I fail a lot!

I moved back up to Seattle because I was tired of not being rained on everyday.

So, now back in Seattle, I went to a meetup group with Kevin Carbon and created the Cascade Investors Alliance and it’s all about getting together in a relaxed setting, and getting to know people.

We are down to two meetings right now.

I don’t even like to call it networking, it’s just people that like to talk about real estate.

Julie
You should come to our Tuesday mastermind. It’s been so good!

I’m enjoying these casual, no dress up meetings.

Troy
The problem is that there aren’t any beers!

Julie
We do have beers! It’s at a brewery!

Are you doing any retail or investor inspections?

Troy
90% of my inspections are for investors. On the front end and back end.

I’m usually giving them a checklist that could be called out on the backend. Then on the backend I give them something they can give to the buyer.

Julie
Are you giving anything written on the front end?

Troy
It all depends. It depends on what the investor needs.

Julie
Are some investors not buying the property after the inspection?

Troy
Let me break that up….

Our newbie investors (emotionally invested). I like these the most because I can give advice. When I point out problems that are probably beyond the scope of what they are able to handle. And then they still buy it, and talk trash about investing.

Then there are the big and aggressive investors that don’t care, and aren’t afraid of anything. They just don’t want to get to closing and have the buyer find something that will delay the closing process.

Often times I’ll have an investors call me out because their property hasn’t sold. Then I’ll find a massive foundation issue (or something).

I’ve done a lot of those, and they come from two or three certain agencies that I’m not going to call out.

Julie
There’s no reason to not do this!

What’s the weirdest inspection that you’ve done?

Troy
There’s this place in Renton…

I go into the living room and there’s a hole in the floor, and a hole in the roof, and rain is just pouring through.

A lot of things don’t worry me about inspections.

You name the small animal and I’ve seen it dead in the crawl space.

The funniest…
This last weekend I broke a garage door. It was embarrassing and funny. Fortunately a very experienced agent and investor and 3-4 hours later the garage door was getting fixed.

Julie
I have a funny story. A sewer inspection story…

Listen in to hear the story!

What kind of investing are you up to these days?

Troy
We are focused on a manufactured home flip, and large mobile home parks. 100 to 200 space mobile home parks.

We almost got to closing on the last one, but sellers can be interesting.

Julie
I was just talking with someone about buying dirt and putting a mobile home park on it.

Have you thought of that?

Troy
Manufactured homes are terrible for rentals. Everyone thinks that the materials are subpar, and they are for a rental.

In most cases you’re going to get a better return on a modular home instead of a manufactured home.

There are a couple of modular sellers locally.

Julie
Do you like investing in single family, fourplex’s, or…

Troy
I’d rather just be rich.

I’m investing so mom (72), and she likes to travel like Joe does, but I have to support her.

My little brother works for amazon and is ok buying triplex’s in Seattle that don’t pay off right now.

Julie
You’re right, a successful investor is someone who achieved their own personal goals.

It’s what you want.

Let’s talk about the credit stuff… or let’s talk about the 3 key attributes, hustle, cash and credit.

Troy
Those are the 3 things that you need to be an investor. Hustle, cash, and credit.

Everything is going to be valued differently.

In traditional investing… cash is king. Because it’s the hardest asset to acquire. Credit is the next hardest.

The guy that’s going to find the deal is getting screwed. They are hustling, but only get the 3.5% to find a deal, and the cash person says “thanks”!

Jan assigns a different part to it. He thinks the hustler gets the bigger part of the deal.

Julie
I think it depends on what part of the deal you’re on.

You have to find people that have the opposite skill set than the other partners. Is that what we’re saying?

Troy
Kind of. I prefer to invest with family because you know what to expect.

Julie
Let’s jump into building credit. I find that people jump into real estate backwards, and they know nothing about debt or credit or financing.

I think that if you go to your local meetup you have a chance.

You shouldn’t start with “I’m going to be a wholesaler”, and for god sakes don’t quit your job.

There are people that we know that go back to get a job to increase their buying power.

How does person credit differ from business credit.

Troy
I don’t think that most people will get to business credit on this podcast. At least not many.

Dave Ramsey tells people to get rid of debt, but will ruin your credit score in the process.

You’re never going to get wealthy that way!

Debt is a tool, and a way to earn more money, and acquire larger properties.

If you look at it… it’s the way that you get your…

Credit utilization score is just your person credit card, mortgage, car loan, etc. It’s the amount of your possible amount of credit that you’ve used.

If you keep your score below 5% it will hurt your score.

You should also keep your 5-30% spread out over all of your cards.

Julie
How many cards should you have?

Troy
I have 12. It really depends on what kind of things you want from your cards.

I love my Home Depot card for flips.

There are so many things that you can do with credit cards. If you are an investor and you don’t have $10-15k of cash advances that you can help yourself with… you’re probably setting yourself up for disaster.

Julie
You know you need some credit cards… what’s your strategy for getting started?

Some of the advice you’re giving could change people’s lives.

Is there something different between reported and unreported credit cards?

Troy
Yeah, a Macy’s card, or a furniture cards… those cards are not lines of credit, they report like credit cards, but they stop reporting, and that’s not good for your score.

If you’re card doesn’t report… it’s not a card that you want.

Julie
There’s investors out there that think you don’t want a bunch of credit cards, and you’re able to live debt free. But when you go to borrow money, you can’t get a loan.

Troy
If you want to be that person that’s debt free… the best thing is to setup your credit card to pay for reoccurring bills. It just has to be over $5.

Strategy: once a month, buy yourself a few Amazon gift cards, and pay the card off each month. This will help you.

Julie
You’re the credit partner. Are you actually in a partnership?

Troy
Yes. If you are a credit partner, you should have a contract just like any other deal.

Julie
Before you do business with anyone, you should ask around to see if anyone knows about the person.

What do you think the first one or two things people should do?

Troy
The Home Depot and Discover cards are great for people that are getting started.

Don’t research How to raise your credit score.

Get credit karma, nerd wallet, and…

You can see what raises your scores on each of these.

Don’t be afraid if I call you stupid. I will tell you why I think you’re stupid. It’s not all roses, it’s a tough business that can change your life for the better or worse.

Julie
I hear you don’t like to read real estate books?

Troy
If someone had one that hasn’t been said in another 100 real estate books. After reading the first few books, you’re just rereading the same things and not learning anything new.

Julie
We need to throw some books out there about debt and credit, and all that stuff first.

I think you’ll win quicker. Don’t you think?

Troy
I think you need to define your goals, and then find your first deal. I knew nothing until I found my first deal. And my whole world exploded on me.

Now we have these groups where people will help you out.

Julie
We have that at our Tuesday meetings! You should come!

If anyone has a real estate problem we’ll do a great job helping you solve that problem.

What do you do for fun?

Troy
We travel a lot. I try to travel once a quarter. We get to go a lot of fancy places.

Chase Safire Reserve, and AMEX travel rewards really upped the game.

Julie
Do you have a favorite credit union?

Troy
All of my banking is done through Wells Fargo.

If you want to have a big business, you want to have a big bank.

Banking is a whole different subject, wow!!

Julie
You should use Troy for home inspections.

Troy
4256895344 call or text is the best. I also do sewer scopes. Bellingham all the way to Chehalis.