I took this picture on Polk St NE the other day when I was driving through Northeast Minneapolis. I haven’t been in this house by I wonder if they put the kitchen on the south side of the house?   View Post →

 

 

 

I was doing some research this morning on houses by Lake Harriet in southwest Minneapolis and I wanted to share with you some of the information I came across.  The average price for a house my Lake Harriet is $435,000 and the average square foot price for a house by Lake Harriet is $200 per square foot.  That is about $185,000 more then the average house price in all of southwest Minneapolis and about $50 per square foot more.  Lake Harriet is beautiful and a great area to live by.  There is Lyndale Park and Linden Hills Fields, which are beautiful areas to walk and play with your kids.  There are tons of older 1890s-1920 homes that have a ton of high quality character.  I just really like Lake Harriet and southwest Minneapolis.  I attached a video I made on the Lake Harriet homes for sale.  Feel free to look at it and give me a call if you are interested in buying or selling your house close to Lake Harriet in southwest Minneapolis.

 

Click on this link to watch the short video on Lake Harriet Homes For Sale:

http://screencast.com/t/TXhqP6Cxc

This house is right down the street from mine.  It is a 1950s ramblers and it was listed at $130,000.  It needed between $40,000-$90,000 worth of work depending on what you wanted to do with it.  It was and still is a really great house with a lot of potential.  The great thing about this house is that it has a 1300 foot foundation, which is pretty large.  So it is listed as a two bedroom one bathroom house, but it has an big addition and it has a huge unfinished basement.  It could easily be a 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom house.  I really liked this house and I considered making an offer on it.  However, I just bought a house that I am remodeling and I got my hands full.  Plus my flooring company is pretty busy right now.  I know how much work it is to fix up a house to the way I would want it to be.  But when I was done with it it would easily sell for $310,000.  There is probably a $30,000-$50,000 profit potential on this one.  It will be really interesting to see what happens.  I love Kenny neighborhood, Armatage, Lynnhurst, Tangletown, Nokomis, Linden Hills.  these are great neighboors in south Minneapolis and if you can find a great home for sale in them at a good price I think you would be very happy.  In the picture below is the house right now door to the foreclosure.  It sold a couple years ago for $309,000.  So I feel pretty confident that you could sell this one all fixed up for about the same price.

This is a duplex that is on the market right now in South Minneapolis on the University of Minnesota campus.  It is a nice 1950s rambler that has one bedroom on the main level. View Post →

I get a lot of people asking me about foreclosures, flips and rentals. I own a couple rental properties in south Minneapolis and I have flipped a bunch of houses too since 2009. I also own a hardwood floor refinishing company. I’ve bought homes cash, conventional, FHA, contract for deed, construction loans. I have hired contractors, spent tons of money fixing up houses, and made and lost money on deals. When people ask me about rentals I alway say good for the long term, not the best for short term and don’t rely on the cash flow. Most rentals will not make a lot of cash flow unless you bought them super cheap. It is still possible to find deals, but harder then a few years ago. If you can cash flow $500 to $1000 a month that is awesome. But remember you are going to need to fix the properties up. Most renters are hard on houses and houses depreciate with time so something will need to be repaired. I think it is good to keep the cash you make from the rentals and use it to fix up the properties. If you NEEED it to live on I don’t think it is a good idea. The real estate market in Minneapolis can change a lot because the government is heavily involved in the economy. The federal reserve has been inflating the money supply for five years now and we don’t really now what is going to happen to all that cash. So it is good to error on the side of caution.

When it comes to flipping houses that is a different story. The key is to buy at a great price, add value and then sell it. Sometimes you can make money and sometimes you don’t. Its all about the price you pay for the house. Also, because the market changes daily prices can go up and down fast. I remember when the government was offering a $8,000 tax credit for first time home buyers everybody was buying. The market was on fire. My deals were selling the first week. But as soon as that credit expired the market went south again. People stopped buying and a house that sold for $180,000 today all of the sudden sold for $170,000 the next day. That is a big difference because most flippers are not making a ton of money flipping houses in Minneapolis. Many of these so called flippers think they will make a killing, but the market is pretty good at pricing properties. If you have any questions about buying rental properties or flipping houses in Minneapolis give me a call.

The real estate market in Minneapolis bottomed out last year. We have seen a 13% increase in home prices over the last 12 months. Houses are selling faster, the are selling quicker, there are very low inventory levels, and then are selling for more money. The federal reserve is trying everything it can to inflate prices. One of the fastest selling prices ranges in Minneapolis are the homes that sell between $350,000 and $500,000. That price range has seen a 41% increase in sold homes in the Twin Cities since last year at this time. I think the spring market is going to be very hot. I think there are going to be more price increases. A lot of people I talk to want to buy rental properties because they know that prices will be higher soon. I bought a house this year in the Kenny neighborhood in south Minneapolis. I love the neighborhood. I have actually been in Kenny a lot because I have family there that have lived in Kenny for over 20 years. I think real estate is a good investment, but my only concern is the macro economic environment. It doesn’t seem like the federal government or the federal reserve is going to stop spending money. I think they are going to continue to print. If they do that then the economy is going to get more unstable and it will be difficult to predict what will happen. I think there could be another crash. I don’t know when it would happen, but it just doesn’t feel like the right then to do when they are basically turning on the printing press and giving money to bankers and military contractors.