Flipping Mobile: January 2013

The end of 2012 brought with it a tornado on Christmas Day. A tornado that destroyed hundreds of thousands of dollars in real estate in midtown Mobile. A tornado that happened to make its debut while we were enjoying a wonderful break in Houston celebrating the holidays with my family. Demouy, a.k.a The Beast turned Beauty, is located in midtown Mobile and encompasses nearly all of our business capital. The tornado touched down literally FEET from our doorstep. Upon returning from Houston, we saw one street over where houses had their entire roof ripped off. Driving around our block, we saw huge sections of houses missing and debris piled high up on the side of the road. But a Christmas miracle happened...we were spared! We had some debris to clean up in the yard (random breaker box wrapped around our tree and tons of small limbs, roofing material from our neighbors, etc.) and off the roof (including a random 2x4??!). One of our windows was cracked from what appeared to be a shingle from the high school tile roof one block over. Aside from this, we weren't affected! Even the pillows in the front porch staging furniture didn't fly away! We feel very blessed and so relieved!

With this behind us, we have hit the ground running in 2013, including securing our 10th flip that we will sign papers on when Sugar Pine closes (Jan. 25th). We are about to reach DOUBLE digits...What a victory!

We are still working on Deerwood (see pics below!) and have taken on the challenge of staging The Beauty. We are hoping this will help get an offer. Once this property is liquidated, we plan on buying 2-3 more with that capital. The last 3 days have been spent hitting up every furniture, consignment, thrift, and decor store all over the city. We are on a major budget so it hasn't been the easiest task to furnish a 2200 square foot house that happens to be listed at nearly 1/4 of a million dollars...but we have found some great items! Pics coming soon!

I am looking forward to a wonderful year. Last year had many struggles trying to figure out how to manage time, finances, and relationships while trying to build a business that could support us financially. We mastered a few areas and are still working on some others. We sacrificed a great deal but feel accomplished after making it through our first year as full time real estate investors...with our marriage and sanity intact! 2013 is full of hope and we are excited to build on our experience from last year and hopefully pocket some serious dough this year! We want to pay of all our of credit card debt and buy a home for us...CASH. No bank loans. No financing. Pure financial freedom. Too big of a goal, you say? Impossible to do, you say? I believe in it. I'm committed to it. I'm excited for it.

Bring on 2013.