This is a story about my coaching student; Russell Sanders.  Russell is a full-time employee of the federal government.  He was tired of losing money doing RE deals, then he decided to join forces with me.  Russ found this deal on the MLS -- and we think it will be a doosey.

This house in Capital Heights, MD was vacant and bank-owned.   The numbers are as follows:

$75,000   purchase
$48,000   rehab

Honestly, when I first saw this house, I thought -- “heavy cosmetic.”  I mean it really was not that bad -- but it needed expensive items, like new windows, 2 new baths, a new kitchen, new doors, a new front entrance, new carpet, some new plumbing and updated electric.  But seriously, its an easy rehab.  I mean, easy in the sense that we won’t be gutting the place all the way back to the studs -- which is refreshing for a change. 

We’re about 3 weeks into the rehab and we’re seeing some serious progress.  I have some great video (but I’m biased) of the progress we’ve made thus far.  Man, I’m starting to love this technology stuff!

Video Tip

The basement here at Gunther is below grade, of course.  While adding the new full-bath, I noticed a big old pipe next to the drain for the toilet, and was wondering what the heck it was.  I got a lesson on plumbing that I thought I’d share with you.  If you don’t like poop floating in your pretty finished basement you must see this extra-special REI video tip.  In the second 1/2 of the video, I talk about how to properly remove a column in the basement.  Check out what I learned!

Post from: Craig Fuhr

REI Coaching Student Rehab -- 5041 Gunther Rd. Part 1

Feel free to leave comments below!

Here’s the second installment of PJ’s mondo-Baltimore City rehab.  At just under a few weeks into the rehab you can see we have the place gutted, and framed.  You’ll also notice that we waterproofed the basement which as I understand, Baltimore City is requiring for all new rehabs whose scope includes a full-finished basement.

REAL ESTATE INVESTING TIP: Beware, if you plan to gut a house and finish the basement in Baltimore City, you may be required to waterproof.  Listen, waterproofing is a plumbing job.  A lot of plumbers don’t like to do it however, because its dirty grunt work.  You have to bust up the concrete slab, and excavate a trench of about 7 inches wide and 12 or so inches deep.  That my friends makes a BIG PILE of mess.  Once that’s complete, the job is pretty simple.  The plumber will drop in a plastic corrugated pipe and you route that to a sump pump.  Cover it all over with some gravel, then fresh cement and viola’ your done.  Seriously, the costs of the material for a job like this is less than $300-bucks.  But the labor is ROUGH!  That’s why we have a $10/hour guy break up the floor and haul the debris.  Then once the plumber is done, we bring the $10 guy back to cover up the plumber’s work.

Check out the video.

At this point we are post-demo, and we’re well into framing.  We’ve pretty much busted out most of the interior walls, added new support beams, and we’ve busted up two bedrooms and made them into one grand master bedroom complete with its own master bath.  We also took away from the over-sized landing at the top of the steps to add space to the otherwise tiny main bath.  We framed in a pantry, a 1/2 bath, and a laundry room on the main level just beyond the kitchen, and we added some nice arched entrances into the living room and dining area.  The kitchen is immense and will have a sit-at breakfast bar for three to four – in addition to an adjacent dining room.  The house is really starting to take on a much more modern and open layout.

Click on the picture below for more pics of our progress.  Enjoy

Post from: Craig Fuhr

R.E.I. Coaching Student Rehab: 2901 Violet Ave, Part 2