Wednesday, September 3, 2014

Flipping Houses Becoming Profitable Again

By Cornelius Nunev


Flipping properties used to be a big thing. Granted, that's when housing as an industry was fairly healthy. Now, however, it it's been ill for a while, but more people are flipping properties again.

Fast cash on a home

When people were actually buying houses, there was a pretty penny to make when flipping houses. Many people were in the business of flipping houses before the recession began.

Most people do not make cash off a house. It is not an investment because an individual has to cover the house, repairs and improvements, taxes, insurance, maintenance and more. When flipping a house, a person generally buys it for dirt cheap and fixes it up to turn a profit.

According to the Washington Post, the house flipping industry has gotten a lot more people in it. There was a 25 percent increase in the first half of the year over last year in the number of people in the industry, according to RealtyTrac.

More interest

Oddly enough, the top area for flipping homes in RealtyTrac's data is Phoenix, Ariz., one of the hardest-hit states in the real estate slump, with almost 10,000 flips. Arizona, along with Nevada, Florida and California were especially affected, as real estate values were drastically inflated in those areas.

However, some of the worst-hit cities are flipping hotbeds. Other areas with additional activities consist of Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Miami and Atlanta, all cities which were hit with massive foreclosures and plummeting values. According to the Chicago Tribune, it's started picking up in the Windy City as well. There have been 1,067 flips there so far this year, a 30 percent increase. Overall, almost 100,000 homes have been turned over for sale nationwide.

A challenging process

It is not all that simple to flip houses despite what you may think. In fact, it could be really hard to come up with the cash to buy the house. On top of that, the homes are usually uninhabitable whenever you purchase them and need a lot of work before they could be sold to someone, according to CNBC. It is expensive, so make sure you research the house to make sure it is secure first.

According to MSN, getting a flappable property with no cash down isn't likely to take place and certainly do not expect realtors to have homes that fit the bill. Auctions are not always going to have many either.

The net profit on flipping houses is not very affordable either, according to the Washington Post. The average profit per flip on RealtyTrac was $29,432, which seems good except that is only the main difference between purchase price and sale price. That does not account for any flipping costs, which are ridiculously high. It is probably not worth it unless you can do all the work in flipping the house on your own or can somehow get really affordable labor.




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