Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Boost In Number Of People Flipping Houses Recorded

By Cornelius Nunev


Flipping homes 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 individuals are flipping properties again.

Fast cash on a home

When people were really buying properties, there was a pretty penny to make when flipping homes. A lot of people were in the business of flipping properties before the recession started.

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

However, the formerly-popular house flipping industry, according to the Washington Post. RealtyTrac, the real estate website, reports a 25 percent increase in the first half of this year over the same period last year.

Gaining steam

Oddly enough, the top area for flipping houses 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 specifically affected, as real estate values were drastically inflated in those areas.

However, some of the worst-hit cities are flipping hotbeds. Other areas with increased activities consist of LA, Las Vegas, Miami and Atlanta, all cities which were hit with massive foreclosures and plummeting values. According to the Chicago Tribune, it's begun 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 houses have been turned over for sale nationwide.

Getting the right skill

Flipping properties seems simple, but it's not just putting in some new cabinets and cash rains from the sky. Many properties are foreclosures, according to CNBC, which have been sitting for some time and need to be rehabbed to be inhabitable, which can be costly. Researching each house is paramount and interested people have to take their time to find a house to flip that will be worth it, financially.

It is challenging to get a flappable property without putting down a good chunk of cash. Auctions do not always have good properties for sale, and it can get really expensive to pay money on a house and flip it.

The net profit on flipping homes is not very inexpensive 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 cheap labor.




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