The Pastor of our church challenged us to follow the story of the Talents and use our wits and ingenuity to multiply money entrusted to us. The money we raised would go to charity and with 49 of us participating we could learn some unique ways to make money. We each got $10 and 30 days to report back.

So being a real estate investor on a mission, I found in 3 days a new house listed on an investor's website. The seller was eager because his company decided not to tranfer him to Phoenix from Las Vegas. He agreed to sell it Subject To: and wanted no cash up front. The terms were take over the payments and pay him back his downpayment and landscaping costs after it was sold or refinanced.

The numbers were:
Value: $466,000
Purchase Price: $389,000
Amount Owed: $350,000
Note to Repay: $39,000
Payments: $2600

The loans were current and the house was new and never occupied. I faxed him a contract and he signed it and faxed it back. To make it binding I FedExed the $10 and the deeds for him to sign and have notorized. I called one of my investor buddies and she bought the contract for $2000. So now my $10 is $2000 and it's only been 7 days! Because I network with lots of people in the real estate game, I got a call from my loan broker. His partner bought a spec home from a custom builder that needed to be decorated and landscaped to reach it's max market value of $1,000,000. She bought it stripped down for $650,000 and has to sell because she's getting transfered out of state.

The numbers are:
FMV: $1,100,000
Purchase price: $700,000
Remodeling Costs: $100,000

I agreed to buy the house and used $1000 of the $2000 to open escrow. I have the credit to buy it for 100% but not the $100k to remodel. So I found a partner to buy into the deal for $50,000 and supply the $100,000 to get the job done. So now my $10 is $50,000! It's going to be a lot of fun to show up with $51,000 in $10 bills to demonstrate what's possible with a little faith and some education about real estate investing.

Thanks for letting me tell my story.

Robert McDowell
Surprise, AZ