Paul Meyer Buys Houses

HPU business blog

Market falls on a Monday – big earnings week

Surprisingly the market fell hard today steadily throughout the day. With the market going against the sell off on Thursday I figured it would continually go up throughout the weekend, but this was not the case. Google (GOOG @ 620) fell with major search engine Bidu (BIDU @ 334). I see good buying opportunities with a possible pop tomorrow since at the end of the day there was a quick late buying interest. If you saw Apple Inc. it spiked straight up the last 30 minutes with “3 white soldiers”. I’m playing a small position in AAPL OCT 07 170 Calls @ 2.06 and I have my GTC order at $2.60 which would make me a 25% ROI if I’m sold out tomorrow morning. If AAPL doesn’t move I’m going to sell myself out of the position.

This week will hold Google earnings. The king of Tech in my opinionGOOG is the stock to be watching because its growth has been huge each year. For the past two years GOOG jumped 30 points during Oct earnings release. I plan to trade only a $500 trade right before close of the earnings annoucement on Oct 18th.

As for dating life. I think this new girl I’m interested in works more then I do and that is a problem. It is great to see such a productive person, but I don’t know when we would ever have time to see each other.

My roommates plan on adding an additional 4th person to our 1 bedroom apartment. Yes, you heard me right. Four people in this tiny 1 bedroom. Currently I’m the only one working. They are getting annoying playing video games and drinking 40’s. I do not know how much longer I will last, but since I’m leaving on patrol again for a few months I can deal plus rent will only be 200-300/month or I could just move all my shit out again which is what I’m thinking I just might do instead and pay $125 in storage fees.

Last thing taking 3 classes, doing stock stuff, trying to meet ladies, living with 2 other guys cramped in a small apartment, and on top of that finding free time has started to add up. Did I also mention trying to buy this second park while my first one is about to become what I can an “end” investment. If I’m unable to rent this place I will take it as a lost and practically give it way because I’m not going to let it turn into a negative cashflow business which it currently is. I’m not giving up on it yet, but I told the property manager if we can get it fully rented by Dec 07 then I’m going to have to shut the entire park down and put it up for sale. I have a feeling this week is going to be a very tiresome week. Big money comes with big stress when theres no one to help you relax…


mobile home park repairs, new manager – non-farm payroll report

My new manager for my mobile home park #1 has been a life saver. He is on his game, at least seems honest, and will not put up with bad tenants. If we can get the park fully rented again I will at least break even in the mean time until I can buy more trailers to fill the empty lots available to rent. I am in another deal to buy an 18 lot park, with 18 park owned trailers, all fully rented, for $190k. You might ask why am I buying another park if my first park has gone to shit and I’m not profiting yet? Well I’m pretty ambitious so I don’t let one park bring me down. It will work. I believe in it, the people helping me, and fixing it up to rent fully. So far I have bought a park that is known as the worst/drug heavy spot outside of town. How’s that to know you are a park owner of scum? Hmm…I guess it could be worst. I was once a young man that would run away from this type of situation, now I’m going to go head on and fix it so I will suceed. If I want to be powerful and successful I need to learn how to fix problems. This is definitely a problem and with a $80k mortgage I definitely need to fix it. I will blog more as more trailers are rented out with more progress.

As for stocks. I steadily keep losing my money. It is simply amazing how well I can lose money. I’m not saying I’ve always lost money, but recently since August 2007 I’ve made some big loss trades. I should be making BIG gains, but for some reason I’m not making the right decisions. Granted, I don’t have time to watch the market all day, buy and sell when I want, but I had plenty of opportunities to make a profit and get out without losing the bulk of my money. Now that my down payment I was using to create more money for a deal is down I’m going to have to work and think triple hard to bring my trading money up to where it was before basically $40,000. Currently at $3000 (minus the $6000 that really doesn’t count because its my down payment, well was $10000 I should say).

I admit my ambitious move to put $10k into a trade to earn $20k probably wasn’t the smartest move, but a 50% chance is pretty good I think. Now that the $10k is $6k I’ll have to work it extra hard. I’m already -$8k down for the entire year. Not one withdrawed profit yet. My $40k profit should of been taken out immediately to put into real estate. Dumb me. Well I guess I learn repeatedly the hard way as usual. If I was married and she know would it make it any different? Would she convience my thoughts otherwise not to re-trade the big profit? Probably.

I plan on trading SHLD in the retail season. SHLD has broken its major downtrend and a lot of positive buzz has been on the stock from a billionaire buying up 5% of the stock just recently.
Currently at $151 and a high of $170s I think or should I say by the facts and charts right now seems like a great time to get in. AAPL @161 just moved up finally of course (taking forever).
AAPL might be the better stock going to $200? Whatever I trade it has to move up or I need to sell my options. The time value of Calls slow the price movement up if the stock stays flat and falls. This I have learned. The recent non-farm payroll report boosted stocks HIGH. I should of NOT bought Put options knowing that there was a “rumor” that the payroll report was going to be higher then expected which is bullish. Again, dumb me. Hard learning.

As for the ladies. I took one charming lady interested in the finance field out to lunch. Haven’t heard back from her – going to send her some small flowers. Will this get me any attention? noticeable? probably unlikely, but it is worth the try.

later -fn


stock market correction = uptrending

If you are a stock market follower you’d notice the different wording journalist are using such as “optimistic” that we hit our low just recently last Thursday Aug 16 to be exact. I was watching the market as AAPL was hitting $112’s and NYX was hitting $65’s. I was drawing my support lines because after the big red candle dropped a big white candle stood right next to it top to bottom and went right up with buyers looking for a golden opportunities. Since I’m still a student I really did not know which direction the market would go. On Friday stocks popped higher creating a doji star showing the market made up its mind. So now for the past almost 6 days the market has ran up with white candles breaking the downward trend since July 15th. I’m currently in AAPL JAN 200 CALLS up around 30% in my options +$3000 in 2 business days. I’m not going to sell at some crazy high number, but I am going to follow the major uptrend line until it is broken or bad news comes out, other wise I’m stick to my play. I’m very confident in Apple and until their next earnings call I’m going to trade it up to earnings or until I’m happy with my profit. I’d also love to be in SHLD and RIG Calls, but I’ve been taught to be in only one trade at a time even if there are other opportunities available. I need to stick to the rules and show some discipline or I’m never going to become a great trader.

Currently I’ve been looking at a trailor park to buy for $190,000. I’ve talked to many experts in this field and the price looks very good for what I’m getting which would be an 18 lot, 2.37 acre, with 18 park owned homes rented for $350-450 each, with all utilities established. It is around 20 minutes away from University of eastern Tennessee (Johnson City, TN). I’d really like to do the deal, but I want to get an outside property manager if I buy it. This is the advice I’ve gotten basically to get rid of any favoritism within the park. It would make some serious cashflow to my real estate portfolio. Between the 2 trailor parks I will eventually be receiving around a $50k net income a year more than my U.S. Coast Guard income so it would finally give me the choice of retirement at age 29. I still want to be a great trader, but it would give me choice even if I did not trade stock options.

I’m almost done with my 3 classes at HPU and will start another 5 online in the next two semesters. I want to double major by 2009 then do some pastry or music school or both when I get out. 2007 has been a very volatile year for my portfolio and my goal is to come out higher than last years or at least breaking even. Many of my penny stocks are worthless so I will have to sell them soon or I will be paying some serious taxes from gains I do not have anymore. Trends are looking good and the technicals are showing major buying right now so look out!


HOKU, AAPL, SWN, NYX – Latest news on the trailor park

After HOKU earnings the stock plummeted to $8 and I totally expected it to fall. Everyone knew they weren’t going to show a profit and it is still very much a speculation stock because it hasn’t been able to start production yet. I’m with Jim Crammer about people rebuying it at a lower price and it moves up again throughout the year on its speculation of being the #1 for alternative energy. Our world is moving in that direction so I could only expect growth. As for AAPL it’s iPhone has been a success, but the market is turning over and its stock is finally starting to become submissive to all the selling. I’d buy AAPL later, but I see it moving much further down into the possible $110’s before it moves into the $200’s. If AAPL is able to continue momentum then I’d buy Calls on it if it moves past $150. Then it will be fighting the selling, but investors are true believers in it. It’s PEG score also has moved down to around 1.66 from over 2.00. So its value has gone up as well with its super profitable earnings. SWN’s charts have been showing a flip to oil/gas companies. Its major trend on the Daily and Weekly are going down with all smaller charts. Just yesterday it bumped up because it was slammed down into the Bollinger bands. I expect it to keep moving further down in the lower $30’s. I’m playing SEP 07 35 Puts on it currently up around 10%. I plan to sell out once it hits around $35 if I’m correct. NYX is always a confusing stock. You’d think this stock would be doing what ICE is doing, but it isn’t. I’m in Calls and I think I’m going to lose my entire $7,000 investment if by Sept. it doesn’t move higher than $87. At its current price of around $74 I’m left dumbfounded and believing in the stock that makes me seem living life a bit bicariously. NYX has had almost 4 major falls with small peaks. This stock has to pop high if on Aug 2nd earnings are awesome and profits are up. It should pop past $90 because there hasn’t been much news on it. So if it surprises investors and analysis it could finally get back in the game and be a more volatile stock like it use to be. If you are currently playing Puts on it you are probably a lot more correct and wise thinking then myself.

As for the good old trailor park I bought. I’ve been working with my property manager. I’ve been trying to get the cable tv hooked back up because it was disconnected before I could transfer it into my name. Two of the tenants are refusing to pay their rent because they are not receiving cable tv. Can you believe this? I’ve never heard of such a moron of a tenant in my life! I told him to turn off their electricity and gas that day until they paid their rent or enforce them to be evicted that week. I’m not going to tollerate this type of behavior. Business is business and you pay your rent regardless if you get cable tv or not. I pay for their housing and all utilities. Cable tv is a luxury. I only see future problems with very low income low education tenants like this in the future. I’m trying to move all the tenants in and rent the trailors properly with full leases, applications, and deposits so I don’t get shitted on. If I’m going to make this profitable I need to take the steps to make it profitable and not deal with unacceptable tenants.


What is good property management?

Recently I bought this trailor park and problems are arousing weekly which doesn’t surprise me, but my property manager is starting to annoy me. I’ve been setting up a bank account in the county where the real estate is being held and it has been very cumbersome. My property manager and owner that sold me the property has been emailing me non-stop with gas leaks, dead cable lines, broken AC window units, and needed new flooring in trailors. I don’t like to think of myself as a slum-lord, but I feel most of these problems can be fixed by the tenants and the gas company. Isn’t the gas company suppose to fix gas leaks. It sounds like a problem they need to fix. If the cable doesn’t work or the connection is messed up you don’t fix it the cable guy comes out and since you are paying for it they check it out. I guess in Tennessee everything is the owners problem? I think not. So far I’ve bought a new AC unit, 100 YDs of flooring, and about to have to pay for a gas guy to repair what is sounds like major gas leaks. Personally I’m starting to think my property manager is doing a shitty job and I’m about to fire him because he should be getting the companies to fix their own equipment connected to my trailors. He is doing a great job at telling me all this and I know I need to have the money ready to fund all his property management duties, but is this good property management?

I have another property manager in Virginia that has it much easier because she only needs to deal with one tenant in single family residence, but she always comes up with solutions not to fix the problems. I actually like her style much more. Her downsides are communication. She does not email me. Email is my #1 form of communication and she rarely replies to anything I write her and does not provide a more personally daily checked email. What fascinates me is that she is a real estate agent just like this other property manager and doesn’t search for other properties in the area for me to buy when I’d be giving her the commission.

The positives about the property manager is Tennessee is that he will respond daily by email. Now he might misspell almost 1 word in every sentence he writes, but even I have grammar problems. He kind of writes how he talks in his very westernly-southern accent and it almost worries me. Should I be worried? Is he a person really to trust? Do I really need a property manager who is very educated to run my park successfully? I think the answer is no to most of these answers. So for the most part I trust hes going to get me tenants in and I hope he is going to search for additional trailors to fill the lot. I’ve already went online at OnedollarSigns.com, which offer very affordable mini-billboards signs for effective marketing I feel that will get all my trailors fully rented again. I’m working on getting 6 month leases as a minimum for secured rent. If I can get 10 units rented at $450/month then that is $4500/month cash flow and after expenses I’d net around $3000. So as long as my current property manager puts all my signs along my road frontage and maybe some others near by to collect interest, he fixes the gas leaks, and gets the flooring in to rent the trailor then I’ll be happy even if it costs me a bit more then I want in repairs.

So what is good property management? It could be the way you like to run your properties and that reflecting in your property management. For me I like a property manager that knows what is needed and not necessary. I think it is also what kind of property you are renting. I am renting a “full-service trailor park”. So I am expected to pay all the bills and more, but how much more? I get the feeling my tenants are going to try to find problems so I keep telling my property manager to only cover what we have to or we raise the rent. What are your thoughts?

Lastly, I have received all the Deed of Trust and promissary note on the property and will complete the deal this week.


HOKU, new recent real estate, and juggling college classes

Currently in the world of the finance ninja he has purchased his second real estate deal. The property is an RV/Trailor park in Tennessee. He has also enrolled in 3 online college classes getting closer to finish his BA, and his stocks holdings have still not changed -$21,000.

Why not talk in the third person?

About 2 weeks ago I believe I purchased HOKU JAN 2008 17.5 CALL options. I should of actually put a GTC up 100%, but of course I didn’t. Currently I’m up around 50%. I feel the stock has much more room to grow and I bought tons of time so I could receive a larger return.
Although HOKU is doing well I only had $1000 to invest so due to my negative -$21000 balance on the stocks owned my networth is still very unhappy with my bad decisions during the new year of 2007 trading.

As for my real estate developments I already know what you are thinking. How can I be purchasing real estate with no money left and who would want to buy a trailor park? Well, I went to a real estate game club that plays Rich Dad Poor Dad’s Cashflow and they sell real estate university packages with a website and company that prepares real estate deals for you. I didn’t buy into it, but for a bran new person it might be a great idea. Personally buying real estate isn’t that hard expecially when you are paying all the closing costs for other people to do everything for you. I actually have been looking on ebay.com real estate listing and loopnet.com listings. They offer a site called investorconcierge.com where you have to pay $3000 just to see the listings. Honestly I think that is crazy because there are already millions of listings available you can do advanced searches on to find bargains to start a real estate portfolio. Also to have full access to the site and first picks on the properties that aren’t any better then any others you have to end up paying around $21,000. Now if you want to do that great, but I’d rather take $21,000 and buy a properties or properties with that money instead of waste it on a 40 CD audio/video course I’m never going to take the time to watch because I’m spending 100% of my time on the internet searching properties and talking to professionals about buying them. Setting up deals isn’t hard. If you can do math then you can figure out if the property you are looking at will make you money. Speaking of properties the RV/Trailor park I bought in Tennessee, a state I’ve only driven through going to California, I found off ebay.com. I usually try to avoid ebay, but most people selling properties there usually have no luck selling in town possibly because its too small with no buyers interested or there to flip a properties quickly for a resale for a quick gain, but the property might be still very underpriced for its value. This RV/trailor park came across as an awesome deal if all things work out of course. It has 1.5 acres of land off a main highway near town. It has 10 units with 6 currently being rented. The owner owned all 6 units which were included in the property of sale. Each unit rents for an average of $450/month. Doing some quick math that is $2700/month income. The owner was selling the full park for $90,000 and offered owner financing at 10% if he got the full $90,000 with a mortgage note of $700/month. The owner/landlord pays all utilities of water, sewage, electricity, and cable of around $600/month.
So the net profit off this property with only 6 units rented is $1400/month or $18,850/year because he rents them weekly not monthly so that is an extra 4 weeks of rent (before property management fee of 10% net will be $1100/month). This is more than a seamn or E-3 makes in the USCG or Navy. His auction was up for a little less than 15 days I believe more than enough time for other investors to catch their eye. I’m surprised no one bought it sooner then I did. I basically just did some research on the town, talked to the owner, and found a property manager to take over the property for me since I will be an absent owner. All the seller wanted was at least $10,000 down which was reasonable and my student loans I took out for college and investing since that is my main independent study came to use finally. Anyone can take out a $40,000 student loan from any major lender. It isn’t very hard and you can use them for many things as long as you are a full-time student. I plan to use the remaining amount for a 3rd property and the rest two buy 4 more trailors for the park. That’s right. Four more trailors only renting at $400/month each would increase my cashflow to $4300 with a net of over $2700/month. Most likely my utilities would go up some, but not likely to double. As for why would the owner sell it for so cheap? I asked him. His answer was reasonable. He said he bought it 3 years earlier and it was a dump and dead. He put 6 old cheap trailors on them and fixed them up and now looking to sell it to go onto another deal. I figure he must of not put more than $30,000 into the 6 trailors and the piece of land. So selling it for $90,000 3 years later is an awesome deal for him and myself since the park produces a very good income. I plan to pay off the remaining $80,000 I owe him on a note sooner to increase my cashflow another $700 which would make it around $2100 with only 6 units occupied. I’m pretty psyched about the deal and my property manager seems very sharp and willing to do a good job. The property manager will earn 10% of all rental income so he wants to help me get those other spots filled increasing his cashflow. I will collect my first rent next week around July 11th.
I plan to build it up, buy more trailors to rent, and pay off the note within 2-5 years.

I enrolled in 3 college online classes in HPU. I expect to get underway soon and will likely blog more occassionally because I have nothing better else to do stuck on the boat once my watch is finished. I study, write some music, and research stocks. This is a normal day underway after work. I like to sleep a lot too, but drills prevent sleep so you do everything else in between. I’m finally qualified so I’ll only have to train for drills which will open more time.

As for am I happy? Well that real estate deal even though it cost me $10,000 felt like buying a bran new car even though it is very new or pretty. I haven’t been very happy lately. Actually this girl I asked to dance and talked to at a concert is really bugging me. I really wish I’d gotten her phone number instead of giving her my fun looking business card! Well I guess I might learn next time, or not. I’m getting fat too. As for personal life fatness sucks. No ninja is quick or stealth-like getting fatter. I plan to exercise more, do more push-ups, and sit-ups, but I have yet to get started. Why? Hmm… a little bit of lazy-ness most likely… Underway you usually get fatter since all you do is eat. I plan to only eat cereal and soups. This should cut down and help me keep that extra sea fat off.

well aloha
-fn


Wi-fitv.com (WTVI) advertising on Myspace.com – good move

I feel wi-fitv.com advertising on myspace.com is the best idea for their buck. If they invest half million dollars on banner ads throughout the myspace.com social network it should definitely drive up hits on wi-fitv.com, give it possible station sales from interested older buyers, build up a new database of videos, and bring in new investors wanting to buy a stock at a penny. This by far, in my opinion, will help the image of the company gain popularity which any website needs to do to survive and make the bucks. If you read in the recent news article it says the advertisers gave a commitment because of the new myspace.com advertisign campaign, which is “bling bling music” singing in my ears. The WTVI stock will stay volatile as any penny stock is but it should also move accordingly if older investors and new are enthusiatic about this very positive news. Now it is up to wi-fitv.com to keep alert on any errors throughout it site and contantly updating it to support its web-video interface system.

As for other things going on today I just sent out some awesome daisy crysanthemums to the ladies at the HPU military admin office. They were very charming and laughed at my humorous jokes. Plus there was a really sweet girl there and I like to go out with a bang to get the brownie points and possible response if she’s interested in another chat. So I’m pysched about sending flowers I always enjoy it whether they like them or not. It’s fun! Don’t you love unexpected surprises? I want a caring surprise! Send me something at work and I’ll be blushing all day then blow up or something.

dating ideas forĀ dorks

Oh yes. I guess I should also let you know I finally started college classes again enrolled with Hawaii Pacific University. My other co-workers are doing it and if they finishes their degrees before mine I’d get jealous so I guess you can say there is a bit of competition. I decided on a BA in Justice Administration just because I have so many electives in business and I only have 12 core classes left to get the degree. So far my humanities class Sociology has been pretty interesting. I like to study groups of people so I’m diggin the class and the teacher knows his stuff. My other class will be Political Science and I hear that teacher is also a riot so I’m stoked.

-FN