“My wife and I are current real estate investors and former flippers.

But Andrew Herrig, of the blog Wealthy Nickel, found himself particularly frustrated trying to successfully flip a house in the current climate. You always have to do your due diligence to find a contractor who’s both efficient and reputable. Good contractors are hard to find.Īsk anyone who’s attempted a home renovation recently and they’ll all tell the same story: contractors are in high demand right now. Allen did walk away with a profit, but whether it was worth the headache is the question. When your house flipping equation relies on doing the work yourself, throwing in the extra costs associated with a contractor can skew the profit margin. But I quickly learned if you don’t have the skills to DIY yourself, it can get very expensive, and I didn’t have the extra capital to pay contractors to do all the necessary work.” Still, I found a way by purchasing a fixer upper. You need capital and good credit to start, and I didn’t have much of either. “Unfortunately, getting into the field wasn’t as easy as the experts made it seem. “I was one of those idealistic folks who saw everyone talking about how great flipping houses is - and I wanted in!” she says.

She bought houses both in Georgia and Pennsylvania before realizing that DIY is a unique skill set that isn’t as easy as picking up a hammer. Melanie Allen, who runs the blog Partners in Fire, went in bright eyed and excited about the opportunity to buy a house in need of a little (or a lot of) love, fix it up with her own two hands, then turn around and sell it for a profit. I talked to three former flippers about their experience, the problems they encountered, and what drove them to quit house flipping. For every house flipper who finds the path to entrepreneurship, another loses money - or at least their patience - in the deal. Before you know it, you’ve quit your day job and you’re on the path to a home reno empire.Įxcept it’s not always that easy. It seems too good to be true, right? You buy a house for a fraction of what it could be worth, fix it up with a bit of elbow grease, put it on the market, witness a bidding war, and turn your massive profits into your next project. From watching regular people who strike gold flipping houses into Magnolia-worthy renos to those who create their dream home out of a diamond in the rough, who hasn’t wondered if they should get in on the game? Flipping houses is all fun and dollar signs on TV.

House flipper buyers