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Jack Murphy
Archived Posts from this Category
Fri 28 Mar 2008
Posted by admin under Media , Jack Murphy 1 Comment
 I find it so interested how vial, rude and basically just plain nasty people can be when they have the anonymity of the Internet to hide behind. So I thought this week I would focus on things people say in the comments sections at the bottoms of online new story’s. (more…)
Thu 20 Mar 2008
Recently I have seen TV infomercial’s where some guy is telling the viewer how to get rich in real estate. I watched a couple of them while riding my exercise bike the other morning and was laughing my rear-end off when I actually figured out what they (more…)
Tue 11 Mar 2008
Yep, the earth is getting warmer. Except where its not.Like most places not originally called deserts. In those ‘other’ places where it’s not warmer, it’s getting colder earlier in the year and staying colder longer. (more…)
Fri 7 Mar 2008
 Dear Democrats, Thank you for choosing Mr. Obama as your presidential candidate. He is a wonderful, good family man and should be a tremendous candidate for you. However, I warned you. I warned you in these pages too. I said please, chose Hillary. Make a smart decision. (more…)
Thu 17 Jan 2008
 Jack Murphy, a Beacon contributor, and his wife Lia Murphy relocated to Michigan last year in what turned out to be an adventure in the property market. Selling their home in Santa Clarita just before the bubble burst and moving to (more…)
Thu 1 Nov 2007
Dear Ray and Tom, After reading your comments yesterday during a Government inquiry into car emissions and CAFE standards, I found myself insulted and in disbelief. Well, kind of. You are from New England and that should have told me that you are both so liberal that you have to espouse your (more…)
Fri 6 Jul 2007
Posted by admin under Jack Murphy [2] Comments
I have been worried and thinking lately about Iraq and the future. If and when we leave there will be a huge void left. We are the security there. We control the influx of bad guys (more…)
Tue 15 May 2007
I hate to keep harping on this, but I think its time to state the obvious. Presidential Candidate Obama has doomed the Democratic Party and its attempt to win in 2008.
When Obama came to the Detroit economic club and in front of the leaders of GM, Chrysler and Ford and a bunch of engineers and economy gurus, mostly all Democrats, and said basically that they are all stupid and the Japanese are smarter and as President he will put them all in their place. He doomed the party. (more…)
Thu 5 Apr 2007
This week Time Magazine offers 51 things you can do to help reduce carbon emissions and help slow the effects of global warming. Let’s look at #29, taken direct from Time Magazine.
“Leave your tie at home. In the summer of 2005, Japanese Salary men swapped their trademark dark blue suites for open collars and light tropical colors. It was all part of a Japanese governments effort to save energy by keeping office temperatures at 82.4 degrees F throughout the summer.
The policy caused sartorial confusion but did make a dent in Japans rising carbon emissions. In one summer, Japan cut an estimated 79,000 tons of co 2. If the U.S. business eased off on their arctic-level air conditioning, the gains could be significant. Time to make every summer day casual Friday?”
Now here is a great step we ALL can agree is GREAT for the environment and GREAT for all of us who hate ties and suits. Where shorts or light khaki’s and a light shirt and turn off the AC during the week.
Jack Murphy
Commentary
Jack Murphy is an independent real estate investor. His commentaries represent his own opinions and not necessarily the views of any organization he may be affiliated with or those of the West Ranch Beacon.
Tue 3 Apr 2007
I am writing this while sitting at my desk in Michigan in April, with snow on it way. Yeah, I know. Global warming has different effects on different parts of the world. I hear that the biggest impacts will be at the equator and in the tropics. They say those areas will be destroyed. But interestingly, they ALL say that North America and most of Europe will experience little effects. Hummm, how convenient that it wont actually effect us eh? Or is it just a way to keep up the charade for years and years? “Look, we said it wasn’t going to affect North America”.
(more…)
Wed 21 Mar 2007
Posted by admin under Jack Murphy No Comments
After 13 years in sunny southern California, Jack Murphy and his family moved back to Michigan in November — for good writes Detroit News columnist Daniel Howes.
And all he and his wife, Lia, seemed to get from the folks on the other end of the phone was a lot of whining and one big, fat dose of disbelief.
“Imagine calling to have Edison, consumers gas, water and cable all hooked up and the first thing they ask you is why would you move from L.A. to Michigan,” says Murphy, 40, a Clinton Township native who graduated from Ferris State and is now a sales rep for Fidelity Title Co.
(more…)
Tue 6 Feb 2007
Posted by admin under Jack Murphy No Comments
Jack Murphy, one of the original columnists for the West Ranch Beacon, has been on a bit of a sabbatical since last November. He and his lovely wife Lia, after having there third child, decided to go on an adventure to the upper mid-west. Their back in the Santa Clarita and Jack details what he has been doing, aside from freezing his tail off, for the past three months. Welcome back Jack!
Well, we are finally home back in the SCV and for me, if only for a week or so a month or just on some weekends. A lot of people have been calling and emailing me and asking where the heck I have been since November. Others know or knew our plan. So here is the story.
As you may know, we just had our 3rd child; a very happy and healthy baby girl. As you also may know, the real estate market in Southern California has been steadily dropping for the past year.
Well, my wife and I had a great idea. She was off on maternity leave from her job for a few months so we decided to sell our house here in SCV while the market was still high and then go to Michigan and invest that money in houses and rent them out. The market in Michigan has been rotten for a number of years and basically, you can set your own price. The positive side is that rent is still very high there in most places.
So, October 1st we bought our first Michigan house, November 13th we bought 3 more. The week before Christmas we bought another one and currently we have offers out on another one and I am looking at 2 others there.
Imagine buying 3 bedroom 2 bath older homes in a very decent neighborhood ( Think older Canyon Country ), for $65,000 with 10% down, payments of around $350 per month, taxes of $100 per month and insurance of say $30 a month for a total monthly out lay of $500 per month. Now imagine renting it for $750-$800 per month. Imagine putting an ad in the paper looking for renters and getting 20 phone calls a day and being able to get the pick out of a batch of 100 plus qualified renters.
Our renters pay the total pmti on the house and we have a few hundred left over on each house at the end of the month. At the end of the year I can also write off the depreciation on the rental houses. We are not doing some crazy get rich scheme or something you see on a late night commercial. We are just buying houses with 10% or so down, one with 20%, and then getting renters for them and then starting the process over again. Just normal buying; but 10% down on a 65K house is only $6,500.
I have learned so much I could never put it all here on these pages. One very valuable lesson I learned on the lending side is when it comes to investment properties if you already have a renter then the house you are buying is considered an immediate asset as opposed to it being a liability due to its vacancy. So, I started buying houses with a “twist”. The offer to buy was based on me finding a renter and getting the renter to accept the house and sign a lease agreement with me BEFORE we close the sale among other things.
That’s what we have been doing. Chasing the deals for a few months was total fun. I look at literally 50 houses a day either on-line or up close and personal and all the while still running my Title/Escrow office in Orange County remotely, as I have always done.
We are now back in SCV, my wife is back to work and we have an offer on a place locally now. I think the market here is getting ready to rebound. First it will be the houses at the lower price end. They will see the growth first, that will then put sales pressure on the middle priced houses and then so on and so on. That’s what I have seen in the Mid West over the past few months as the markets there start to winter rebound.
As the weeks and months go by I will provide you with updates and ideas as well as provide you with the details of what and how I did certain things. I have so much to share that I have learned. My next step is a book. Not a get rich quick book but more a how to take the fear out of investing in real estate for beginners type of book. I am so excited to share what I have learned and all the problems we have faced. Its been so much fun.
It’s good to be home for a while!!!
Jack Murphy
Commentary
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