Everything begins in the home.  It is amazing how much you learn from your home-life, good and bad.  It is great if you are living a life of love, joy, peace, and abundance.  You find yourself in God’s incubator for life.  All of His principles are found, learned, and hopefully practiced there.  That is awesome.  The other side is when someone has found themselves in a home that is broken, devoid of love, joy, peace, or abundance.  Both of these situations are common and both are evidence of the spiritual battle we find ourselves in daily – the Kingdom of God displacing the kingdom of darkness.  Even though our battle is not against flesh and blood, the enemy uses flesh and blood.  People’s choices decide which Kingdom advances.  Tactics of the enemy involve lethargy – so many do not even recognize the battle.  Others believe the lie that “this is the way it is, and you can’t change it.”  But others, those born of water and blood, those born of the Spirit – the Saints of the Most High God know that Jesus has all authority on earth and has conferred His Kingdom upon us.  We are His body.  We are forcefully advancing the Kingdom of light.  We are able to offer hope to the lost, hurting, and poverty-stricken.  As I mentioned last week the people in need are in desperate need to renew their minds according to God’s will BUT first they must have the physical need addressed.  In the case of community redemption and in our case that is a safe place to live.  Full circle, it all begins in a home.

That’s the spirit driving us, now let’s lose some elevation and begin to look at the home in the basics of community redemption through real estate.  The first thing you need is a house.  You can use any house, but in order for this to grow, I would suggest you find houses that offer three things.  First, a house in need of redemption.  Second, equity, or hidden value, the ability to increase in value with some work.  Third, the house will rent for 1% of the purchase price or more.

A house in need of redemption can be identified by a few unique characteristics.  You are not interested in a house that has structural flaws like a bad foundation, termite infestation, etc.  It may need paint and minor maintenance, that is what you’re looking for.  Landscaping probably needs attention because it is either overgrown or non-existent.  These are all things easily done and add a great deal of value in appearance.  Remember, the way the house is maintained is the way you value the tenant moving in.  You don’t have to gold plate the door knob, but you better paint the trim!  The front door may be a candidate to replace.  The inside will always be cleaned – everything!  Paint the inside with warm current colors.  Replace carpet and floors to compliment the colors of the paint.  New faucets are usually needed and add aesthetic value as well as being useful.  Refurbish or replace cabinets to match.  These are characteristics of a house in need of redemption.  You don’t have to look very far to discover houses like this, but  do they fit the other criteria?

The second criteria is equity and/or hidden value.  This is critical for three reasons.

1. The tenant is not currently able to obtain a mortgage for one reason or another.  Usually credit problems, cash problems, or both.  This is where we have an opportunity to “leave the edges of the field for the poor” as described in Leviticus 22:23.  In other words, share some of the equity you receive by buying right, then there is equity to pass on.  This helps lenders give a loan, at the end of the process, because it reduces the loan to value ratio or to say it differently it reduces the amount of the loan.

2. You have to make money to live, and equity in the house is part of that.  You can cloak yourself in a spirit of poverty and give it all away, but within a short time you will be in need of help yourself.  Do not ever forget the goal, for God’s glory, is this lives past you.  It can only do that if the plan/model grows and pays for itself.

3.  To do more than a few houses in your lifetime you need investors with a heart for community redemption.  They are out there and they want to be able to invest their money and it grow to be used again and again.  The only way that happens is for you to pay them a decent rate of return.  To do this you better buy right.  This way there is a slice of the pie for everyone involved.

The third criteria; Will it rent for at least 1% of the purchase price?  This is important for the same reasons above – cash flow.  There has to be enough pie for everyone to get a slice or one of the players isn’t going to want to play.  If rent is too high the tenant will not be interested.  If it is too low you won’t be able to offer a decent rate of return and may not even be able to pay yourself for doing all the work.  We want to buy the right house so the pie will feed everyone and they will be satisfied.

This is a short overview of the basics for finding a house that fits the community redemption model.  You will certainly need to be experienced and understand the nuances of everything that has been shared.  There are loads of great resources out there and probably even more bad ones.  Don’t bother with the bad ones 🙂  I would highly recommend Billy Epperhart’s book, Real Estate Mastery.  He has a Kingdom mindset and a gracious heart.  He also has great tips on his blog and YouTube.  His website is www.wealthbuilders.com.  There is a fantastic real estate attorney named Bill Bronchick who has tons of YouTube videos to help in your quest of education too.  His website is www.legalwiz.com.

Next week we will discuss the Community Redemption Model.  Thank you for your interest and taking the time to read this, I look forward to your comments and questions.  I pray God continues to unfold His perfect plan for your life to impact the world around you with His presence, love, and purpose!  Please share this with others that may have interest and ears to hear.  Remember the greatest investment we can ever make is in people.  It will transform the world.