How do we pick the houses to rehab?

We do not have a set procedure for picking houses we rehab or even for finding houses to purchase. However, we are becoming smarter in our selection of houses. The first house we purchased had no plumbing. It sat on pier and beam and someone had gotten underneath and stolen the copper pipes. We did not find this out until after we had bought the house. That of course added quite a bit to the cost of remodelling the house. I found this house just driving around looking at houses. We bought it from another rehabber who started the project and ran out of money. We now know why.

Two of the houses we have purchased we learned about by word of mouth, just asking the right person who knew someone that had a house for sale.

I answered an ad in the newspaper about a house for sale and it was owned by someone I went to high school with. We then bought a second house from him, and it is the house we have under contract now.
We have turned down houses when the asking price was too high, and or the repairs were going to be too extensive.


Our current process involves having the realtor, contractor and my wife and I look at the house. The contractor gives us his opinion on the cost of repairs needed, and our realtor tells us what she thinks the house will sell for. All four of us have to agree that it's a good deal. We recently decided that we will also pay an inspector to give us his opinion, so we can avoid surprises like the ones we got on the first house we did.