How To Buy Tiny Homes Without Getting Burned

Wiring money for a tiny home can feel like a gamble if you don’t have a process, and I’ve learned the hard way that “good deals” can still bleed you with moving costs, bad paperwork, or sellers who change their mind. I’m Travis Wells, and I’m walking you through how I just lined up two new tiny homes at steep discounts and how I protect myself so I can keep buying consistently without cash stress.

You’ll hear the exact checkpoints I use before I accept an assignment from a wholesaler, including why I won’t let anyone rush me with fake urgency. I share what I look for during a fast walk-through, how I split deposits to keep both sides safe, and how seller motivation (like converting space into high-demand RV spots near Austin, Texas) can create opportunity if you ask the right questions.

Then we get tactical on the stuff that quietly destroys returns: transport, decks, fencing, plumbing, and electrical. I break down how one question took moving quotes from $5,000 down to about $700, how I stack vendors to get work done cheaper, and how bundling electrical repairs in my park got my tiny home hookups handled without the usual multi-thousand-dollar hit. We also talk contracts for tiny homes, including using ChatGPT to draft simple agreements when you’re dealing with bill of sale style paperwork.

If you’re into tiny home investing, mobile home park investing, RV park cash flow, and practical negotiation, this one is built for you. Subscribe, share this with a friend who’s buying off-market deals, and leave a review so more investors can find the playbook.

Transcript

Why Tiny Homes Beat The Hamster Wheel

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Got a cool story for y'all today. All right. So I bought two tiny homes recently, new tiny homes, right? Not the ones I've told you about in the past. These are badass. And I want to tell you how I got them, how I protect myself from losing money. You know, anybody could lose money. Things happen. But I have systems and processes that I'm going to share with you when I buy these because I'm buying two a month right now, typically, because I already told you I'm trying to fill this park with tiny homes. That's the play for me, right? So, anyways, let's jump into it. I want to give you some proven strategies. So hopefully you don't lose any money like I did when I was a rookie back in the day, and and you know, and how you protect yourself, protect people you work with, uh, protect your capital, your investment, get the deals you want, make sure it's a good deal, all the stuff I'm gonna break down for you just from my experience. Don't take anything I say as gospel, right? It's just my experience, how I do things, and how I've been successful at it and continue to be successful. I'm learning just like you, right? I learn new lessons every single day, and I like to talk about them. I like to tell you the good, the bad, and where I screwed up, where I did great. Hopefully that helps you. And if you've got anything you want to share, put it in comments, any of that stuff. And by the way, if you're new to my uh my podcast, my channel, whatever you're watching this on, my name's Travis Wells. I'm a real estate investor. I invest in mobile home parks, RV parks. Had a single family wholesaling company forever, still do it kind of, but it's not my focus. I mainly focus on parks, right? I was able to build a lot more wealth with parks. I like parks a lot better because cash flows a lot better. I'm not on that hamster wheel. I don't compete with anybody, right? Everybody's chasing the those houses these days. I'm not, right? I chase the bigger money now. That's what I like doing. Anyways, back to the segment. All right.

The Deal Rule Before Assignment

SPEAKER_01 1:54

So this is how I bought the first new tiny home. Wholesaler, bird dog, whatever you want to call them, brings me a deal. All right. I tell them what price I wanted at, what to negotiate, all the stuff. And I'm like, lock it up. They're like, okay, can we send the assignment? No. You can send the assignment once I'm warm and fuzzy. And this is how I get warm and fuzzy. I'm actually going out that way. It's on the way to where I'm going in a couple days, which was a bodybuilding competition in Austin. It was right outside of Austin. I was like, I'm gonna stop by there. I want to meet the owner. All right. I want to walk the place. I want to make sure it doesn't have any funny smells. It doesn't have any soft spots in the floor. There's nothing that aren't in the pictures that, you know, it can be moved. I'm gonna look under it to make sure nothing's pitted, right? If it's all rusted out, I don't want it. Like it can't be moved. All that stuff is what I'm gonna go look for. And it takes me all of every bit of three minutes, right? And I don't go visit everything in person, but I mean, I'm paying $15,000 for this, which these cost, they bought this for I think $40 something. Yeah, right. So I'll break down why they're selling all that stuff. So, anyways, um, wholesalers like, no problem. They know me, we do business, they know I do do good business. And by the way, if like a wholesaler, anybody tries to pressure you into doing anything, like, and and you're not comfortable, like, hey, I want the earnest money right now, we need to lock this up now, somebody else is gonna get it. It's like, cool, let them have it. I don't even deal with those types of people. And 99% of them are that way, right? Cool with me, no problem. But if you've worked with me, you know that everybody's gonna win, including me. I'm not getting screwed, you're not getting screwed, homeowners not getting screwed, we're all gonna do good business. That's how I like to operate. It's a lot different than other folks. Not saying people don't do good business, but they want everything right now, right now. It's not how good business works, in my opinion. Not at all. That's one-sided, anyways. So, two days later, drive up there, meet with the owner. They actually own this establishment. I'm not gonna mention what kind of establishment it is because I don't want, you know. Anyways, um, I don't want like anybody's privacy. Not it's not a bad establishment, it's a business. But, anyways, I don't I don't know if they want me to tell people they're selling because they run these as vacation rules. I'll show you pictures and do some footage once I get them to or get it. Well, get them because I'm buying it from the same owner. They're badass, by the way. Badass tiny homes. So this particular one walked it, walked around it, met the owner, felt good, good person, right? I'm like, cool. I'm gonna wire you $7,500 today to hold it, right? And then whenever we pick it up, I'm gonna send you the other $7,500. She's like, cool, no problem. I said that protects both of us, right? We're under contract because the wholesaler locked it up. As soon as I saw it, I let them assign it to me. I didn't pay any earnest money, right? They know me. We do business, right? Is what it is. And because a tiny home is $15,000. So, anyways, I paid the deposit and the wholesaler will get their thousand bucks that we agreed on whenever we close. And we're gonna close this week now, because I told them next week. All right, this place is awesome. So, why is the why is

Why The Seller Wants Them Gone

SPEAKER_01 5:09

the owner selling it? Well, they have uh like a mixed establishment. Uh, it's a business with like all sorts of different businesses in there, and they actually want to remove the two tiny homes. I'll tell you about the second one in a minute. Um, that way they can make this into this portion of the property into like a little RV park. But those tiny homes are taking up a lot of real estate. They got fencing decks, and they've like made it real pretty over there just for the two, but they want to capitalize on that land. They don't want to be landlords, they're doing vacation rentals on them, and they just want people to bring their RVs because they have a demand for it. The RV spots there, the RV parks there in that town are just packed, which I need to start marketing over there because I want one of them. But, anyways, um, you know, I told the owner, I was like, man, that's a badass tiny home next door. Do you want to sell that one? They're like, Yeah, somebody's been wanting to buy it, but you know, we need to sell that one too. And I'll I made a deal with them. I got some money off of it, which it was a bigger, not even nicer tiny home. I told her I'd give her $22,000 for that one. And I was like, look, I'll give you $5,000. I'm gonna send a contract when I'm back to my bodybuilding competition next week, and I'm gonna give you $5,000 deposit. I want you to hold it, and then I'll pay for it the rest of it on the 10th of the following month. She's like, no problem. If you're buying this one from me, I want to sell both of them to you. Right. And the reason I did that is cash flow, right? Because this particular park brings in, I don't know, 30 something thousand a month. So, you know, I don't want to spend all this money up front and like have cash constraints at any time. I like to have reserves, I like to have plenty of cash. So I'm like, I buy two a month. I don't want to put myself in a bind with that particular park. So I like, you know, so we'll buy, and she didn't have any problem. So put the five grand and then I'll give the remaining 17, uh, making sure I did my bath. Yeah, 17. And there's no wholesaler on that one, right? Because I negotiated it, you know, with her. And by the way, if you're a wholesaler, look for properties in the area and see if it's the same owner because you can get paid multiple times. I would have paid them again if they brought me the deal, but I'm the one that saw it when I was there. All right, they didn't even know they were selling another one. So ask questions. More questions leads to more opportunities. Opportunities can turn into more dollars, right?

Finding A Mover And Saving Thousands

SPEAKER_01 7:32

And here's the other thing is movers. I called several movers, they wanted like four and five grand to move a damn tiny home. It has a hitch on it. You can't pull it with a regular truck. Um, and I was like, hey, you know, as the owner, I was like, who put these here for you? Who moved them? Oh, it's a great dude. He's licensed, insured, he does a lot of work around here, built this park, did that. And I'm like, cool, can I have his numbers? Like, yeah, the dude's gonna move them for $700 each. My quotes were five grand. All right. And I'm like, well, by the way, so I don't because I have to rebuild decks, stairs, because a lot of movers won't take that stuff. And then I got to spend another 500 to a thousand bucks to do all this other crap. I'm like, how much would you charge me extra to bring the decking and to bring the fence? Right? Because it's a nice fence too, and she doesn't want any of it. And he's like, another 700 bucks. I'm like, done. So like I'm gonna get this tiny home transported, set up, fence, deck for what, 1400 bucks? And I was like, hey, will you hook up the plumbing too? He's like, sure. How much will it be? A few hundred bucks, right? Because these aren't that hard, the sewer and the and the water line. And I'm like, dude, this is crazy. Because uh, if you call a plumber, a plumber's gonna charge you three grand, even though it's easy, they're gonna charge you three grand to hook it up. And I'm telling you this, that I'm gonna save, I'm saved you probably 10 grand with this with this conversation we're having right now. All right. Now I have an electrician. I wanted to give you some more sauce here. I have an electrician coming out because I have three pads that the electrical uh underneath the ground um is just we're having like shortages, like it has a short in it somewhere. So there's like three pads that aren't working, right? And they like put this wire in without conduit. Maybe it's shallow in those areas. I don't know. So when you drive over, you know, I don't know what the hell it is. I haven't seen it, but I'm just assuming. But anyways, they're gonna fix this for me. It's gonna cost me five grand to fix the three pads. But I was like, hey, by the way, what will you charge me to hook up these tiny homes if I do it at the same time you're fixing that? They're like, oh, we'll just do it for free. Cost three grand to hook up electric, because you have to use a licensed electrician, you should, to hook these up. And it will cost three grand each. So six grand, but I was like, hey, if I give you this five grand worth of work, what will you do? And they're like, well, we'll do it for free, Travis, right? Just give us the five grand of work. So, like, I got some stuff free, right? Which is pretty badass. So, all in, you know, I'm like under two grand each to get these set up. So my rule is I like to be $25,000 in on any spot that I put in or less, and I win, right? That's a good rule of thumb for me. A lot of people say you can't do it. I'm documenting this for you to show you how I'm doing it. No BS, no fluff. This is how I do it, right? And today, that other tiny home she had, I have my assistant um drafting

Electric, Plumbing, And Bundled Free Work

SPEAKER_01 10:42

the contract now. And where do you get a contract for something like this? It's like a bill of sale and no title and all this stuff. Use Chat GPT. Um let me, I'm sorry, I'm not telling you what to do, I'm telling you what we do. My assistant will I'll send them pictures of the tiny home, right? And then I'll say, hey, draft a contract. And they'll put all it into a chat GPT with the owner's information, our information, our entity, and our close date and everything we've talked about. And then we send it to the owner, and now we have a contract, right? It's signed. And then I'll send the five, I'll have my bookkeepers send the $5,000 deposit. We're locked in, right? Like I said earlier, yeah, we can lose the $5,000, but we do have a contract, and contracts are enforceable in Texas. So I can get that money back if I really wanted to, or just cause some discomfort legally. So, like, but people aren't pick the right people you're gonna do business with. Not saying that you know, some people can't pull something over on you, but I met these people, they own a good establishment, good business, they have a good game plan. I understand it. There's no questions. We like each other. They even texted me, how'd your show go? Like we're buddies now. I like making friends with people like that. They're building a damn park. They got a flourishing business right outside of Austin, Texas, right? Those are the kind of people I like to meet. Those are my people, you know? So that's how I did it. That's how I'm doing it. You want to talk numbers on these

Paperwork With ChatGPT Plus Rent To Own Math

SPEAKER_01 12:05

tiny homes now? Now I haven't done it yet, but I'm not gonna give you optimistic numbers. I'm gonna give you proven numbers from my others. Um, this one I'm getting, I guess the first one is equivalent to the one I just sold on a rent to own. Over time, it'll make us $120,000 if they don't pay it off early. But we sold it for $49,000 on a rent to own, and a couple hundred dollars a month goes to principal. All right. Like that's how we sold the other one. I'm probably gonna do the same thing on this one, but I think I'm gonna I think I get $9.75 a month. I charge the other dude $8.75 a month. Um, but I think I get this one's like cooler, right? It's just cool, it's like unique. I can't wait to show it to y'all. But let's just say it's $8.75 a month and I do the same thing, $49,000 purchase. That's a good deal for this home, right? But over 15 years or 16 years. So you can do the math. It's like you know, triple if you don't ever pay it off early, right? Um, and then and then I'm buying, you know, her other one. That one has three bedrooms, but it's it's there's two lofts, like it's badass. I I'll probably, I mean, the market over there, I could charge like $1,200 for it in any other market, but well, it's San Antonio, but I don't I don't like uh waiting. I like to just move money. I think if I put that thing for $975, it would fly. I think it's way too cheap, but I think it would fly, and that's what I want. I'm fine with $9.75 a month, right? On 20, let's just call it $24,000 all in, $9.75 a month for 16 years. You know, like I'm okay with that, right? So on a rent to own, so I don't have any maintenance, repairs, anything like that. So pretty cool stuff going

Wrap Up And Where To Follow

SPEAKER_01 14:03

on. Again, my name's Travis Wells. This is the Property Profits Podcast. Thank you so much for listening to me. I ramble on about tiny homes. I hope you're interested. If you're still here, I know you are. Follow me on social media, Facebook. I document not only real estate, but fitness, everything I do. This is a lifestyle thing for me, right? I'm an open book. I have a funny story on there from last night when I got to Pittsburgh. You know, side note, there was a I was looking for a gym and ended up at a anyways, read the post.

SPEAKER_00 14:33

I don't even want to get into it. It was crazy. But uh, I left and went to a gym.

SPEAKER_01 14:38

But, anyways, um, YouTube, we've got that. Instagram, refer a friend, family member to the show. Would love it. Means the world. It'll help the algorithm pick us up and help more people document this journey. Until next time, see y'all.