We be out of here, not a fuk CA or fuk AZ post

[Rondog4405]

Congrats Walt! Absolutely living the dream.. man I'd go nuts fishing those parts

 

[n2otoofast4u]

1- we’ll be out to visit! That’s a part of the country on our list, and I can think of no way better to sway the vote than a little tour of your lake on the toon!

2- this REALLY sucks for us out west, now we have to pay transport to get the boats back here that you sell!!! LOL

3- Nothing but respect here. We followed you through your wife cancer stuff, we cheered when she got the nod. A few house flips, lord knows how many boat flips (I was a recipient of those), you’re always Walt, like love or hate. I remember when you were wanting to test props on I don’t even recall which boat. I had those brand new Hill CNC (fake Merc) that I had never even seen let alone use them. Never thought twice when I text you to grab them from Joe and give them a try. You’ve always been nice to me, you’re just another dude in my book. Congrats Walt, you’re living the dream!

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

1- we’ll be out to visit! That’s a part of the country on our list, and I can think of no way better to sway the vote than a little tour of your lake on the toon!

2- this REALLY sucks for us out west, now we have to pay transport to get the boats back here that you sell!!! LOL

3- Nothing but respect here. We followed you through your wife cancer stuff, we cheered when she got the nod. A few house flips, lord knows how many boat flips (I was a recipient of those), you’re always Walt, like love or hate. I remember when you were wanting to test props on I don’t even recall which boat. I had those brand new Hill CNC (fake Merc) that I had never even seen let alone use them. Never thought twice when I text you to grab them from Joe and give them a try. You’ve always been nice to me, you’re just another dude in my book. Congrats Walt, you’re living the dream!

Thanks, glad I could help please message me any time if your going to be in the area

And thanks for the props to test, you cost be a good chunk of $$ that day

 

[1manshow]

Glad you enjoyed it.

Sorry off subject…. Any bites on your storage unit??

 

[monkeyswrench]

@ONE-A-DAY , congratulations to you and your wife! Not just on the purchase or the playing of the real-estate game, but for her making it out of the job and you both attaining what most consider a dream. You both reached serious goals.

 

[Jay Dub]

Congratulations Walt. On a lake, with a nice dock. yes! great looking house as well.

 

[rivrrts429]

Let me ruffle some feathers……
Form what I read, took Cali money, Exploited Havasu market, bragged about it, capitalized on Havasu market then bounced. Then wrote a story that said miss me. Lol. Great story.

That’s capitalism at its best and I fully support Walt’s choices. I’d switch shoes with him in a split second and congratulate him on a job well done.

 

[C-Ya]

Well this whole thing is getting real. Rewind 6 years back, we decided to sell our Anaheim Hills home and invest the proceeds into a full time sized house in Havasu and rent in CA for a few years before going full time in Havasu once my wife retired from nursing. I can run my company from anywhere so why not. We sold the OC house at what we thought was the top of market, who would have thought where it would be today, but we still made a killing on it having owned the place for 20 years. We upgraded the havasu program from a weekend home to a full time sized place. We did very well selling our weekend place here and that started the ball rolling on Havasu real estate. My wife's side gig is fixing up homes so over the next 6 years we sold three Havasu houses and we kept upgrading and rolling over the profits into the houses and slowly ending up with a smaller and smaller mortgage. We moved every two years once the capital gains issue timed out. I worked from Havasu and my wife drove back to work as a nurse, working 4 days on 10 days off, and staying in a small rental condo we shared with our kids in Anaheim Hills.

Fast forward to earlier in 2021, Covid is in full blown ape shit mode in CA and the deal comes down that all healthcare workers have to be vax'd as of 10/1/21. My wife is a cancer survivor and wasn't comfortable taking the jab, that combined with how much of a shit show nursing has become since covid, so she cashed in her 32 years as a nurse and retired. Best thing she ever did, all of her coworkers absolutely hate their jobs and the working conditions now.

At the same time, our son starts dating this traveling nurse that my wife worked with and she is from Alabama. We got to know the family and they invited us to Alabama for Thanksgiving. We had a great time and like we usually do checked out zillow when we were there and started exploring. Near their home is Lewis Smith Lake, its about twice the size of Havasu, 600 miles of shoreline and one of the cleanest lakes in the country. My wife knew of my dream, live on a lake with my boat in the backyard and have no mortgage. So we called a local realtor and saw some homes. Made two more trips to spend time with the realtor and then found the house that made the decision easy. We fell in love with the area and the people, its just a different pace, kids say yes sir and yes mam and you can hear a pin drop when the national anthem plays at a football game. We both grew up in small towns on the east coast so the whole thing just felt like home to us both.

Next up, call Stacy and lets see what we can sell the house for. Like anything in Havasu realty these days we were like, "are you serious"? Listed the house, it sold in 3 weeks at basically full asking price. Hopped on a plane two days later back to Alabama and inked the deal on a lake house. We are no longer tied to any one location with my wife retiring and with zoom and a nearby airport I can work from anywhere.

For a little over a million we bought a brand new 4000 square foot home on 1.2 waterfront acres with year round water with a sandy beach. Its a gated community with our own launch ramp for residents. The house will have a 30 by 30 boat house with two lifts for our toon and a boat for me. With Havasu real estate market the way it has been the past 5 years or so we were able to pay cash for the place which is really comforting as we knock on the door of 60. The dock wont be done for this summer since all dock construction has to be completed by 3/31. After that they start bringing the water level back up, and the dock builders are about 6 months out so we met with the dock builder and designed what we wanted and they will be starting it soon.

Yes the summers are humid as fuck but Havasu full time summers suck as well. Sitting in a cove on a Saturday with a beer when its a 120 in Havasu is one thing, doing errands on a wednesday when its 120 degrees is a whole different animal. Our plan was to leave Havasu this summer for about three months and travel to cooler spots in the motorhome and we are going to do the same from Alabama, just basically a different home base. We also plan to spend alot of time back in Havasu visiting friends and family in our motorhome and having friends come out to visit us, so we had the builder ad a 50 foot RV pad with full hookups.

Sold most of the toys, market is nuts for all of that as well as you all know, and I think our timing is good as this bubble has to deflate a little bit, so I think we sold the toys at the perfect time. I found a mint condition Mirage mod vp with a merc racing 260 on it in Michigan and sent the guy a deposit, he is going to hold it till we get situated and it will be the perfect compliment parked in the boat house next to our toon and a couple sea doos. Performance boating on the lake isnt at all what is like in Havasu, its toons, dock crushers and glitter bass boats. The fastest boats on the lake are the bass boats, so my plan it to put an end to all of that and started kicking some glitter boat ass.

So we close on 3/11 on the sale of our Havasu house and close on the Alabama home on 3/15.

We would both like to say thank you to Stacy and Team RDP for getting us in and out of 4 homes in roughly 9 years, and allowing me to live my dream on living on a lake. And yes we all bitch about Havasu real estate prices but it played out well for us on timing and it turned out to be my wifes side job basically getting the houses dialed in and then selling them once they were.

If anyone wants to visit just let us know.......pics are still a work in progress but it will be done soon. Also the 3 car garage is free standing, we added that and it has not been started yet in these pics, the dirt being moved in the pic is where the garage goes.

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If you and your wife ever come down to South Florida…… I would be happy to take you and your wife out on my boat.

Great story……We have a lot in common.

 

[PaPaG]

Walt, you are living the dream, congrats. I bet you are going to love it there, house looks amazing. Keep us posted for sure.

 

[gqchris]

Nice congrats sir!

If there are two members I envy on here the most, it is you and @SJP . Both living my dreams, and I enjoy living vicariously thru both of your posts.

Boat House, Lake in my backyard....Yup sign me up.

I chose to be the sole provider for my house, so I dont think Ill ever make it to that level before my time here is up by myself only towing the cart. But I am sure giving it my best try. I started late, partied too much in my 20 and 30's.

Please keep us posted on your adventure. That mirage looks killer. Another dream boat of mine.

 

[mbrown2]

Love the new place and love the Mirage...perfect morning and afternoon runner!

 

[RCDave]

Congratulations!

 

[Blubyu]

Northern Alabama, we can go to Nashville for the day, 2 hours directly south. 45 minutes from Birmingham. Cullman would be the nearest major city. We are in a place called Houston.

Barber Motorsports Park has a bitchen museum (in Birmingham), worth checking out. The track is cool too. We have not raced there in a while, but I am sure that track will be added back to the schedule again at some point. If it is, I will let you know you can come out and I will give you a whole experience. Congrats on the new place!!

 

[BingerFang]

Amazing! Keep posting pics as the build comes along. Also- that Mirage is bad ass!

 

[Tommy Gun Images]

Congrats Walt!

 

[Mandelon]

I'm sure you will love it there. A new adventure!

 

[Dirtbag]

awesome retirement story. Capitalism and hard work at its finest. Good luck to you and the wife. I couldnt handle the humidity but that setup looks optimal. Congrats!!!!!!!

 

[OldSchoolBoats]

Congratulations Walt! Happy for you guys!

 

[RiverDave]

Yeah, copper heads are all across the South. Scary SOB’s. They don’t rattle and run.
We had them on the golf course in Atl. They were faster and more aggressive than i cared for.
But also. WTH.

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No alcohol on the lake?

 

[RiverDave]

Walt both Stacy and I wish you the best on your adventures! We are going to miss one of our favorite real estate clients and all that entailed!

If for some reason it doesn’t work out Havasu will
Always be here for ya.

 

[Essex3757]

Congratulations Walt that place looks awesome. Bummed you and Laurie won’t be there when Shelly and I go fulltime in Havasu this December. Hopefully we can catch you when you come to town. Enjoy the new home

 

[SJP]

Walt - Congrats to you and Laurie. GiGi and I are stoked for you guys. Excited to see updates on here from your next phase / adventure.

That is the great thing about this place is there are a number of mentors that have either documented their process on here or willing to answer questions. It has been really helpful to me over the years. The take away from this is planning, planning, planning. It is not going to just happen overnight when you want to bail your current position (and maximize profit..)

 

[DILLIGAF]

Congrats and cheers!

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

awesome retirement story. Capitalism and hard work at its finest. Good luck to you and the wife. I couldnt handle the humidity but that setup looks optimal. Congrats!!!!!!!

No alcohol on the lake?

Yes and no, there’s a post from me earlier on here that explains it, restaurants and bars on the lake serve, technically the lake itself is dry but I would say it’s similar to havasu, don’t act like an idiot and the lake cops don’t care, act like a dick and they will hit you with the alcohol fines and anything else you are doing wrong.

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

awesome retirement story. Capitalism and hard work at its finest. Good luck to you and the wife. I couldnt handle the humidity but that setup looks optimal. Congrats!!!!!!!

Congratulations Walt that place looks awesome. Bummed you and Laurie won’t be there when Shelly and I go fulltime in Havasu this December. Hopefully we can catch you when you come to town. Enjoy the new home

We will be back here quite a bit, will let you know when.

 

[Emac]

Congrats and good luck. The wife and I were just there last week looking at some property and the lake on your advise in my thread about Tennessee. Place is freaking beautiful even in the middle of winter. We will definitely be back out to check out more of the lake. Looks like we will probably pick up a rental in Meridianville so gives me another reason to head out there. One thing I do have to ask though is about the RV parking at your new house? Will they let you build a big ass garage or are you going to have to store it somewhere else? I know you are doing a slab for guests but what about your?

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

Congrats and good luck. The wife and I were just there last week looking at some property and the lake on your advise in my thread about Tennessee. Place is freaking beautiful even in the middle of winter. We will definitely be back out to check out more of the lake. Looks like we will probably pick up a rental in Meridianville so gives me another reason to head out there. One thing I do have to ask though is about the RV parking at your new house? Will they let you build a big ass garage or are you going to have to store it somewhere else? I know you are doing a slab for guests but what about your?

Slab is for guests and when we are loading up. I rented indoor 50 foot storage for it for $200 a month for the short term. Long term is to buy a lot off the water near the house, they sell for about $10,000 and then put up a metal shop to put it in. There are no rules preventing it, no building permits, no building inspector etc. Houses have to be 2500 feet or bigger and any free standing garage must match the house. We could have done it, but we opted to add a three car instead that is 30 feet deep for two cars and my small boat, the property off the lake is so cheap it didn’t make sense to take up all the space by the lake. Toon will stay on the lift in the water year round.

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

awesome retirement story. Capitalism and hard work at its finest. Good luck to you and the wife. I couldnt handle the humidity but that setup looks optimal. Congrats!!!!!!!

We won’t be there for July and august, same as havasu, heat just gets old after awhile.

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

If you and your wife ever come down to South Florida…… I would be happy to take you and your wife out on my boat.

Great story……We have a lot in common.

I’m gonna go to some of the outboard meet ups on the rivers eventually, lots of STV’s and Mirage boats running in Florida.

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

Sorry off subject…. Any bites on your storage unit??

Yes, several, looks close to being sold.

 

[last1]

You are only about an hour from Pickwik lake and the Tenn river. Awsome boating all the way around you. The fun is about to begin.

 

[1manshow]

Yes, several, looks close to being sold.

Nice!! Good for you!! Hope your transition all goes smoothly to your new home….

 

[CarolynandBob]

Congrats. Welcome to the south. Living on a lake is awesome.

On a side note you said the toon will stay on your lift year round. I have thought about that, but worried about critter getting into it. What is your take on that?

 

[ONE-A-DAY]

Congrats. Welcome to the south. Living on a lake is awesome.

On a side note you said the toon will stay on your lift year round. I have thought about that, but worried about critter getting into it. What is your take on that?

Never thought about that, everyone on the lake has their boats out on lifts year round so I guess it isnt a huge problem, i will ask though - Thx