Flipping Houses STX

Well, your visit this summer should answer a lot of your questions, but let me hit the highlights (in order).
1. No - not a good business here
2. No - houses are for sale here for many many months, sometimes years
3. No - "island time" is a very real thing here
4. No - everything must be brought over in a container (by boat) from the mainland

I would suggest sending a PM to "beachy" and asking them all about building and remodeling houses on St. Croix. Just to give you an idea... we were considering moving into one of their houses, which they hoped would be finished late January / early February. You'd have to double-check with them for sure, but I believe it is still unfinished at this time for all the reasons you questioned above. Good luck!

Lisa

Thank-you Lisa. That is kinda what we figured. We were thinking it might be able to give us enough of an income to live there but I guess we will think of another business venture. We are not trying to get rich- just something to have some income and maybe provide a few jobs to the people there.

Hi Tania,
I sent you a PM. If not familiar with that yet, look up at the top, and it will say (in dark blue) You Have a New Private Message.

For what it is worth, as a general rule most residential construction/renovation projects in the islands get behind schedule and over budget almost from Day 1. When making your plans figure your project will take 50% longer and cost 50% more than your best pre-construction estimates.

Has anyone ever shipped over a pre-fab home from the states?

A friend of mine who has made his living the last 20 something years flipping houses just sold the house he bought, it needed a lot of work that he did ALL the work on himself. He considered himself lucky, he got all of his money back, no profit for labor.
He is moving to Flordia to continue this business.

Another friend who bought a very nice house and then remodeled wants to leave island and hasn't been able to sell it for what he has in it.

There are several Force 10 and Deltec homes on island.

Flipping homes here would be an easy way to lose a lot of money. Popflops is correcto mundo on his answers about STX. There are several nice homes on the North Shore that have been on the market for over 3 years. The real estate market is very slow/sluggish. RE/home prices prior to 2008 had steadily risen to unheard of high prices. In the past year or two, the builders have stopped building spec homes because nobody is willing to "spend the outageous prices" that were being paid prior to Wall Street brokerage/banks falling on their dirty swords.

Allow me to add that reliable contractors are few and far between on St Croix. There are some but most are not; been down that road with that experience.

The Force 10 homes are of steel construction. The pieces are made in Australia & put in a sea container. Only one contractor on this island has the authority/rights to bring them here and that is M&M Construction, whom by the way is a very reliable contractor.

Jumbie

While you're here, check out the very low end of the real estate market. If there is any money to be made, it might be there.

Thanks everyone for your info! It confirms what I already thought. I guess we will have to think of another way to generate income. Now we know when we visit this summer not to spend much time investigating this option.