Going Rogue – Is it Worth It?

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I’m not exactly sure why Sarah Palin called her book Going Rogue. A rogue is a mischievous or deceitful person. It would seem silly for someone to describe himself or herself in that manner, especially as the title of an autobiography (maybe there’s some irony in there somewhere).

A Palin associate, however, said that Palin was just trying to “bust free” of what she believes was a damaging and mismanaged roll-out, a rogue roll-out, I guess.

Another buzzword of that McCain/Palin campaign a few years back was the word maverick. A maverick is one who exhibits great thought and independence in action. Now, that’s a term of respect in my book. You can call me a maverick all day if you want—just don’t expect to see me in any John Wayne movies.

In real estate these days, we see many mavericks, particularly those who want to use investor-buying strategies to flip distressed properties.

Purchasing short sales for resale is becoming increasingly more difficult. Three or four years ago (as the market began to fall), most banks did not have large loss mitigation departments with guidelines and overlays for analyzing properties. Banks did not have laundry lists of BPO agents at their disposal. They did not have procedures and policies for analyzing the short sale file when it was assigned to them. And, none of the banks had time frames for responding (heck, many of them still do not have time frames). For all of these reasons, mavericks were able to purchase short sales for a song and then effectively resell them for an aria.

This technique, unfortunately, has become increasingly more difficult. Now that banks are using overarching systems (like Equator, for example) and have procedures and policies in place for reviewing short sale packages, it is much more difficult to purchase a short sale for cents on the dollar. Generally, banks perceive each house as a mansion. Buyers place offers on shacks. It’s only at resale that the buyer also perceives each house as a mansion.

So, what’s a maverick to do these days? There are still opportunities for maverick investor buyers of distressed properties—but they are increasingly more difficult to find. The most obvious choice for a maverick investor in my neck of the woods might be commercial properties or those residential properties that are in condition for which a loan cannot be obtained. No need to go rogue. Just conduct your due diligence and you can still find a great place to invest your money.

Photo: flickr creative commons by peter pearson

Note By BiggerPockets: These are opinions written by the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of BiggerPockets.