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Tax Overages
Anyone know if this tax Overages program with Rick Dawson and Bob Diamond is for real or legit? Thinking about adding this to my portfolio just want to make sure i'm not being scammed with this.
Thanks
Andre
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@Andre Johnson I listened to this webinar last night. Have you found out any additional information on the systems or on Bob Diamond?
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I was also on that call last night. I did some research today and found out pretty much everything I need to know to get started in the business. What I am uncertain about is how saturated the business is. From what I have seen so far it looks legit and a nice niche to explore.
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It's an old, old game fully saturated. In Florida, you're limited to a 12% fee because of all the abuses that have occurred over the last 20 years. Completely saturated, it only sounds "innovative" to new people who haven't heard of it before.
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@Wayne Brooks do you know anyone who has had success in the tax overages? There are lots of businesses that are over-saturated but people are successful nonetheless.
I found some pretty damaging complaints against Bob Diamond though..
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It never interested me, and I don't personally know anyone doing it
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From what I gathered from the "free" training session these overages are not subject to the 12% finders fees. I plan on giving it a shot. Already did some initial searches and now the next step is to close a few and the I can confirm (1) how feasible the opportunity is and (2) how saturated the business is... #staytuned
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My first clerkship was with a firm in CA that worked overages from the FC sale - same basic principle as tax overages. The downside to FL vs CA is that if you can't find the next in line to claim the overage you are dead in the water and can't go any farther on that file. In CA you could skip that person and move to the next after a notice period. FL just doesn't seem to be the most profitable venue.
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If you're tracking down owners entitled to overages after a tax deed auction, the 12% does apply, there's way around it. The FL statutes were actually amended to address this. The only way to achieve more than the 12% is to be the actual deeded owner, prior to the auction.
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like most things when dealing with government when they have money in their possession they don't want to give it up, they want to keep it, even though it isn't theirs. I
example is California tax sale overages, note I don't know the current law, they had a chance for the ex-owner to claim overages for one year. Of course those that even knew there was a tax sale didn't know about any possible overage, they just thought the property was gone and that was that, and the counties were not going to hunt them down and tell them, so after one year they got to keep the money. And that was fair because they wanted the money to help some poor politician out that had to drive a two year old car and needed a raise to cover a new one, or some other worthy public need.
I did this for several years as a side activity and one day a county supervisor said to me, do you know how much your costing the county each year? Of course I knew a ton about him and said not as much as that feather bedding wife of yours. I knew her office second in command and if his wife even showed up at all in her department to head it, it probably didn't add up to 18 days a year.
Any way most states passed laws to limit finders fees to help keep the money in their coffers. The official bs was we are saving consumers from being abused by finders. The real fact is they get to keep the money because the real owner is very unlikely to ever find out about it without a finder showing up. .But I bypassed those laws by actually buying the rights to the money. The actual owner could get his money now, It is theirs and they have a right to sell their rights to it. And I upset some treasurers that viewed these kinds of moneys as government slush funds.
One person I knew in Washington state just used to send a postcard saying you have X dollars due you. I will tell you where it is for 5% of the amount you have coming, save this card because I won't ask again and many sources of funds due people have time limits to collect or you lose the money. The state had a 5% finders limit at the time and
The challenge in CA now is the required disclosure. The county recorders require a notarized disclosure from the the owner upon assignment that states that excess proceeds are available, how much much they are, and that they understand that they do not need to go through any intermediary and that there is no charge for applying for the proceeds. There are still some plays involving heirs of deceased owners. I know their are heir hunters and others in the overage biz who somehow manage to get people to agree to a split before they'll tell them what the amount is. Sounds like no fun and not my business model.
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@Wayne Brooks are you absolute sure 12% is the max you can get? The course teaches a loophole that makes it perfectly legal to charge double triple or quadruple that amount! Legal loophole of course. I just believe that people who are making good money doing this wont confirm it because it is a nice income stream if you know what you are doing.
As I said before I am charging ahead with it and I will let you all know how it goes. So far everything I needed was freely available online.
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it sounds easy but in reality to chase these kind of deals down you need to be a PI and have accruant account so you can skip trace. Its not as easy as just getting on the phone or sending a few letter. As well as when the overage is distributed its cut to the rightful owner .. and if they consult anyone they will just not pay you.. Just like when the big company in CA tried to do that to my 80 year mother.. she signed up for it.. I stepped in thanked the company and proceeded to get my mother her overage without paying anyone.
as Wayne stats this is been going on a long time.. google Joe Kaiser Washington for more information
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@Sandra Lee The law, and enforcement, is very clear. In addition to the 12% cap on fees, the same disclosures signed by the owner, as K. Marie mentioned in CA, also have to be submitted to the clerk. The FL statute is easy find, you just have to google it, and you'll find the required disclosures too. Or, you can go down to your local Tax Deed office, and they'll give you the whole shebang. However, should you find what seems to be a loophole, please let me know, PM of you want. Trust me, I won't be stepping on your path.
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What you all are saying is true. But we are not really looking at this from the the same angle. Yes, full disclosures are a must but there are also step to ensure you get paid for your efforts. Also I don't need to be a PI to find people (lol). Anyhow, if I listened to everyone who told me it can't be done... I would rather try and fail than not try at all. Bob Diamond did many other things with overages and his problems are not what i am looking to get into! I am not scamming or looking to take advantage of anyone. I plan on preforming a service and getting paid for it. All while staying within the boundaries of the law.
just got my business line set up and by weekend will have my first 25 prospects to try and find. If i am able to process 2-3 out of those i will be ok with those stats every week.
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@Sandra Lee Good luck with it! How are you determining your prospects? The obvious way is look at the list of properties that sold, then to determine those with surplus due the owner, probably the easiest way is to use the clerk's file for the tax deed sale, and look at their title report for mtgs. and liens.
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As @Jay Hinrichs mentioned, Joe Kaiser got into quite a bit of legal trouble doing this, so check into that ...
Bob Diamond is an attorney in the Phila area, who used to be a BP member but I think he was booted off for pushing his wares here in sections of the forum where that is prohibited. The concepts work I guess (I have not taken any of his courses but others I have checked out were based on concepts that were plausible ), but for what cost to you vs returns you will get ... that's hard to measure.
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I don't mean you literally need a PI what you will soon find out when you start hunting down your prospects is that you can't find them. They will be deceased,, moved etc etc.
You need to be able to chase down next of kin neighbor's etc to try to find these folks.
Maybe in Florida it will be easier however the folks I knew that were halfway successful at this that is how they were set up.. It took a lot of effort to find the rightful owner and or their family.
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thanks all for the support. So far my investment in learning and understanding the business has been just time. I have done lots of research, been on the free call several times where they tried to sell the training for $1500. I found free and valuable info, contracts and tools online. More importantly I found the most feasible way to track down the claimant.
all using online tools and resources --- totally free. So next steps is my prospect list. Most of the counties already provide the tax due, tax lien sales price and the exact overage amount. No need to go to other files. Again all of the info was free online.
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I am also researching how to get involved in the business of helping people retrieve their excess funds from tax sales. I am in Atlanta, GA. I literally just started the research yesterday and found that some Counties have the detailed excess funds list available online. @Sandra Lee Was the training that you took in regards to FL only? Any insight your willing to share to point me in the right direction to continue my research? Call me directly if you wish. My number is in my signature. Any insight would be highly appreciated!!
@Brian P. I would like to hear more from you directly as you have had success. Looks like your post got cut off.
Has anyone had success doing this in Atlanta, GA?
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I'd love to know how you are finding your claimants. Is this specific to Florida? That is the only hiccup I'm having as all the other pieces are in place. I'm willing to pay, but free is always better.
I've thought about approaching PI's with a partnership, but if I can do it without them that would be much easier.
Do you know how investors are getting accurint accounts? From what they've told me investors don't have a legitimate reason to have one.
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@Sandra Lee Just a tip. The "overage" amounts you are seeing on the Clark's site is simply the auction price, less the taxes due. The majority of theses operatives have mortgages or other liens, so that amount generally is Not the overage claimable by the owner. Thus the reason for looking at the Clark's title report to not waste your time on those with mortgages.
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@Sandra Lee Also, just FYI. Owners I've talked to recently who lost their property to tax deed auctions, get 3 or 4 people contacting them the day of the sale and the day after, offering to help them collect their money.
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@Mohamed Tarawally your right I have one b\c I am a mortgage banker. They come out and do a brick and mortar inspection as well its a very powerful tool. And not something that should go to the general public. My point is without the tax overage bizz is pretty tough there will be folks (many of them) that you just won't be able to find without skip tracing abilities. Joe kaiser had an account that is how he tracked people down
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Brian
Your right for some reason my post was cut off short. I would like to be more specific but I don't know a darn thing about your states tax laws. But some principals are the same and courses out there don't really provide much more info then you can gather on your own.
Joe Kaiser has been mentioned for Washington and I would have told new investors to use his info in many areas of investing. I kind of thought he was a brother I didn't know I had. I did do a couple of tax sale deals in that state just like Joe and I felt the states real interest was not consumer protection but state slush fund protection. Joe knew how to get the overages and the state hated writing checks to him and reducing their slush fund balance and they were willing to spend tons of tax payer money to stop him.
Now to change the subject Joe had the right idea to make contact with an owner before the sale. I still do that but my hours I can devote to investing are less and less each month. Many sources of business I used I have been eliminating one by one.
Remember as has been stated there are often amounts due others on the property that will be wiped out. So one thing I do is to give an option to buy the debt before the sale, now you have just been given one of my secrets I have kept to myself. Of course you need to analyze probable sales price and you chance of collecting. In the state I have done this the priority of claims on the overage is determined by the requests or claims on the overage in a timely manner and many potential claimants never put in a request and the county is not going to go hunting for those who failed to file a claim. Plus certain banks for example were notorious for never paying the back taxes or going after an overage for some reason, but junior lien holders though their lien was worthless because of the liens in front of them and didn't bother, That is the ones that even knew an overage was possible.