All Forum Posts by: David Dey

Michael,

This is my 2 cents regarding how to never be lonely in a new market.  

First, I check out for local meetups in the area and also look up the national association of investors to see if there are local meetings.

Once there, you always look for the silverbacks.  (Yes I'm using a gorilla reference regarding investors) these are the the investors that are surrounded by the other guys regaling them with stories of how they got their scars.  

My most important way of getting good contacts are the same ways I get all my deals and buyers etc... Public records.

Go into your local clerk of courts/register of deeds, look up the deeds in the last 30 days and look only for the deeds to corporations and trusts. 

Then go to your local Secretary of State and look up the owner of the LLC or Corp. these are your target investors.

Remember, the only reason they would show up in public records is if they actually do the business.

Hope this helps.

Barrett, the thing that you need to you understand first is that if it was easy, someone would've done the deal already.  That being said, a little extra digging can go a long way.  

The first place to look is in your local clerk of courts/register of deeds.  Look up your owners name in your public records and you will usually see a story emerge.  A divorce, a foreclosure, a bankruptcy, a death certificate, etc.  there's usually a reason someone abandons a house.  

many times there will also be clues of where they are located such as in a foreclosure, where were they served.  Did they answer the complaint, and if so, did they include their contact info?

An eviction on the NOD usually has the owner/landlord's phone number on it, as does a notice of commencement (pulling a permit for repairs on a house)

The financial affidavit on a divorce usually includes contact info.  

In short there are many cool tools you can find right in public records.  

Also, Google is the most underrated tool of skip tracing out there.  With just a few tweaks you can usually find all sorts of things about your person.

Hope this helps

This is what I have done in situations where the mtg is not an option immediately.

I offer to put the property directly into the lender's name, or into a land trust with a 3rd party atty, as trustee and the lender as beneficiary until a mortgage can be ratified, once that is done, then have the property transferred over to me or left in the trust and transferring beneficial interest.

Check with your servicer and make sure it was a Piti loan, if it was an equity loan, many of those are not the servicers job to pay.

but don't leave it at that.

Follow up directly with the local tax collector what the time frame is for that county before tax deed can be applied for and make sure you keep the taxes under that time limit.

@Ryland Taniguchi spoken like a true "title fixer!!"

I send flowers, chocolates, art pieces, etc.., and lay it on OH SO THICK, to make up for the torture I put her through.

Additionally, I love the fact that we have some contrarians here that don't fall into a straight panic and lose all bodily functions at the mention of a non clearable title.  

Point one:  as Ryland said, this can be where you literarily earn your profit.  

Ex: Earlier this year, I just flipped a 25 unit condo complex with a starting price of 850k which had a screwed up title as well as a mountain of code enforcement liens.  

My final price ended up being 200k and after clearing the title the flip was for 457k, and believe me, we earned every dollar of it.

(The magic mantra of this type of investing is, it's not whether it's right or wrong, it's what the underwriter will cover)

Point two:  if for some reason you just can't clear the title up... >gasp< I'm about to say it!!!  If the price is right, SO WHAT??!!

Ex:  somewhere back in 13-14, I came across a property that was forwarded by another investor that couldn't figure out what to do.

It was a rehabbed property that had been funded by one of those high interest hard money companies that disappeared after the crash.  By the time he was ready to pay it off, they were gone.  He abandoned the property and for years it had just sat there but then code enforcement picked it up and started dinging him.  He ended up refining the place up and had a tenant moving in that month.  

He was trying to sell the property for 21k.  Thinking it could give him some money to try and clear the title with.  (The original loan was in the high 60k range)

I just simply asked him, "forget the liens and codes and back taxes.  What do you want for you?"  

"I spent 2500 on refixing the property.""I would be happy if I could just get that back."

The tenant had already paid for the deposit and the first months rent so I said, "keep the deposit and rent you just received and I will give you the balance to meet your 2500."

He was happy and signed over a quit claim deed. By the third month, I was in the green. 

It had been a great cash flow property ever since, until I sold it to another investor for 15k as a qcd.

So again, I ask you.  If the price is right... Who cares??!!

@Eduardo Slesaransky @Skylar Moyer 

I guess I'll add my 2 cents as being someone that has been doing tax delinquent properties as one of my main filters, and have made a truckload of money off of these.

Before I give you some hints on your methods, remember these leads are just a means to an end. Our business model isn't probate, code enforcement, abandoned properties, or tax delinquent properties. Our biz model is professional problem solving.

All of those situations, being tax delinquent, having code enforcement issues, etc, are all leads to people with problems that you can solve in exchange for equity.

Ex: sure a number of properties are getting delinquent because the owner past, but if you track down the heir and assist them in doing the probate, isn't that going to be a great point of negotiation? "I will pay for your probate and take care of the liens and pay you (blank) for your equity," wouldn't that be a strong negotiating position?

(For more of an understanding of what I mean, here is a link to a post I did that explains in more detail. https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/62/topics/243... )

Ok, enough of the soapbox speech, though if you understand that truth, you will get more deals which will make you more money, let's get to those leads.

You can get tax delinquent leads from many good lead sources, however if I were you, I would add another filter. I would ask for vacant house leads with tax delinquent as the additional filter. That will give you a lot more bang for your buck.

As @rick h said, you can get your list for free from the tax collector. The catch is, there is no such thing as a free list. You have to pay either with cash to the list provider or pay with sweat equity through the collector by having to weed through their list for what you are specifically looking for. You can usually get the list of delinquent liens by asking your collector for the current or most recent list of tax certificates for sale. There will usually be an additional identifier for multi year delinquent. (Like an asterix or something) Most of the certificates are first year certificates, I prefer at least 2 years or more.

@Skylar, when you find a home where the person has past, simply google that person's name along with the city where the home was and the word obituary and more often then not you will pull up an obit along with his/her next of kin along with the city/state they live.

I do not send letters because I do exactly what Rick said and do my title due diligence before reaching out and look for the best deals and the low hanging fruit, then I skip those people using my own techniques which I posted in another post. 

https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/93/topics/290841-ugly-abandoned-house---where-can-i-find-the-owner

I call these people personally as these deals are golden and get probably a 50-70% closing rate by solving problems.

I hope this helps.

@Sharon Tukay

I posted this a Lil while ago but don't know how to send the actual post, so I'm copying and pasting it here.

Let me first start by saying that to find the owner of the property, first you must go to your local property appraiser's site, then look up the address to find out who owns the place. That's the first step.

Here is a link to every property appraiser and public records search in the country. Just click on the map to your state, then click on your county, then go to the data online for which ever branch of public records you need.

http://publicrecords.netronline.com

Hope this helps, so here is that other post.

Finding absentee owners and their phone numbers is actually pretty easy now days. In this age of Internet and public records and ease of access, It's very difficult to stay off the radar.

Everybody leaves a digital footprint somewhere.

Here are some basic tools I use to find people.

Free first:

Whitepages/anywho/zabasearch/

Google is the most underrated tool to finding a person. Starting with their name and hopefully city or at least state. You can find out pieces of the puzzle that make it easier to locate the person.

Ex: if they are a professional of some sort, i.e. Doctor, lawyer, now you have areas you can find them. If they are a part of a forum, it pops up.

I once pulled up a person that was a on a site for classic cars that posted a request for parts along with his phone number. (Bought the house and made a 20k flip profit)

Public records are amazing: if you locate the area where the seller lives, make sure you look them up in their counties property appraiser, and clerk of court/register of deeds.

Examples of places you can find them:

If they pulled a permit on a house the notice of commencement may include their phone number.

If they were in a lawsuit and represented themselves, most forms will include a phone number.

If they were a landlord and did an eviction, the 3 day notice or complaint will usually have their phone number.

There are quite a few areas the info will show up in public records.

Social media is the hands down best way to locate people.

I have found more people through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn then I can tell you.

My favorite example is where I located the owner of an abandoned home on Facebook. I had tried every tool I had available to me prior including free and paid services. Including high end skip trace tools. I had found out she had a daughter but couldn't find her either. Then I tried Facebook. Her daughter popped right up showing that she worked at the local Applebee's as a bartender. And on her page her most recent post was a request by her to her fb friends requesting a ride to work. And in the response was.... Wait for it... Her mom apologized for not being able to pick her up as she was heading into work right then. (Thank you oversharers) a quick click over to moms fb page revealed that she worked as a waitress at the crackerbarrel next door.

One of our bird dogs actually went over there and talked to her, set up an appt and we ended up buying the house for $600.

Cheap next:

Ussearch is a cheap skip trace tool that costs about $49 for a 3 month unlimited use service. There is a lot of junk in to sift through but many times you get lucky. The best tool in there is their direct link to social media.

More costly but worth it:

We have access to a service called tracers that, for .50 per pull, gets us some of the most up to date info on anyone out there.

We also employ a couple of private eyes that are somewhat entrepreneurial that will not only locate the owner but set up the appt for between 500-1000 per closed transaction.

These are a few of the tools we use to locate our sellers... And our buyers.

Hope this helps!!

P.S. I mentioned if the owner is a professional of some sort.

If they are, check your states Secretary of State corporation look up, manytimes in their filings you will find their phone numbers.

P.S.S. If they own or run a website, that turns out to be an easy search. Whois.sc is like a whitepages for domain owners. Unless they specifically use and pay for a private service, you will have their email and phone number right there. (Try Zillow for example. I used the tool to speak to someone at the company to learn how to get info on expired listings off Zillow)

P.S.S.S.  If you still can't find the person, give me a ring and I'll try to help you find them.  

P.S.S.S.S.  As to the offer, make sure that you talk to them and discuss their situation with them before you make your offer.  You may be leaving money on the table by just making an offer and not seeing where you can solve their problem.

Ex:  they may not have the ability to do the probate in which case a lower offer with you covering the cost and walking them through the process may be in order.  

Maybe, they have liens and judgments against them that by you negotiating you can save a truckload of money.

Ex:  code enforcement against the property that you can get reduced by bringing the property into compliance.  (I once got a 300k code enforcement lien reduced down to 1k.  I benefited from my sweat equity of solving problems as opposed to giving it to the gov.  

My approach is to ask the owner to forget what liens and junk is against the property, what do they need for themselves.  Then I put that number or solution into the contract "plus payoff of all liens and encumbrances."

Hope this helps

@Wayne Brooks first, I am definitely open to the conversation.  As to the balloon, that is the default because that is the final payment.  

One of the best articles I've read on Batram V Us Bank is this one.

http://www.attorneyatlawmagazine.com/palm-beach/u-...

In any case, we should find out within a month.

In any case, here is the actual statute regarding the computation of time regarding acceleration and the statute of limitations:

95.031 Computation of time.—Except as provided in subsection (2) and in s. 95.051 and elsewhere in these statutes, the time within which an action shall be begun under any statute of limitations runs from the time the cause of action accrues.

(1) A cause of action accrues when the last element constituting the cause of action occurs. For the purposes of this chapter, the last element constituting a cause of action on an obligation or liability founded on a negotiable or nonnegotiable note payable on demand or after date with no specific maturity date specified in the note, and the last element constituting a cause of action against any endorser, guarantor, or other person secondarily liable on any such obligation or liability founded on any such note, is the first written demand for payment, notwithstanding that the endorser, guarantor, or other person secondarily liable has executed a separate writing evidencing such liability

The first written demand for payment constitutes acceleration, not the foreclosure.  However, I tend to use the first date of lis pendens as my counting date.  (Or at least the date listed in the complaint as the month of default, by the plaintiffs own admission)

@Wayne Brooks

You are absolutely right, however, batram v US Bank is before the Florida Supreme Court right now and is expecting a ruling in April, with the expectation that the court will uphold the statute as written, which is 5 years from default, not the monthly default that the judge tried to rule.

(Thus proving this is the best government that money can buy)

The fact that there is an acceleration clause and not a deceleration clause should be enough to have put that argument into the ground in the first place.

Also, most of the other states have upheld a statute of lims for their states.

That being said, I have been using the statute of limitations rule in regards to balloon payments and maturity dates, as in those situations the default date is extremely clear.  In those properties, my title company's underwriter goes ahead and covers the property as simple process of law.  (In other words, no quiet title needed)

code enforcement is one of my specialties.. (Chk out some of my posts)

You will be fine as long as you show effort to comply and make friends with the inspector.

Most people resent the CE officers and it is a thankless job, so a little kindness can go a long way.

Remember, CE is in the business of getting properties into compliance not charging fines, so do your part and you'll be fine.