All Forum Posts by: Juan Jorge

@Jeremy Goemaat 

I no longer live in Iowa, but if I did I'd lobby strongly against non-small investor bidding. Small guy can do it if he is willing to go through the hassle of setting up multiple entities using Iowa's Series LLC law. Yeah, I did and all the paperwork, tax hassle, etc, plus the bid down to 1% creating uncertainty as to legal title should I have ever gotten to foreclosure, just wasn't worth it. The online bidding process plus all the yield hungry BIG investment pockets, who can afford to set up 100's of legal entities to "outbid" the smaller fries, has frozen us out in Iowa, at least in the online format. It's great revenue for the counties, so they would probably resist any efforts to shut out or severely limit the 1 percenters. I imagine it would take a concerted effort among small investors to lobby the Iowa legislature. I believe in spreading the wealth and vehemently oppose any concentration of wealth in few hands, including tax lien sales and farmland ownership.

@GeorgeBlower

Thanks! Let's say my spouse sets up/funds my spousal IRA (traditional pre-tax), wouldn't I be able to direct rollover that spousal IRA to the Solo 401k (also, pre-tax and assuming the plan documents allow for direct rollovers)?

@Dmitriy Fomichenko Thanks!

@George Blower, thanks for the info on Solo 401k! My understanding is that I can open a solo 401k for myself and one for my spouse? What if my spouse is primary breadwinner? You have heard of spousal IRAs I'm sure. Is there such a thing as spousal Solo 401k?  Let's say I can only fund $5,000 to my solo 401k. Can my spouse contribute more $$$ to MY solo 401k based off the breadwinner's earned income?

I'm looking into virtual business address to set up an out of state LLC, where the state requires an in-state physical address for registered agent (service of process). So far, the best value for money seems to be ipostal1 or Anytime Mailbox, which have several addresses in the state where I want to do business as well as be domiciled for LLC purposes.

Back in 2011, I held the tax lien on a 160 acre parcel in rural Henry County. This was from an in-person/live auction. Henry County wasn't online back then. So, after the required year and a half or two, and owner still not paid up, I started the foreclosure process. A few days after the last notice of intent to foreclose, the owner settled up with the county. Anyway, I still made more in income than the attorney fees. At first, I hired a local lawyer, but his gumption level was very low in dealing with this. I think he was behind the curve and really couldn't be bothered. I had to fire him and go with expert lawyer from DesMoines. 

I participated in 2013 Iowa online auction, and most properties were bid down to 1% ownership. I think this is probably what happened in your case. Like others on this thread, I understand what a cluster it would be to foreclose on the lien in the event the owner didn't pay back taxes. I only know of one Iowa attorney who is competent and thoroughly knowledgable of the foreclosure process. I wish Iowa would change that law, but understand it was meant to help to keep people in ownership of their piece of Mother Iowa.