All Forum Posts by: Sue In Denver

Wow - great link. Interesting that that time line began over a year ago!

Toby,
Would your lender be able to do a land development loan?
PM if so!
Thanks!

William, we're learning here in Colorado (5th highest in the nation for foreclosures), that the banks will look at short sale offers of about 80% of FMV from which we deduct repair costs, their foreclosure costs, legal, their carrying costs, etc.

So, on a 100k deal, you would offer $80k less repairs (say $5000), legal/court costs of $1200, utilities for 3-4 months ($1000) and so on.
Final offer would be $71,000. You show them the breakdown and take pictures of every hole in the wall, torn carpet and blow them up so they can really see the size of the repairs, ha ha.

There's no hard fast rule. When you get a direct contact in the loss mit. dept. you may also ask them if they have any other properties they'd like to get rid of that are in your area. Many times they will say yes and you'll have a steady pipeline of discounted properties coming your way. Some banks will give you a better discount if you're buying several properties.

I know the REO market is a bit different on discounts. Here, when a property first hits the market, the bank will accept offers within 5% of the listed price. If it's been on the market for awhile, they'll come down another 10% or so. However, it's getting very competitive out there so the banks will accept several offers (rather than first offer in gets accepted) and then take the best offer of the bunch.

As for the guru's telling you about their whopper checks, look at the copywrite date of the material. Usually it's 3-4-5 years or older. Before the market drop, yes, you could get some good REO deals because very few investors were doing them. Now, everyone wants on the bandwagon and the banks know it and know they can hold out just a bit and get a higher price.

Just have to keep submitting offers because there's one out there with your name on it!

Good luck!

Thanks Mercury,
Do you have a reference to this article? Would like to use it!

Gosh, after all these years, you would think I would have come across these people. Sounds like it's a good thing I haven't!
Thanks for the posts letting us know to stay away!

Toby, although I'm not a lawyer either, I learned the ins and outs of evictions on my first property here in CO.
If you haven't yet filed the complaint for eviction, get it done ASAP.

The necessary papers you need are at http://www.courts.state.co.us/chs/court/forms/fed/fed.html

If you file Monday, and the tenant is served on Monday, you can get a hearing set within 5-days. If you get the judgment on that day, I think you have to repost a 3-day notice that you and the sheriff are going to come clean out the place unless they vacate at that time. The court clerk can walk you through it.

It may be a moot point at this stage in getting the tenant out before the 31st. However, you want the judgment as it will follow the tenant wherever he goes. In some states, a judgment will prevent them from every buying property until it is cleared. It will also raise issues with prospective landlords who do background/credit checks.

If the tenant is served personally, you can recoup (in the judgment) court costs, service of summons (which I recommend you use a private process server rather than the sheriff). A friend of yours can serve the summons. You may be considered an interested party which could moot the personal service issue.

In any event, get the papers filed ASAP. Feel free to PM me if you have any other questions!

Good luck!

Hi Anna,
I have been reading the posts here and saw you're victory in court. Good job!
As an aside, most leases have a clause for the landlord/owner to enter a property with notice and if not possible, without notice if it's a matter of an emergency or a need to preserve the property from damage. I'd say the smell of animal urine in a building that doesn't allow pets is an emergency! My leases also have a clause that says I will be through the properties every three months for inspection. While I always try to give advance notice, I don't have to when it comes to inspections.
And, as for posting as a tenant, I think it was okay because it gave you some honest answers from a tenant's persepctive. You also came clean when the mission was accomplished.
Get the books, learn from your mistakes (which we've all made!) and move on. Guessing you won't do this again any time soon!

Shat, welcome aboard! I see you've had a lot of looks to this post but no replies! So, I'll take a stab at this one.

I'm guessing there's an REI club in your area. MN/SP is a pretty good sized metro area so likely there is a club you could check out. The best place to team up with other investors is at one of these clubs. You will get ZERO responses (like here) for people looking for someone who is
dedicated, educated, loyal, and a quick learner to perhaps become a part of thier team. The reason being is they have no personal relationship with you. No matter how great of a person you are, they don't know that from reading a cold ad.

Within the network of an REI club, there will be countless people who would be glad to give you tips and pointers. You will also likely find someone who has the specific need for a birddog. And, you may just luck out and find someone who wants to pay it forward and bring you onboard to show you the ropes.

I wouldn't worry too much about money at this point. If you have a smokin' deal, the money and investors will find you. Or there's always hard money lenders who can walk you through a deal or two.
REI clubs are also great places to share deals!

Hopes this helps!

troyce you can do this a couple of ways.

I'm not sure I'd have a buyer sign any type of agreement with you however others might differ.

Instead, I would go to the wholesaler and let him know that you have a buyer interested in the property. Ask him what his birddog or referral fee is. If he's comfortable with paying you for the referral (which he should be), then have the wholesaler sign a referral agreement before giving him the buyer information. If you do this, then let the buyer know you are going to bring him together with the wholesaler so the buyer's isn't surprised getting a call from a total stranger.

The other way is to buy from the wholesaler and sell to your end buyer. This would entail a double closing and/or a pass through closing via a trust. This would cost more but if you crunch the numbers on what your end profit would be after closing costs, you might end up with a bigger end profit.

Hope this helps a little!

Alacri,
You'd be surprised at the flake investors who have said they were in on this deal, only to disappear. This has been going on for a while and we're only guessing it's the economy. In 30-years of developing, he's never run into this - ever. Lesson learned, when someone gives you their word, they're lying!