All Forum Posts by: Account Closed

We've been making hard money loans for years and I read three books when I first started.

1. Private Lending Profits, Lee J. Carney

2. The Top Pitfalls of Trust Deed & Mortgage Investing, Brian Davison

3. Private Mortgage Investing, Martha Maeda, Teri Clark and Matthew Tabacchi

Best of Luck! 

That's on the verge of being too good a deal to be true!

Robert: Have you checked the American Association of Private Lenders website? They have an online directory. I'm a GA only lender, and we can close deals with only minor issues in 2 weeks, or less (closed a loan last week in 8 business days). Assuming there are no title issues, the struggle with the National LO is the time to get the site visit done and the appraisal. They'll all promise two weeks but focus on the timeline, the process for inspection and appraisal, and ask them when they actually start counting days--the onboarding process. Good luck, Steve

The State of GA Dept. of Community Affairs has a Georgia Landlord Tenant Handbook FAQ. 

www.dca.ga.gov . We manage 10 SFR in Metro ATL, and it allows us to handle almost every issue, including properly handling our own evictions.

Mack: Georgia is mostly a landlord friendly state as long as you give proper notification and have acted responsibly (i.e. addressed any repair request). I've gone to court to evict two tenants and didn't need a lawyer. 

Dave: Let me guess, the property with the lower value but higher taxes is in Fulton county/City of Atlanta?

Joseph: I've been using Bank of North GA and BB&T, both decent regional banks. Each of them have provided common sense decisions at the local branch level. 

Good luck,

Steve

Regarding the entity requirements, some lenders only loan to LLC's, partnerships, or corporations, and not individuals. This is meant to establish the loan as a commercial investment loan NOT a consumer loan.

Sharaya: Upfront fees, bait & switch loan terms, and onerous loan-to-own documents are the areas where you need to watch yourself the most. 

1. Frankly, a true "old school" HML shouldn't run a credit report. The strength of the asset and your equity in the deal is your credit. However, many of the newer "institutional" lenders are requiring minimum FICO scores (630) to fund a loan because it was a condition of their Regulation A+ capital-raising documents.

2. If they have a significant application fee, I'd be wary. This is simply another revenue stream, and not meant to defer their overhead cost.

3. After your application, make sure you get a firm loan proposal including rate, term, conditions, and estimated cost. 

4. Most importantly, the lawyer closing the loan works for the lender not you, even though they gave you a bottle of water and have a bowl of mini-candy bars in their mahogany conference room. Have your attorney review the loan documents prior to closing. 

5. If the loan terms change at the closing table--bolt.  

Good luck,

Steve

Cap Rate is a good # to know, and you've done well in that regard, despite 6.75% being to the low side, What about your annual ROI?

cash flow + appreciation + depreciation + loan pay down / amount invested