@Nick ClurmanFor decades Cali has been the biggest money maker especially for SFRs buy and holders.

Not sure what you meant by return of principal in 12/24 months that may be through the investment pool, not likely as a note holder unless they are short fused deals. 

Although there may be other certificate holders/lien purchasers, sometimes they do not file for the deed/foreclose on the property prior to the statutory period/date, as required. 

This is not an auction for the lien, in NC you come away from an auction not as a lien holder but a property owner.The property is valued at say 250K, the junior lien bidding started at 100K and ended at 190K and to the best of my knowledge and for the sake of this question the outstanding balance on the senior lien is 50K.

Why dont you get him to sign for you to be the first holder .

I've been pleasantly surprised by the passion and diligence of so many using this tremendous resource.I've bought the book on estimating, and have started it, but obviously vis a vie this question haven't completed it yet.

Vis a vi risk reward scenario.. compared to buying on the west coast..

But in your case, the daughter is Not on title, and as Rick H. says, "the title holder is not available to execute the deed transfer".  

I would agree with @Steve Babiak that the only way to avoid foreclosure is to pay.But, and this a very big caveat, I also agree that foreclosure can be used as a viable financial strategy dependent on multiple variables that the mortgage holder has taken into consideration. 

Every year, I stay in the US on business visa for a couple of months and scout for multifamily properties, mostly in Chicago, NYC and Boston areas.