My motivations are two folds: I would like to own (and grow) real estate as part of my overall financial portfolio, and second, wait for more favorable market conditions to sell any portion of real estate that I acquire in the near term.

There are two separate issues here.First, typically the laws -when you rent to someone in your own home- are more favorable to the landlord.

They do it for their tenants, so it's like returning the favor.

Established LLCs will use commercial lenders, though, and some lenders will have more favorable terms when you have a track record with them and tangible assets/cash flow.

This way of handling rental loss is supposed to be more favorable for the borrower, but I have not really run any numbers to verify it.  

This works in your favor two fold.

Mike there are the Federal laws which I am talking about and then on top of that tenant laws that vary by state.As you know California is very heavy in favor of the tenant.So it takes a long time to foreclose.In Georgia we have no post redemption rights after the sale and to foreclose the lender simply has to send a letter giving 30 days notice in the newspaper.That doesn't mean the owner won't prolong by filing BK,trying a trial loan mod,short sale,etc.

I am in favor of forcing the banks to mark their assets to market so we can devour the weak entities and move on with life.

HAFA is a government run short sale program and it favors the lenders.

Originally posted by Jake Kucheck: Now if the HOA were to start negotiating on mere delinquencies, I would agree with you 100%.In theory, I completely agree...The problem comes down to whether or not the members of the HOA (the homeowners) would have to -- or even have the option to -- vote on the decision to reduce the fees.If the homeowners got wind of the fact that they could appeal to the board and potentially get a hardship reduction in HOA payments, you could imagine a large group of homeowners banding together to request (and then vote in favor of) these hardship reductions.On what grounds could the board consider your particular situation (your short sale house) without considering every other request they get from a homeowner who claims to be in financial straits?