The clock does not start till the notice is given which is why it should always be given immediately upon not receiving  payment IN FULL.The notice is the only "nudge" that a landlord should ever give a tenant.Tenants do occasional pay late and are short.

A six-months' supply is considered a balanced market by the Real Estate Center.The single-family home median price rose 3.8 percent to $218,000 — the highest ever for January.

I would still treat him like a normal tenant and have him sign a lease but the downside (god forbid) if I ever needed to evict him could turn out messy.Should I realistically consider this option?

Has anyone ever obtained a secured loan from a bank using a pool of Louisiana Tax Liens (Tax Sale Certificates) as collateral?

Stephen Murdock if you ever want to jump on a call and talk Minneapolis let me know!

In other words, I refuse to ever be blind to suggested negative about something I believe in.

Only knowing one person is an easy problem to fix, not one that should ever keep you from doing something. 

I noticed most people don't ever actually knock on doors, but rather just collect information and then revert to mailing and and phone calls. 

we worked through the old owner and tried to get to the kids when ever possible.. all leads were leads until the logs were on the ground.. a few things we did to speed things up  were as posted above and pretty obviouswe set up 1031s  but hard to sell to an 80 year old who could not fathom how that could be legal.and a few did charitable remainder trusts  probably even more complicated and the ones' where we bought those deals I would say the sellers were pretty savvy folks not your typical tree farmer. so as many have stated whats the sellers best interest and your best interest is many times vis a vi taxation not aligned in any manner.

Has anyone ever used this methods rather than a cash purchase before?