Bulk REO Investor Tips
There are more foreclosures in the United States right now than we have ever experienced before. Yet as always, this challenge has given rise to a huge new opportunity for alert real estate investors.
This new opportunity – known as ‘Bulk REO Investing’ – is so huge it’s captured attention from wealthy investors and private investment funds alike.
Take a just a minute to consider the basics of this highly profitable business.
To understand Bulk REO investing is to understand the foreclosure process.
Mortgage lenders faced with a non-paying home owner send a large volume of threats, warnings and documentation to the borrower who is late. Following a period of time determined by the lender, formal foreclosure proceedings begin. Between the formal beginning of the foreclosure process and the public auction is the ‘preforeclosure’ period.
Foreclosure is completed when the defaulted property is auctioned. If the property is not purchased at auction, ownership reverts to the original lender. Such a property is then classified as an ‘REO’ (Real Estate Owned) by the lender.
Lenders have no interest in owning property, and thus usually opt to list their REO properties with a local real estate broker in hopes of a retail sale. Yet with increasing frequency, REO properties are being sold for pennies or dimes on the dollar. Lenders are willing to do so in exchange for the buyer’s agreement to purchase a ‘package’ of REO’s rather than a single property.
These REO packages represent the potential to acquire huge amounts of equity for savvy real estate investors. The most successful Bulk REO Investors will have a well-respected source of funding for their transactions. Some sources of funding for these transactions are: personal funds, hard money lenders, commercial lenders and non-conventional sources such as private investors and hedge funds. Additionally, one man is becoming very well known in the field of bulk REO investing, and his name is Salvatore Bushemi of Dandrew Capital Partners, a hedge fund in New York.
