If you’re a real estate solutions company buying properties for cash, try adding another arrow to your quiver by buying notes and deeds. Notes and deeds can be far more profitable, and less stressful than stocks and real estate investment in physical property. Here’s how to go about buying notes and deeds.

First, let’s define some terms:

The Deed – The Deed is a legal document which gives rights to something. In real estate, a Deed transfers title of ownership and gives the new owner the rights to use the property.

The Note – The Note (or Promissory Note) is a contract where a party makes a promise to pay a sum of money to another party under specific terms. In real estate, the Note is the legal document that binds the borrower to repay a mortgage loan. This agreement will contain important loan specification, such as the loan amount, interest rate, due dates, late charges, and the terms of the mortgage.
Hard money lenders, individual investors, and community banks can auction-off or sell-off mortgage notes (the notes can be current or in various states of default)

Individuals can bid on and purchase these notes and start receiving payments from the borrowers

You become the bank and service the loan yourself or hire a third-party servicing company that also deals with late pays.

How to Buy and Sell Notes and Deeds

  • Look at the most recent quarterly balance sheet that lists liabilities for any bank associated with FDIC insurance
  • See the many residential and multifamily loans
  • You can check the status of loans (30-60-90-120 days past due), in pre-foreclosure
  • You can contact the bank directly to see if you can bid on those notes – you bid less than the face value for those loans
  • Smaller community banks are best to deal with
  • Larger banks like Chase may ask you to put down $100K plus just to be on their list to be considered to bid
  • Ask the smaller community banks to send a spreadsheet (called a tape) of all deeds of trusts that are 90-days past due that you can bid upon. The spreadsheet says all the details (principal balance, monthly payment, property address, fees, etc.)  You can bid on the entire list of “cherry pick” the deeds you want
  • All deeds are backed up by the property. You can also research to determine the value of the property
  • Ask the bank for a list of all their performing and non-performing notes up for bid
  • If you are interested in cash flow, you target the list of discounted notes for those that are past due (60-180 days past due) – the discount is on the principal balance of the mortgage (can sometimes get for 20 cents on the dollar)

For more information on Building Wealth with Notes Workshop attend one of  Paige Panzarello’s classes. You can register for the next class, go online for training. or listen to these powerful podcasts.