Re: John Beck Real Estate System - Posted by Ronald * Starr(in No CA)
Posted by Ronald * Starr(in No CA) on October 25, 2002 at 22:52:32:
Dogpound-----------------
My favored investment approach is buying properties on tax sales. And I have a little bit of experience investing in tax certificates, although I have not yet converted any of them into deeds. However, I probably will in the next few months.
I can believe that it is possible to get a few properties for 3.3 cents on the dollar. But that is going to be an extreme case. Think more of about 15 to 30 cents on the dollar. And it is not as easy as falling off a log. But it is definately possible to get very good deals with tax sales and tax certificates.
Different states have different laws about their tax sales and tax lien investing. John Beck’s “Free and Clear” system discussses the systems in every state and territory of the USA and the Canadian provinces. For the price, it is an incredible resource. If you were really serious about delinquent property tax prooperty investing, I would greatly recommend the course. I have a copy of it myself. Two, actually, an eary version and the current version.
Now, understand that probably fewer than one out of a thousand of the real good properties with delinquent taxes can be gotten for the back taxes. You are going to have to study up on the topic. And you are going to have to expend a lot of effort to get good properties free and clear. But it can be done if you have persistent and are willing to really put out the effort. Notice that John Beck does not claim that you have exciting times and fun while making the money. Maybe making the money is reward enough for you?
Undestand that most tax delinquent properties–probably over 90% are vacant land and vacant lots. So, if you are interested in acquiring improved properties, you immediately have to do a sort through the delinquent property tax properties to find the few that are improved. Then there are other things to look out for, which John details in his materials, to find the properties most likely to be gotten through this process. So, there is a lot of tedious effort before you will be getting a property, probably. One good thing though. When you “lose”–you do not get a property–you can still get an interest rate or penalty return on your investment. Perhaps a very generous return, like 12% to 18% a year. Loser situations like that are not too hard to take, are they? What rate does the local bank pay for your deposits these days? I’ll bet less than 10%–a whole lot less.
Also understand that those houses he shows in the infomercial, while acquired with the tax lien processes, may not have been as good looking when the owners acquired them as when John took the pictures. They may or may not have been so good looking–I do not know. From my experience with tax sale investing, I suggest that most of the houses probably looked like dumps when they were acquired and that they were probably fixed up, at some considerable expense, by the owners subsequent to their acquisition. Remember, this is a guess, not a fact.
So, yes there is substance to the claims. But it is not as easy at it seems on the TV infomercial.
Good InvestingRon Starr********