The recession in the U.S. economy has resulted in more foreclosures than experienced by any other generation of Americans. Yet well-funded investors in real estate are seizing upon this opening to profit from an profoundly profitable new opportunity.
That opportunity is called Bulk REO Investing, and the opportunity is huge.
The basis of the Bulk REO business is foreclosures, so let’s analyze the foreclosure process now.
Understanding of the foreclosure process is central to understanding Bulk REO investing.
When a home owner begins to miss payments on their mortgage, the lender begins to send late/overdue notices to the home owner. Following a period of time determined by the lender, formal foreclosure proceedings begin. The name for this period is ‘preforeclosure’.
To complete the foreclosure process, the property is auction to the public. If there are no buyers for the property at auction, the property is returned to the lender. The lender then categorizes the property as ‘Real Estate Owned’ – or ‘REO’ for short.
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. But more and more, lenders are selling their REO properties for a greatly reduced price. 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.
The recession in the United States has yielded huge profits to real estate investors prepared to take advantage. 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 Sal Buscemi of Dandrew Partners, a New-York based hedge fund.
