Tips For Success As A Bulk REO Investor

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.

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.

Understanding the notion of Bulk REO’s requires understanding of the foreclosure process.

A home owner who misses one or more mortgage payments is faced with an ever-increasing volume of threatening correspondence from their lender. The lender directs the subsequent timing of the actual foreclosure proceedings. The ‘pre-foreclosure’ time starts with filing of foreclosure paperwork and concludes at public auction.

When a defaulted property is placed up for auction, the foreclosure process is completed. Ownership of the property is returned to the lender if the property is not sold at auction. The property then receives the designation of being an ‘REO’ or the more formal name, ‘Real Estate Owned’.

Typically, lenders list their REO properties with local real estate agents in hopes of selling the property to a retail buyer who will pay full price. But as a consequence of the weak economy, lenders are frequently selling their REO properties far below their actual value. The trade-off is that the buyer must purchase multiple REO properties in each transaction.

Qualified real estate investors are increasingly finding once-in-a-lifetime opportunities in these REO packages. Bulk REO Investors are most successful when they have a well-established source of funding for their REO packages. There are many sources of funding for these transasactions including: hard money and commercial financing, as well as non conventional sources such as hedge funds and private investors. Additionally, one man is becoming very well known in the field of bulk REO investing, and his name is Salvatore Buscemi of Dandrew Partners, a hedge fund in New York.