Transcript:

Hey there it’s Casey Denman here with TaxSaleAcademy.com. Thanks so much for joining me for this week’s tax sale question segment. Before we get to today’s question, if you are looking to learn more about investing in tax defaulted real estate, don’t forget to subscribe to our channel so you don’t miss out on our future training videos.

Alright, this week’s question. Is from . . . RealtorMary, and it was actually a comment that I wanted to reply to more than anything. Simply put: How about you can’t sell tax sale titles?

So, short and to the point, but need to be addressed because this is such a common misconception especially to those who have just a little bit of knowhow in this business. While RealtorMary might’ve had good intentions with her comment, she is unfortunately misinformed.

So, let’s go to the beginning real quick. In the conventional real estate market, when real estate transfers from one person to the next it will usually close through a title company or attorney. What most people might not even realize is during that transfer, there is something called a title search done. This is research done against the chain of title for that property. In the simplest form, one thing they check for is liens. The buyer doesn’t deserve to get any liens that they might not know about, right? Would be fair. So they check for those and all sorts of other stuff. If it all checks out, the attorney or title company will issue insurance, known as title insurance. This insures the buyer and lender that the title is clear and there is nothing to worry about. If something pops up, you have an insurance policy to protect you down the road. So, that’s title insurance.

Now, back to tax sales. When a property goes through tax foreclosure, there are extremely precise steps that must be met to make sure everything is done properly. Owners to contact, deadlines to meet, language in documents, that kind of stuff. When a title company or attorney sees that a property has gone through tax foreclosure, they usually won’t offer insurance on that property. Instead, they’ll label the title clouded. Which is what the Realtor lady who commented was referencing and is usually about as much as most Realtors understand about this business. Not knocking Realtors here, because I’ve been one for close to 20 years now. It’s just not in their business interest most of the time.

So, now we have this clouded title that can’t be insured. So what do we do? Well, we have a few options. And I’ve got videos on all of these options, by the way, that go into much greater detail.

The first is to sell it as-is. Let the buyer take care of it using one of the processes we’re about to discuss. I’ve done this hundreds of times. It’s a very easy process if you understand and go into the deal knowing you won’t get full market value. Noone will pay that since it still have the clouded title that transfers. But it’s easy and it’s fast.

Another option is to hire an attorney to clear the title for you. This is usually done through a suit to quiet title. That’s a lawsuit against anyone that could potentially claim an interest in the property, like former owners and lienholders. You’re essentially suing them in an effort to force them to raise their claim or otherwise forever quiet the title. It’s usually just a formality, but as long as there are no issues the judge signs off on the quieted title, you go back to the title insurance company or attorney and they’ll insure it.

Another option is to use a tax foreclosure certification company. These companies have partnerships with title insurance companies and what they do is they’ll research every single little detail in the tax foreclosure to insure every t was crossed and every I was dotted. In other words, they’ll be able to certify to the title insurance company that they work with that everything is good. And in the end, they’ll give them the go ahead to provide the title insurance.

And the last option is to run a title search, identify anyone who might have a potential interest in the property and have them sign a quit claim deed to you. This works best when it’s just one or two people that might have a claim, when they’re easy to track down and when they agree to sign that piece of paper. When it’s easy to track down the former owners, it’s usually a cheap and fast process. When it’s difficult to track them down, it can be impossible.

And again, I’ve got videos on each one of these here on YouTube and obviously we go into great detail on them inside The Academy.

So, RealtorMary, hopefully this has served to educate you some when it comes to tax defaulted real estate. A lot of new investors, as well as Realtors might understand that something in this process does cloud the title, but hopefully now you also understand how to solve these issues as well.

If anyone watching this has a question, feel free to post it below and I’ll definitely answer it and I might just shoot a video like this one.

And if you’re interested in learning about investing in tax defaulted real estate, just head on over to TaxSaleAcademy.com, where you can grab my free book or you can join the academy for access to all of our step by step training programs.

Take care and make it a successful day! See ya!