Press says tax delinquent real estate investors are ‘blood suckers’. Post 57

Aspen Times

Bloodsuckers and bottom-feeders

Opportunists attend local tax lien

ASPEN — If you don’t pay your property taxes, beware: People are cueing up to pay them for you.

Every year in early November, the Pitkin County treasurer’s office holds a tax lien auction at the courthouse in Aspen. On Thursday, 28 buyers forked over more than $250,000 to buy back-taxes.

Investors can earn as much as 15 percent on any tax liens they buy. And, if they pay a homeowner’s taxes for three years in a row, on the fourth year the investor can take possession of the property in a tax foreclosure, county treasury officials said.

Dave Wyman and his wife, Nancy, have been coming to tax auctions in Aspen since 1994.

“We’re a bunch of bottom-feeding bloodsuckers,” Wyman joked.

An investor by trade, Wyman travels all across Colorado and Wyoming to tax lien sales. He uses the Internet to conduct title searches and even gets an overview of a parcel using Google Earth, he said.

Wyman said it’s important to research properties, and said he’s bought the same lien on the same land for many years.

It’s the Internet that is changing the sale business, Wyman said, with counties all across the U.S. conducting auctions online.

But it’s the human element and the challenge of bidding with someone eye to eye that’s the draw, he said.

“You do it because it is interesting and it’s fun,” Wyman said, adding that the big-money breaks are rare. “It’s a crapshoot.”

Poach was the top bidder Thursday, spending $118,000 on a handful of properties.

He warned about dangerous premium bids, saying, “I lose money all the time.”

But Poach paid some $8,000 in overbidding Thursday and said the county would probably “have a party” on the money he spent.

Overbid funds go to the county general fund, and this year’s auction earned $13,050.

But in pricey Pitkin County, a tax foreclosure hasn’t happened in a long time, officials said.

See the entire article at:  http://www.aspentimes.com/article/20071109/NEWS/71109003/0/FRONTPAGE

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Coach Mitch’s REFLECTIONS

Surprise, Surprise

By the headline, I was expecting an article that denigrated real estate investors. That is typical. The reporter’s feelings are shown by his choice of the title and sub-title.

It’s OK to denigrate REI

I know that reporters are seeking to heighten readership of their articles with a provocative title, however it is politically correct to denigrate real estate investors and landlords.

Imagine if, for instance, the reporter was writing about an aides infected man who was purposefully infecting gay men. I doubt that a headline would read “Queer sticking it to fagots.” We would be outraged by the headline, and righteously so.

However, we have been inured to accept virtually anything negative that is said regarding real estate investors or landlords. There is no similar outrage amongst the press, nor amongst the public.

The direction is all bad

We are being set up. In the future, several things will happen to the detriment of our republic because of the events listed below.

1. Government’s, at all levels, are spending well beyond our means,
2. Taxes for the middle class are taking an increasingly crippling share of our income,
3. Because of inflation, hard assets are rising precipitously,
4. Thus, a significant percentage of people can’t afford a house,
5. People must rent because they are finding it increasingly difficult to afford a house,
6. Rents are rising to unaffordable levels because housing costs are soaring,
7. Under the rubric of consumer protection, the public is being “protected” against blood sucking, huckster real estate investors who are “taking advantage” of citizens in financial distress.

This is not made up.

As one example: NY law, S4744, The Home Equity Theft Prevention Act, went into effect February, 2007. This law makes it so hard to do real estate investing in New York State that I have stopped investing in NY. An even more onerous law exists in Maryland. South Carolina has a difficult law, Texas has severe restrictions on lease options, etc.

For instance, the NY law allows a seller seven years to overturn the sale if the seller declares that the language the buyer used was confusing. No examples of confusing language are given.

How would you like to lose the property, pay a hefty fine and perhaps go to jail, because, seven years after the sale, the seller said he “didn’t understand?” Further, this law does not allow any legal protections for the investor, i.e. no corporation or trust or other device will allow an investor to escape prosecution if, within seven years, a seller chooses to overturn the sale. There are many other onerous provisions.

In the 1990’s, I spoke widely against legislation that had been passed by the NYS Assembly and was being looked at by the NYS Senate.

There were many of similar type, but one such law stated that evictions were overwhelming the social welfare benefit and medical system in NY City. The city could not afford to take care of the increasing number of indigents. The solution, explained in the legislative overview, was to make it more difficult for the renter to become evicted. The legislation would require landlords to jump through bureaucratic hoops especially set to give New York City at least an additional 90 days of not having to provide housing – because the landlord would have to allow the non-paying renter to stay in the apartment – without compensation.

In NY, should the Republican Senate pass to Democratic Party control, several laws detrimental to landlords will be passed by the legislature, furthering the socialistic agenda, which encompasses the taking of private property.

3 Predictions

1. I predict that in the fairly near future, hard assets will rise to record heights, i.e. gold, silver, land.
2. I predict that in the mid-term future, all rental properties will come under Rent Control ordinances.
3. I predict that in the longer term, property rights will be virtually eliminated – in the public interest.

The Big Bust or the Orwellian End

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0405/S00268.htm

Now is the time to make your play. Coach Mitch’s “Ridiculously Simple System…” for getting tax delinquent property is a wonderful way to get hard assets at a price that is well below the market rate. Even if prices plunge, which is hardly likely, you are protected because you have purchased correctly.

See Coach Mitch’s “Ridiculously Simple System…” ™ for details.

Hope you agree,