I'm almost done filtering a tax assessor's roll I recently received, and I've come across some owners without a known address. I remember Jack saying that these are great to keep and focus on, but I'm not sure how to find these people. Any thoughts?
I think I mentioned that they are great when talking about Tax Liens and Tax deeds. Because if the county does not know where they live, they logically can't deliver the tax bills to them AND they can't deliver the LATE notices to them. so they might (or probably) don't even know that they are late on their taxes.
All this increases your chances of being able to foreclose on a Tax lien down the road, or in case of Tax Deeds in increases that chance that such a property actually will come up for auction.
If you do my LandforPennies direct investing method, then finding these guys is a little bit of work but it is worth it. If the county did not give you ANY address (not even the old one) you will need to pull up one of their old deeds, get that old address and then go the skip tracing rout.
If you need a skip tracing service I use Lexis Nexis but I understand they have changed their service plans since I signed up and now they require some kind of a minimum fee per month (for I heard at least $300.00 but i might be wrong).
If you don't want to spend that kind of money, then I can also offer you to do skip tracing for you for a small fee per property. Please call my assistant at 602 712 0175 ext. 207 and ask her to give you a quote.
i don't specialize in this but I do have a subscription with them and my staff has a little bandwith to get this done. But please be aware that even skip tracing does not find all of them but only usually 50% to 2/3 of the people you are looking for. But that is not bad.
Hi Becky If the properties are close to you, and there is a structure on it, ....and you have the time.... One thing you may want to consider is speaking with the neighbors. They are usually helpful, especially if you tell them you're interested in buying the house and fixing it up. Most of the lower value properties need some work. They may know where the owner moved to....maybe to live with their son or daughter etc.... maybe they have the sons name and phone #..... or....even a general location....they moved to Orlando...or Denver.....etc it helps to narrow down your search
If you don't have much luck locating them, you can try this one... Put a "FOR SALE BY OWNER" "MUST SELL NOW " sign on the house / property with your phone # The neighbors will call the owners and say, "Hey Joe, you didn't tell me you were selling?!" Many times the owner will call you to ask what the heck is going on...who are you etc... Tell them you've trying to get in touch with them for soooo long etc... to purchase their property etc... ( works better with a house than vacant land ) At the very least, you may develop a list of potential buyers if you are able to locate the owners. Are these potential buyers interested in your other properties in the general area ?......etc