Scoop Bucket

Creative financing happens to be one of my expertise. I bought a huge 5,000 square foot historic victorian mansion for $40,000 using a contract for deed. And I had the seller financing it 100% with zero down over 15 years at 10% interest. It resulted in a monthly payment of $430.

The reason why this seller was open-minded was that they lived in California and the property was located in Illinois. They could not manage it. They initially turned down my offer, but I resubmitted the same exact offer 5 days later and they accepted it. They simply needed time to think it over. Do not assume that because your offer was rejected that it will not be accepted in the near future. The sellers realized that they had no offers on the property and they simply wanted to get it out of their responsibility list.

When you do a contract for deed, it is like owning the property even though you do not get the title to the property until your contract obligations are completely fullfilled. Basically that means you get the title after you pay the entire mortgage off. Until then, you are still responsible for property taxes, upkeep, etc. YOU are essentially the owner of the property.

When you buy using a land contact like this you want to make sure there is a clause in your contact that states you have the “right of first refusal”. It means that if the person who sold you the property decides to sell your contract (paper) for less than what you are paying for the house, then you get to buy the property at the new price if you can come up with the cash, or refinance. Otherwise they can go to a note broker and sell to the highest bidder. The winning bidder would then be the person you pay the monthly mortgage payment to from then on.

I will post in the future in more detail about creative financing methods and details. Bookmark this site and check back often.