Indianapolis, IN · Member since 2014 · 30 posts · 1 vote
I was driving for dollars in Indianapolis, Indiana and found an abandoned property I searched the address on my local assessor site ( http://maps.indy.gov/AssessorPropertyCards/ )
only to find out the website hasn't been updated.
The website says the owner still lives in the property I searched which is incorrect.
My question is how do I find and contact the owner if the address is the same as the abandoned property?
Any local investors know what I could do in this situation?
Rental Property Investor · Gainesville, FL · Member since 2015 · 1k+ posts · 432 votes
11y
@Account Closed
have you tried calling the tax assessors or property appraiser office? or looking up the property at the tax site to see what's going on with the payments?
Edgewood, MD · Member since 2014 · 79 posts · 17 votes
11y
You should also check the Land Records/ Recorder of Deeds. This will have the mortgage information and whether the property was assigned to another party. This is more accurate than the tax records. Also check the judicial records and check for judgements or lis pendus. Cross reference the name on the tax records with probate records. See if the owner has passed.
Real Estate Broker · Chicago, IL · Member since 2014 · 2k+ posts · 1k+ votes
11y
Originally posted by @Account Closed:
We're not local investor, but in Cook County Illinois, the best place to check for the current address of the owner is not the assessor's office; it's the Treasure's office. We usually find the address that the property tax bill is sent.
Lender · Greater LA/Orange County area, CA · Member since 2012 · 3k+ posts · 3k+ votes
11y
It's not the job of any government agency to keep tabs on the comings and goings of citizens!
The recorders office is merely the local county archive for deeds and other documents of public record. The court clerk keeps track of civil and superior court records such as order and decrees in a Registry of Actions. The county health department may hold records and certainly the bureau of vital records. State and Federal social Security Death Indexes.
No, for clues and cues you need to use a combination of anecdotal trails and commercial data providers. If your target is deceased, find family members by subscribing to genealogical sites like Ancestry or Family Tree.
Once a target and chain of relatives and associates are determined, use skip tracing services or online data provider.
Rental Property Investor · Malvern, PA · Member since 2015 · 82 posts · 28 votes
10y
Hey @Brian Gibbons-- My day job is as a listing agent for a brokerage of self storage on the East coast. The problem that I have right now is identifying the owners for self storage facilities in an efficient way. Our mailers to facilities with managers often never make it to the owners because the manager takes one look at it and thinks, "I don't want my job to be sold out underneath me!" So our goal is to acquire the home/office addresses for owners of facilities in order to insure they see our mailers.
My methodology so far has been to go county by county, identify all self storage facilities on Google Maps (double-checking with our database to make sure I don't miss any not on Google,) and entering the addresses into a tax parcel GIS unique to the county. Once in a blue moon the county will have the owner's name and address listed with the tax parcel info. More often, it'll be listed under an LLC specific to the property. So my next step is to go into the state corporation search and try to find out more info that way. Usually that's fruitless, too -- the entire state of NJ has no useful info with the LLC data.
So how would you solve this problem? My next thought is to try to search filed deeds and liens in individual counties, but this is all obviously extremely time intensive and potentially expensive.
After all other avenues fail to find an owner .... Here's a tip I tried recently.
Place a For Sale sign in the yard with YOUR phone number on it.
The owner will be calling you in short order!
This is a great example of creative real estate. LOL
It is also an example of civil trespass, if not criminal in some jurisdictions.
There are a number of resources you could use to find someone original poster. Attorneys and private investigators have access to strong utilities like ACCURINT that can find people you're looking for. If you're desperate, seek out a PI.
Seattle, WA · Member since 2014 · 1 post · 0 votes
10y
I would write a letter to that abandoned property with your return address on it. The post office will return your letter with the forwarding address on it. Also you can search for the tax parcel number on your country web site to see if you can find the owner's new address.