All Forum Posts by: Patrick Desjardins

I also recommend FCI, especially for performing loans.

But be aware that all servicing companies suck. A loan defaulted and the borrower texted me. We agreed she would pay $350 per month. It's been 3 months and they have finally gotten the paperwork done for the forbearance agreement. They will keep calling the wrong number and you have to hound them. AND they're still the best. So this is really a case of scraping the bottom and trying to find the less worst of the bunch.

I tried Land Home before. Definitely do NOT recommend them. They are completely incompetent. I've talked about them before but it's the same company that on the same file: autodialed the same wrong number for a month (even if the borrower had called them from another valid number), didn't send the demand letter for a month (despite telling me they were going to send it) and other problems I don't remember the details of. All in all it took twice as long to foreclose with them as it has with other companies due to their constant screw ups. Others may have a different experience with them but after this fiasco I immediately transferred to another servicer.

You have to give him credit, he's creative. Never of that one before about selling chapters.

More importantly though.. aside from suing him locally, can anyone confirm reporting him to the authorities as a ponzi scheme? Since that's the only way to really shut him down.

You're correct but there's something you aren't taking into account:

They don't want to antagonize him and probably gave him the benefit of the doubt for a long time. You know, paperwork got lost. Email went to spam. The borrowers filed bankruptcy.

Also, people don't want to spend more time/money chasing after it when realistically the only way they'll get money back is him scamming someone else to pay them. In which case once he does get caught, the government will try to collect from them to pay off the other victims. Then they get f'd a second time. I'm not an expert and don't claim to be one but you see this often on American Greed.

I did both. Since I moved here from Canada, I didn't have a job (W2) and credit, so I couldn't get traditional bank financing to buy rentals. Of course at the time I didn't know about HMLs and other ways to buy properties. But I had enough money to buy 2nd mortgages.

And then, we started building a small portfolio of rentals after foreclosing on some homes and learning some neighborhoods. All in on a home for 40 and rented for $900, I can live with that. Don't need to be a genius real estate investor to make those numbers work. So you're right, they aren't mutually exclusive. In fact I agree with Gordon Moss' theory that they are both very much complementary and owning both is a good thing.

Some people want to grow and build funds etc, or own hundreds of units. That's not for me. Maybe if things lined up perfectly but otherwise it sounds like too much work and responsibilities.

I'm just looking for lifestyle investing. I want to go play golf at 2pm on a tuesday and not be stuck in an office. My goal is 10-12k passive per month. I was getting pretty close but have had a few big setbacks over the past 18 months.

As others have said, a 20k program isn't worth it. Their suggestion of a JV is good. Or you could buy a performing note and make profits while learning the administrative aspect of notes (ie servicers)

Right now, I don't advise anyone to get into notes. At least not the way we did 5 years ago. Some people are successful at it but it's more trouble than it's worth because of the scarcity of inventory and large amount of small investors looking for the same thing.

At the moment there is a much lower barrier to entry in creating your own notes by funding other people's real estate projects (ie private lending). Easier, quicker, less headache and still decent returns.

Cheri, even people with a lot of money can benefit from non bank loans. To get off market deals, REOs or auctions for example, speed is of the essence. A bank will take over a month to close and a lot of distressed houses aren't financeable in the first place.

HMLs are quicker and can fund deals that wouldn't pass an inspection.

So.. the reason why someone would be able to get refinanced is because they would have rehabbed the house (which should pass inspection) and time would be less of an issue.

Stupid question but did his contracts look professional?`

I remember seeing the materials he was giving out as templates in one of his first note camps and it looked so amateur-ish it completely turned me off to his info products. It was something like a 1 page JV agreement that he could have written on a napkin, and definitely not reviewed by an attorney.

Maybe it's improved since then. I'm just curious to know if it raised any alarm bells for people.

It's pretty common. One of Scott's marketing "mentor" is Perry Belcher, a convicted felon. There are plenty of them in the internet marketing community, which he's a proud member of.

As others have said, you have to vet people carefully. I think everyone uses the "fake it til you make it" attitude when they start out, which is understandable to a point, but there's a difference between that and outright bilking investors' money.