Buy Apartment Buildings — Find Sellers in Public Records

In this article

Some of the best deals to be had for the buyer of apartment building can be had by ignoring real estate listings and going directly to the source. However, locating and making contact with apartment building owners actually takes some work. The work is not hard or time-consuming if you know where and how to find the information.

The first place to look is the public records.

In every U.S. municipality you will find a tax assessor’s office. In the tax assessor’s office you will find a list called the tax roll which itemizes every real estate property in that municipality. These are public records, so don’t worry about breaking the law or invading people’s privacy. These records identify the mailing address of the property owner, his or her name, the name of the lender and description of the real estate along with an assessed value.

Ask the tax assessor to see the tax map to identify a property and find its tax identification number. This tax identification will tell you the lot, block and parcel numbers. You can then use the tax roll to find the real estate owner. Armed with this arsenal of information you can literally spend hours in the tax assessor’s office identifying the name and mailing address of every apartment building owner in your municipality. But how do you use this information once you have it?

After you have the names and addresses of the apartment building owners in your municipality all that is left for you to do is begin sending them out a pre-prepared form letter to inform the apartment building owner you are an active investor looking to purchase apartment building from private owners.

The secret to contacting owners is for you to realize that you are only looking for a needle in a haystack. Most sellers will list their property with a commercial realtor. Most sellers will have a sales price that would make their apartment building an unprofitable investment for you. You shouldn’t let this concern you because you are only looking to find that one great deal. And you are more likely to find a great deal from an unlisted property then one that is listed.

Note By BiggerPockets: These are opinions written by the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions of BiggerPockets.