When I was only 18, I bought three bank foreclosure lists from a foreclosure listing service of all the property that banks had foreclosed on in my area and I also bought a book on buying foreclosure property. Needless to say I was a small confused by all the terms: bank REO’s, government foreclosure homes, FHA foreclosure homes, etc. I didn’t even know who FHA was much less how to buy a home from them. Since then, and with a lot of trial and error, I have bought and sold over 35 homes and here are some really excellent guidelines if you are trying to do this yourself as a result of massive increase in home foreclosure listings due to the mortgage crisis.

The first thing is don’t try and do it all by yourself. This is a surefire way to get overwhelmed and then just end up quitting. Get a partner. A friend, relative or someone already in the business of buying foreclosed homes. If you still want to do it on your own there are even fantastic investor concierge services that allow investors the opportunity to buy those homes after they have already been bought and fully renovated. This is probably the smartest way to start in the game if you have investment capital and not a lot of expertise. A fantastic real estate investment concierge is www.painfreeproperties.com . Check out the Investor Advantage program they offer.

Also, you don’t need to spend money on a foreclosure listing service. You can contact any title company and question for a list of foreclosed home in the area. They have quick and simple access to public records and can limit your cost of trying to identify local foreclosed homes for sale. If you are going to place offers I recommend using that title company for their services once you do identify a property for buy. You can also use a foreclosure free search online. Just key those three words into Google and look around. You don’t have to spend any money to get fresh home foreclosure listings.

And lastly, be patient but diligent. The simplest way to buy a foreclosed home is to buy it before it goes into foreclosure. Once a homeowner is late or delinquent on their payments they receive a notice of default and then the clock starts ticking. It is during this time you can negotiate with sellers that can’t or don’t want to save their home and you can come in and buy the property. You can sometimes just offer cash for them to go and you can bring the property current with the lender thus acquiring property for pennies on the dollar. You can get a list of notices of default from that same title company you get your foreclosure lists from as well.

So if you are in the market to buy bank foreclosure property, remember if you are new to the business, than get a partner or professional investment service because you don’t have to do it yourself, get quality lists from title companies for foreclosure homes for sale and use the internet for home foreclosure information and try and identify homes in pre foreclosure to find motivated sellers.

Aaron M. Thomas Sr, The Bay Area Mortgage Expert, is lead syndicator for www.painfreeproperties.com and has been featured on CNN, MSNBC & Rob Black and Your Money. His approach to real estate finance and investing has been well documented and he is considered by many to be a leader in the field of residential real estate.

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