Creative Owner Financing Part 1
Author: Real Estate Information // Category: International Investing, Mortgage Information, Real Estate InvestingAny arrangement where you, the home seller, are involved in any way in the ongoing financing of the property falls beneath the category of owner financing. But, contrary to what most folks think of when they see the phrase, it doesn’t typically indicate that you own the property totally free and clear prior to selling it. There are a number of situations which can be described as seller financing.
Let’s consider that typical viewpoint as our initial example. You, the owner , have rights to a home free and clear of liens or mortgages. Maybe you acquired it for cash, or maybe you have paid it off over a 15- or 30-year period, and are now seeking to sell it. The prevalent customer is seeking a mortgage comparable to that which buyers get at a financial institution (i.e., a 30 year home loan, sensible interest rate, and so on), and yet the buyer that is seeking seller funding is usually not able to get bank funding for some reason. We’ll deal with those concerns later, but for now, presume that the client needs to ask the seller to finance the property, and that the seller has legal ownership of it totally free and clear and is inclined to fund it for the customer. This is the easiest form of owner financing.
The course of action here is fairly straightforward. The buyer tenders a proposal of terms that the seller is inclined to accept. The conditions of the offer include an interest rate and time period for the mortgage. The owner accepts a negotiated down payment and will receive monthly payments, which includes interest, for the duration of the mortgage. Concluding the sale happens as in any normal housing transaction, the deed is vested in the buyer ’s name, and the owner has basically taken the place of the bank.
However, this is not the only state of affairs that is considered seller financing.
Let’s consider the next example, which is a seller who owns a home with an existing mortgage in place. The home has any equity, i.e., it would market for over the leftover balance of the mortgage. How much more, and why you need to sell, turn out to be important to this discussion. Let’s say you have to sell; for instance if you are unable to afford payments, have moved or because of divorce proceedings, and the equity isn’t ample to cover the price of the transaction plus real estate agent fees. It becomes quite enticing to roll the existing home loan plus the equity into a new home loan for the buyer. Add to the necessity of selling any urgency and you may have a dilemma if you rely on traditional financing, because of the current market’s standard transactions taking typically 4 months up to a year or more for marketing.
This scenario has the added benefit that you receive not only the equity but interest on it as well , as it will be amortized over the the rest of the time period of the underlying mortgage. Once more, you, the owner, have taken the place of the financial institution. Do realize that you don’t get that equity in a lump sum; however, it may be possible to get a minimum of some of it. Doing so is distinct from getting a 2nd mortgage in back of a new bank home loan (i.e., a seller carryback) that was common when the consumer didn’t have a down payment. Nowadays, it ismuch more probable that the customer has a down payment, but can’t get a new mortgage.
Due to the fact the mortgage that the consumer signs is with you rather than using a financial institution, the funds are sent to you or to an escrow associate (which is preferable for both parties), who will distribute the money to the existing mortgage processor and to you, as appropriate. This can be a speedy way to sell the house due to the fact you don’t have to hold out for the consumer’s loan to close, it is less costly compared to a everyday MLS sale, and has the advantage of increasing the total amount it is possible to earn from the sale. Are there cons? Certainly , or many people would be executing this.
In the next article we will discuss not only these concerns, but also the last situation for seller financing–how to make it work when your mortgage is actually underwater.

