ST THOMAS APRIL 2015

[SISU]

Does anyone know what inkerman commercial property was used for in the past  ?

[Dave2]

Sisu:

This answer will be deliberately incomplete but it is part of the tax sale buying art. As a potential competitor I am selective what I disclose to you.  This is what I can say.  

There are 3 phases to this and it varies by time of the bid cycle:

a) Before the bid
b) You have the winning bid but are confirming you wish to put down the remaining 80%
c) After you own the property.  

In reverse order;  after you own the property; I talk to the neighbours.  Contrary to this guy's hope my budget for coffee and ice cream is a lot higher then for beer.  (Ice cream is used in a different phase of the cycle.)

Most people are civil and I have picked up more information over a Tim Horton's coffee then any amount of title searches could provide.  As the new owner that particularly applies in commercial property.  

b) is trickly particularly for commercial or industrial properties.  You want to get information without tipping off the owner and having him or her redeem the property post bid.  Depending on the situation I use different techniques but most of them are proprietary and part of the purchase art of buying tax sale property.  

Of critical interest at this phase is why is the property going to tax sale?   One of the key issues is THE OWNER ABANDONING THE PROPERTY?  While hopefully rare it does happen.  

I know of one property in the last couple of years that I am convinced the owner abandoned the property and it was worth 7 figures.  Think about it; would you abandon a $1,000,000 property.    Obviously you may want to think twice about buying a property like that at any price?

People tend to forget that tax sales are high risk and you can lose as much money as you make.  As they say in poker,"You need to know when hold them and you need to know when to fold them."

Before the bid I am even more secretive.  As people say we should never talk to the neighbours because they will tip off the owner and the property will be redeemed.  I sometimes wonder if that is why we are getting all the redemptions lately because people are ignoring that fundamental principle.