Why Use Hard Money Lenders and Hard Money Loans
Posted: Tuesday, November 10, 2009
by Louis Jeffries
http://healthyweightloss4babyboomers.com
Hard Money Loans.
The reason many real estate investors use high rate loans is that they are a source to purchase and rehab property and make a substantial profit that they would not have without the use of this expensive money. These short term loans are expensive and even if they were legal for a home owner to borrow from the private lenders offering these loans it would never be advisable. So how hard are these short term loans, you ask? The answer is threefold. They are restrictive in loan to value, they are high in rate and high in fees.
The maximum loan to value for most private loans range from 50% to 75%. No deals are done at the higher loan to value for two reasons. The hard money lenders require lots of equity in case of default so they can sell the property quickly because it will be below market value. The reason I say in theory is because there are so many REO's, Short Sales and foreclosure properties on the market today that what was normally considered an exceptional deal is common place. Therefore, private lenders are more particular about the properties, borrowers and loans they choose to fund.
Secondly, any real estate investment that has less than 30% equity are not good investments for the investors unless they are purchasing the property for the cash flow. In that case they are long term investments and not suitable for the short term nature of these expensive bridge loans.
High Interest Rates.
Whether as n real estate investor buying and or rehabbing commercial or residential investment real estate the interest rates are much higher than conventional commercial or residential investment lending. The rates are higher because the risks are higher. Higher risks because these loans are not underwritten to standard conventional criteria and there is a very limited or no secondary market for these private bridge loans. This is generally not an issue because the borrowers know these are only short term loans. The terms range typically from 3 to 24 months. Therefore, the higher interest rate is of minimum importance because both lenders and borrowers know that the borrowers have an exit strategy to quickly payoff these high interest rate loans. Most lenders require a viable and verifiable exit strategy before they make will the loans.
Higher Points.
Because these loans are short term in nature the hard money lenders always charge discount points. They may charge 1 to 5 points. In addition the private money brokers will charge 2 to 5 points. An average a borrower will 5 to 10 points. Plus closing costs. These are high fees. They only make sense when an real estate investor will make substantially more money and they have no other way to fund the deals.
Why Use Hard Money Lenders.
Simply to make money. As a real estate investor you have choices in financing your deals. You can choose conventional financing that requires at 30% to 35% down payment for properties that are in good shape. There are many other conventional mortgage criteria including credit, cash reserves, seasoning of funds and property. These all make conventional financing almost impossible.
Another option is to use your own funds and not finance a deal at all. But, most astute real estate investors know that if they can make a net profit of $25,000, $50,000, $100,000 or more using a hard money loan they do not like the fees but they we pay them versus not making any money because of lack of financing.
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Louis Jeffries has been a Mortgage Banker for over 20 years. A Investor Rehab Specialist Louis will help you fund you next rehab or construction project. Contact Louis louisj@alldominionmortgage.com 708-299-3244 Visit The Blogs Investor Rehab Hard Money
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