Jul
25
Score One for the Old Chicks
July 25, 2008 | Leave a Comment
So, some of you may know that I am HUGE women’s basketball fan. In my office I have an autographed jersey of Sheryl Swoopes and at home I have a pair of her Nike shoes. She was the first female athlete to ever get her own Nike shoe.
I played basketball briefly in high school. I ran track and the coach needed some speed that season so she put me on the team. Soon, she discovered how awful I was (not for lack of trying - I practiced for three hours daily!) and I rode the bench the rest of the season.
For me, I love it even more because I stink at it. I have a huge respect for the women that play the game and the LA Sparks and Tennessee Lady Vols are my teams.
This week, the Sparks were playing Detroit and a bench-clearing brawl broke loose. Not something you typically see in the WNBA so it was big news. The league suspended a bazillion players and Detroit was left with only 7 eligible players on their roster.
Enter Nancy Lieberman.
Nancy is a 50- year old, Hall of Fame basketball player/coach/analyst and Detroit gave her a 7 day contract. She played last night and although she missed her one shot, she did complete one HECK of a no-look pass for an assist. 50 years old. 50!!
So, like I said, score one for the old chicks. You, GO, Nancy!
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Jul
22
Your LLC Loan is Gone!
July 22, 2008 | 2 Comments
For almost two years now I’ve been advising anyone who will listen to begin a refinance strategy to peel residential investment property loans off of their personal credit into portfolio loans in the name of their entity or LLC. No one listened. I heard a bunch of excuses such as “it’s too expensive” or “I don’t have enough equity” or “I don’t think I need to do that.” Well, a couple of things have happened in the last month or so to prove that (once again) I was right. Hate to say I told you so, but…
Beginning August 1st, Freddie Mac is limiting the number of financed properties an investor can have to 4. Fannie hasn’t yet announced a reduction but some Fannie lenders have voluntarily reduced their max to 6 in anticipation of an announcement.
Yesterday, Wachovia announced that they are no longer accepting loans. Wachovia was the bank that did the residential LLC loan. So, now all those investors that have been calling in a panic in response to the Freddie Mac rule have waited too long. Ix-nay on the efinance-ray. That’s pig latin for “no can do an LLC loan.”
So, what to do now? If you have more than 4-6 financed properties on your personal credit and you want to employ this LLC refinance strategy, your broker can’t help you. I get at least two calls a day from investors that are looking to buy or refinance a property and they are essentially unfinanceable with conventional financing. They always ask me to “be creative.”
Well, my creative solution for those investors ended yesterday. If you are in this boat, you may be able to help yourself by developing a relationship with a portfolio lender on your own. A lender that will loan in the name of your entity and doesn’t sell their loans into the secondary markets. But I can only think that if you could do that, wouldn’t you have done that already?
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