Many of the “real estate experts” stress the importance of using other people’s money (OPM). Their reason for using OPM, is to defer risk. If you’re not confident in your real estate investment enough to be using your own money, then you probably shouldn’t be taking that investment option. But that’s not the point of this article, today we will talk about hard money.
Privately funded loans with high interest rates and fees intended for temporary financing are known as hard money loans. These loans aren’t hard because they are hard to get, but because the terms of them are very “hard”. It’s not cheap to get hard money financing. They typically have an upfront origination fee of three to four points, plus 12-18% interest.
One of the major differences with hard money lending, and other types of financing is the criteria used to determine finance risk. The focus on traditional mortgage loans is the borrower. Traditional lenders only approve borrowers with good credit, low debt, and consistent income. With hard money loans, the main focus is on the value of the property. When the value of the property is worth significantly more than the amount financed, hard money lenders will typically grant financing. If the borrower defaults, the hard money lender quickly forecloses and owns a property with substantially more equity than it was paid for.
Hard money loans do have a purpose, and can be a valuable tool for people getting into real estate investing. Many foreclosure auction and other deals need financing very fast. They must come up with money fast. Good California hard money lenders are able to fund money in a very short period of time. If the property purchased really is a good real estate investment, and the buyer has a good timely exit strategy, then even though the borrowing cost may be high, the profit made is worth the cost. With real estate investments it’s not how much money is spent, but what the net profit is.
If an investor borrowed $100,000 from a hard money lender at 20% interest, and sold it three months later for $140,000. If there up front fee was three points on top of then to the interest paid. They may have paid the hard money lender Nine Thousand Dollars, but they would have netted more than Thirty Thousand..
Real Estate investors can benefit from hard money loans, but need to be careful with the way they use them as the costs are very high.
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Posted under Local Real Estate News
This post was written by admin on July 31, 2010

