Note Queen: Owner Financing Strategies

06/02/2026

If you've owned rental properties for 20+ years, you've been pitched everything by everybody... and you're exhausted. In fact, you have a black belt in warding off advances, detest hype, and can smell BS a mile away.

People come at you with:

👉 Let me list your property
👉 Let me give you a low cash offer
👉 You should do a 1031 Exchange into another management headache
👉 Hey sell that thing and take what's left after sending the IRS their blood money and get into annuities.
👉 Honestly, you've resigned yourself to the fact that nothing is really going to work for you... so you keep climbing on the roof, taking that 9am text on a Sunday morning...

Of course those are reasonable options for many people, and...

The Installment Sale (Internal Revenue Code 453) is absurdly under represented as a viable exit strategy.

If you own rentals free and clear (or nearly so) and want to explore whether or not seller financing might be right for you without being sold something, let's talk:

https://calendly.com/dawn-rickabaugh/seller-financing-exploration

This is an age old strategy that was 'the way things were done' for centuries before the federal mortgage system was established in 1930. It's not some new-fangled thing.

If it were, why would the IRS have a tax code for it??

Why would so many sellers turn their rents into mortgage payments instead? I would guess there is about $70 Billion in seller carry back loans created each year. MANY seller financing transactions never hit the MLS.

06/01/2026

You're tired, but there's no way you're going to give the IRS a third of what you've built.

You've been pitched 1031 Exchanges, but you don't want replace one headache for another.

Phone calls from the Phillipines and Pakistan, followed by low-ball cash offers... yes, that would reduce your capital gains alright, but yah... right...

Unless you don't want to kick your tenants out, rehab the place, or pay agent commissions, then yes, that could be a great option for you.

Your financial advisor wants you to sell, take the tax hit and buy insurance annuities.

Did you know you can CREATE YOUR OWN annuity? Turn your rental into an annuity and save big time on taxes.

Did you know that some of the wisest tax planning involves selling a property over time?

Oddly, most landlords never hear about this strategy from their Trusted Advisors. Even though it's been around for centuries and is used by hundreds of thousands of Mom 'n' Pop landlords each year.

Trust me, you CPAs, attorneys and real estate brokers know about it... The "Installment Sale" has been in the tax code for a very long time. (IRC 453). It's just that they don't generally bring it up to their clients for some reason.

Either landlords have planned their whole lives to trade their properties for seller carry notes to optimize retirement later in life, or they've never heard of it.

I'm here to bridge the gap. Schedule a free 15-min discovery session to see if seller financing might be right for you. Link in comments.

05/29/2026

Landlords often feel stuck. They don't want the grind any more, but they're not about to write the IRS a whopping check at closing, giving up a third of what they've built.

There are a few Mom 'n' Pop landlords that plan all along to turn their rentals into notes (via seller financing) later in life... it is their primary retirement plan.

But most never get the memo... that have NO IDEA that the "Installment Sale" very likely provides the answer they're looking for:

Defer capital gains... stretch the tax bill over decades
Greatly increase net income for retirement
Leave a great inheritance
Quit dealing with rising costs for property taxes, insurance and maintenance

Most find quiet relief when they take the time to consider this option, something I'm calling:

The Landlord Liberation Method.

If you own rental properties free and clear, and you're only hanging on because you can't stomach the tax hit, let's talk and see if seller financing is right for you.

https://calendly.com/dawn-rickabaugh/seller-financing-exploration

If it is, then we'll rope in your CPA, attorney and the rest of your trusted advisors for fine tuning and precise planning.

05/28/2026

Master leasing is the gateway drug for buying with owner financed terms.

In our last Property & Paper Live, Jim shares how he leased a vacant property to honor the owner's wishes, PLUS provide cash flow.

A while later, when it was palatable to do so, the owner seller financed the property to him for an EVEN BETTER win-win situation... great profits for the last 6 years, and the seller just keeps getting paid month after month for a property he sold years ago...

That's creating your own annuity... your own 'real estate annuity'... a stream of secure income, not backed by the promises of insurance companies but by the very property you have known and loved (or at least known!) for the last several decades.

05/21/2026

05/21/2026

One of my takeaways from the DME (Diversified Mortgage Expo) conference in Nashville was that I need to pay a lot more attention to the risk of flooding when I'm evaluating a note for purchase.

Beth Boisseau-Coots representing JB Lloyd & Associates specifically called out flooding as one of the top going concerns for insurers.

05/19/2026

Credit card debt has gone vertical, private credit and the bond market are uncomfortable unknowns, and FHA loans are allegedly sitting at default rate of 12%+... foreclosures will likely be on the rise later this year,

Maybe an economic crash can be pushed out for a couple more years??... maybe it's best to be prepared for tougher economic times starting now...

Batten down the hatches, stop the financial leaks in your boat and find ways to turn your passions into a business that provides extra income independent of your W-2, social security and pensions.

Or start taking charge of your own investments so they work harder for you and spin off more cash flow and/or appreciation so you actually have a shot at keeping pace with inflation.

Don't let someone/some institution be in charge of 100% of your financial future.

Yes, I could open a fund, capital raise and run a bigger ship, but that has to be done very carefully... I've seen too many operators get too far over their skiis, which ends up badly all around.

I prefer to remain a boutique investor, real estate & note professional and work with other everyday people who want to work with someone they trust as they invest in notes secured by real estate in a simple, straightforward manner.

05/14/2026

A guy in Utah has some commercial land he wants to sell, and he's thinking that he'll offer owner financing to get a better price, but he only wants to carry for a year, then he wants his money back out of it.

Generally, seller financing only supports a higher real estate sales price if it's a reasonably long term.

A buyer who will have to come up against a 1-year maturity date where he has to get the owner carry note paid off won't really value the financing all that much... he'd rather get a cheaper all cash price right from the get go.

Sometimes sellers think they can 'game' the system and inflate the sales price of the property so they can sell the note (even at a discount) to yield the equivalent (or better) of a cash sale.

Many times that thinking backfires.

If you know you want or need cash within a year or two, just lower the price of your real estate until you get a cash offer... if you carry, get a BIG down payment and charge the highest interest rate the seller will agree to.

I often work with buyers, sellers and their agents to reverse engineer the terms to optimize the financial outcomes for all parties and make sure risk and reward are appropriately shared.

05/12/2026

If the note business (particularly the 'non-performing' note business) is likely to be good for investors over the next few years, that implies that real estate and the private finances of many people across the country are going to be increasingly painful and strained... that we could have a lot more foreclosures heading our way.

I'd be happy to be wrong, but better to be prepared for hard times than to be caught flat footed.

First, prepare for a time of temporary collapse with food and water storage, water purification devices, backup heat, power and light, cash on hand, some silver rounds, items for barter, learn to grow some food even if it's just sprouting.

When it comes to 'asset protection', make sure your flesh, your 'personal real estate' and the bodies of the people you love will be taken care of if you couldn't go to the store or order anything online for a month or more.

Your net worth is meaningless if you can't feed yourself and your loved ones through a period of disruption.

05/07/2026

I was having a private zoom session with Melody Wright, whose work I respect and closely follow, and she asked me how much seller carry back 'paper' I thought was originated each year.

I popped off the number often quoted in the industry: $35 billion or so.

Then Melody said, 'Yes, I've talk to Fred and Tracy, but they confirm that is just for seller financing transactions reported on the MLS.'

Welp... none of the owner financing I've ever participated in (whether I was the real estate buyer getting terms from the seller, or I was the one offering seller financing to a buyer) was reported in the MLS.

So... if that's true just in my little corner of the world, then my guess is that the number is AT LEAST double that... $70 billion... maybe even snuggling up to a Trillion$$.

There are enough sellers that think owner financing is an acceptable exit strategy to the point that there is probably about $70 Billion in private paper (notes/loans) out there.

Which means that if you're a note buyer / investor, there is plenty of opportunity for you ...you just have to be a 'hunter gatherer'... you're never going to find seller financed notes all in one place waiting for you to dump into your shopping cart.

The closest thing you'll get to that is checking out PaperStac (an 'MLS' for notes) or to buy institutionally originated bank paper from a larger hedge fund or other group.

I, myself, stick to Mom 'n Pop owner carry notes and buy them with the help of my intimate group of Mom 'n Pop investing partners.