I Bought a Rental…
Now What?
We at CheckBook IRA want to wish all of you a very Happy Thanksgiving and hoping that you surround yourself with family or loved ones. This is the time of year when we take stock in our investment performance and pat ourselves on the back or give ourselves a kick in the pants.
Retirement accounts are becoming a major source of security for our financial future and because of this more people want to take as much control as possible over these accounts. That is where we come in. You have as much control as you want, but you can enlist the help of a professional advisor whenever you so desire.
I asked one of our very successful affiliates what they tell their clients to help them secure financial security:
- Stay true to your goals.If you’re invested for the long term, don’t sell off at the first sign of a downturn—maybe that’s the time to invest more.
- Realize what is fake news and what is real news.Too often, people read articles on the Internet written by fear mongers who have sold an investment short and are trying to drive price down. In other words, vet your source or sources of information.
- Invest in what you know.If you’re going to invest in Bitcoin, become a student of cryptocurrency. Don’t be afraid to look at your past career to see how you can invest in your expertise.
- Don’t be afraid to use a financial advisor.Good advisers relish the thought of their clients using checkbook-controlled retirement accounts, for it leads to all kinds of alternative investments and helps them show their value to the client. They can also help shuffle through the fake news and suspect investments.
- Invest with a worst-case scenario – WHAT IS THE WORST THAT CAN HAPPEN.That is one of the reasons I like real estate, for if everything goes into a kerfuffle, I always will have some place to live in or a income producing rental. I have enough stock certificates that are only good for starting a campfire.
We don’t invest to lose money, but to build our financial future and the best way to do that is to have a complete plan. Remember that the greater reward the greater risk.
All in all, the above are a few nuggets that I hope you can use.
Finally, we would like to wish you and your family a very joyous and profitable holiday season.
Can an IRA take out a mortgage for an investment property or does it have to be paid in full?
IRAs can certainly take a loan from a bank or private party. The loan has to be non-recourse, which is to say that you can’t personally guarantee the loan, and the bank’s only recourse will be to take back the property. Because of that, lenders generally will not loan as much. From what I’ve seen, you can expect anywhere from 40%-60% LTV for a non-recourse loan.
Make sure though that is a non-recourse loan. There was a case (Peek v. Commissioner) that shows what happens when an IRA owner personally guarantees a loan made to their IRA. In Peek’s case, it was a Corp that was owned by several IRAs. The loan was made to the Corp, but guaranteed by the IRA owners. The tax court disqualified their accounts. Ouch.
There are a couple places you can go to get rates for non-recourse loans, although these aren’t by any means the only places that do non-recourse loans. http://www.iralending.com and http://www.myiralender.com
Be aware that financing property in an IRA will trigger the Unrelated Debt-Finance tax; this is commonly referred to as UDFI. The IRA will have to pay taxes on the portion of the net profits that were made with the bank’s money. Make sure you deal with a knowledgable CPA who can handle the 990-T filing for the IRA and correctly calculate the deductions, depreciation, and tax liability.
Finally, make sure there are no carve-outs in the loan documents. Carve-outs are kind of like exceptions to the non-recourse status of the loan. Put another way, they are clauses in the note that establish circumstances under which the IRA owner is personally liable. Many times they are called “bad-boy” clauses. Here’s a pretty good article on the subject.