A note sale takes as long as its slowest check, so nobody can give you a firm number of days before seeing your file. Pricing is the quick part. The calendar goes on verifying the title, the property and the paperwork, and some of that is in your hands.
If you have a date in mind, that answer will not satisfy you. What can be done is to split the sale into its stages, see what sets the pace of each one, and work on the stages that respond to effort.
What the timeline is made of
| Stage | What sets the pace | Who controls it |
|---|---|---|
| Describing the note | How quickly you can state the terms and the payment record | You |
| Pricing | How many buyers are asked and how clear the description is | Buyers and broker |
| Choosing | How long you want to think | You |
| Purchase agreement | Whether you or an attorney want changes | You and the buyer |
| Document review | How complete your file is | Mostly you |
| Title search | The county’s records and the title company’s workload | Third party |
| Property valuation | Local availability of an agent or appraiser, and access to the property | Third party |
| Closing | Getting signatures notarized and the original note delivered | You and the closing agent |
Several of these overlap. A buyer has no reason to wait for the title search before ordering the valuation, so the total is closer to the length of the longest row, plus the stages at each end, than to the sum of all eight.
Where your own effort counts
Finding the paperwork
A seller who starts hunting for documents after accepting an offer has added that hunt to the timeline. Gather the note, security instrument, closing statement and payment record before you ask for a price, and document review can begin the day you sign.
Answering questions
Buyers send follow-up questions while their checks are running. Was the March payment late or missed? Is the well shared with the neighbor? Each one waits on you, so reply the same day where you can.
Deciding
Choosing an offer is the one stage where being slow costs you only the wait, so take the time you need. Bear in mind that an offer reflects conditions on the day it was made, and a buyer may want to confirm a figure that has sat for a long while.
The checks that run on someone else’s calendar
Title comes first. A title company or search firm reads the county records to confirm your lien and look for others. Some counties keep their records online and up to date, and in others a person has to visit the courthouse, so the same request can come back quickly in one county and slowly in the next.
The second is value. The buyer wants an independent view of what the property is worth. Where there are plenty of agents and appraisers nearby, that is routine work. For rural land, a remote cabin or an unusual building, fewer people can do it and booking one takes longer.
A broker or buyer can order both promptly and chase them, which is as far as their influence goes.
What stretches a sale
A file with a complication in it takes longer than a clean one, and the complications fall into a few groups.
Some concern the documents. If the original note is lost, the buyer has to decide whether a sworn statement will do and may want legal input first. If the payment record is thin, someone has to rebuild the history from bank statements.
Some concern who is selling. Where a note has several holders or heirs, every one of them must agree and sign, and one person away from home can hold up the rest. An estate or trust has to show that the signer has authority, and any court paperwork moves at the court’s pace.
The rest come out of the checks themselves. A title search can turn up an unpaid tax bill, a judgment against the payer, or an old lien that was paid off and never released, and each has to be resolved or priced. A payer who has fallen behind changes which buyers are interested and how closely they look at the property. And if the checks alter the offer, you will want time to weigh the new figure, which you should take.
What shortens it
- Locate the original note before anything else.
- Print a payment history, from your servicer if you have one or from your bank if you do not.
- Disclose problems up front. A late payment or a second loan declared at the start is already in the price, while one discovered later restarts the conversation.
- If the note has more than one holder, get everyone’s agreement in principle before you request offers.
- Find a notary, or ask the closing agent whether one can be sent to you.
- Ask the buyer for their full document list on day one, then send everything together.
Be careful with promised dates
Some buyers advertise a closing speed. Read it as their best case on a perfect file, because no buyer knows what a title search will show until it comes back.
A more useful question than “how fast can you close?” is “what do you still need before you can fund, and who are you waiting on?” A buyer who is working the file can answer with a specific list. We do not quote a closing date before we have seen the documents. Send us your note details with any date you are working to, and once the file is in we tell you what is outstanding and who has it.
Speed and price also pull against each other. A buyer who knows you are in a hurry has less reason to sharpen the number, and a sale to a single buyer is quicker to arrange than one where several are asked. Asking several adds some time at the start and none to the checks or the closing. Whether that trade is worth it is your call, and the wider sequence is set out in the guide to selling a note.
If you need the money by a certain date
Say so at the outset, and give both the date and the amount, because those two facts change the advice.
If the amount is well below what the whole note would fetch, a partial may cover it. A partial is the sale of a set number of payments, and it can be sized to a specific cash need so that the rest of the note stays yours. If the date is close, how soon a note can sell is the first thing to find out, so that you have time to arrange something else if a sale cannot meet it. If someone else set the date, such as a court or a lender, ask them directly whether there is any room in it before you plan around it.
Whatever the date, work backward from it with the table at the top of this page. The rows marked as yours are the only ones you can shorten, and most of that work can be finished before a buyer is involved.
Related questions
Which part of a note sale takes the longest?
The checks done by outside parties are the ones nobody in the sale can speed up, mainly the title search and the property valuation. Their pace depends on the county and on who is available locally, which is why no buyer can honestly promise a date before those are ordered.
Does getting several offers slow the sale down?
A little, at the start. Asking more than one buyer to price the note adds time before you choose. The checks and the closing take the same time whichever buyer you pick.
Is a partial sale quicker than a full sale?
Not by much. The buyer verifies the same documents, title and property in both cases. The partial agreement is an extra document to read, so allow time to understand it.