Owner Financing & Note Investing Podcast with Dawn Rickabaugh · Dawn Rickabaugh | Expert Advice for building wealth through Owner Financing & Note Investing

Texas Attorney Scott Horne and I Talk About the History of Creative Real Estate and Why You Need It

·39 min·2 clips

Scott says creative finance saved his business because buyers still wanted houses when they could not get loans.

1. Owner Financing & Note Investing Podcast with Dawn Rickabaugh centers on Scott Horn’s history with creative real estate and owner financing in Texas. 2. Dawn Rickabaugh hosts as the Note Queen, and Scott Horn joins as a Texas attorney, investor, and former hard money lender who built systems for seller finance. 3. The episode asks how Scott’s experience through the 1985-86 crash, the 2008-09 collapse, and changing Texas laws shaped his current owner financing network. 4. Scott says he became a lawyer after studying engineering, then entered real estate by default in 1985-86 during the RTC era and a major recession. 5. He describes losing his in-house attorney job at a Dallas real estate development firm and then putting together a syndication of 100 foreclosed duplexes. 6. A church CPA brought investors to that duplex deal, but last-minute tax law changes disrupted it and left Scott managing the properties for three out-of-state banks. 7. Scott says he learned property management and leasing before the internet, using typewriters to prepare leases and paperwork. 8. He moved into apartments, office buildings, and other commercial work, but says recession conditions made those markets slow and difficult. 9. A "kids Texas head" asked him about "sweat equity," which led him into buying houses for $10,000 and $15,000 and learning by doing. 10. Scott describes using hard money, then trying to cut out middlemen, get cheaper capital, and eventually secure one bank deal that became about a thousand deals over time. 11. He names Ken D’Angelo, Craig Pettit, and Todd Eder as Dallas figures who helped shape the early home investor and mortgage-buying landscape. 12. Scott says Texas allowed lease options, lease purchases, contractor deeds, and other creative finance structures before repeated law changes in 2001, 2005, 2007, and 2009. 13. He says he is "not really a note buyer" but a note creator who prefers rehabs and the "rehab gift" as his passion. 14. Scott recalls starting a title company in 1996, becoming a fee attorney for 30 years, and later becoming Texas’ largest hard money lender before that business went "poof" in 2009. 15. He describes the 2008-09 crisis, including watching Washington Mutual fail on Fox News, holding a $5 million line of credit there, and meeting with 22 banks to survive. 16. Scott says about 130 investors walked away from hard money loans, but none of the owner-occupants did, because creative finance kept buyers in homes they could not otherwise finance. 17. The episode’s tone is conversational and practical, with Dawn prompting Scott on recession cycles, legal changes, and what makes a business survive in Texas and nationally. 18. Scott uses analogies like Neiman Marcus, Walmart, and the "Walmart theory of houses" to explain why he focuses on lower-priced properties and flexible exits. 19. Investors working in seller finance, subject-to deals, wraps, and Texas compliance would get the most value from this episode. 20. Casual listeners looking for light entertainment or non-real-estate topics may skip this one.

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