Nick Disney
Nick Disney has been a guest on Collecting Keys, the real estate investing podcast hosted by Mike DeHaan, Dan Austin and Dylan Koch.
Tenant-Free Cash Flow: A Strategy to Scale Your Real Estate Business w/ Nick Disney
Nick Disney explains how his San Antonio team buys distressed single-family houses, rehabs them, and resells them with owner-financed mortgage notes at 10.9% interest — creating what he calls "tenant-free cash flow" without landlord repair, tax or insurance costs. He walks through underwriting buyers, requiring roughly $25,000 down, using a residential mortgage loan originator and third-party servicer, selling notes to private investors, and pledging notes as collateral at small local banks. He also covers what happens when borrowers stop paying, including deed in lieu and foreclosure in Texas.
Key takeaways
- Nick's model: buy off-market, rehab to rent-ready condition, then sell with owner financing at 10.9% on houses priced $200,000 or less — leaving roughly $135K in a house sold for $189K, so the return is higher than the stated rate.
- He pays off the acquisition lender before selling so the note is in first position; wrapped notes are much harder to sell or borrow against.
- Notes can be pledged as collateral with small local banks (six to eight branches, not national banks). If a 30-year note is refinanced on 10- or 12-year bank terms, you may break even for a decade and then collect 20 years of pure cash flow with no money in the deal.
- Underwriting: no credit is fine, bad credit is not. He looks for stable income and work history, requires about $25,000 total for down payment and closing, and interviews every buyer face to face in the office.