"There are 142 NEW Foreclosures in your counties!" Each week, a message similar to this one appears in your inbox, notifying you of all the new foreclosures that have started in your counties. With so many new foreclosures filed each week, knowing what to do with them is as critical as knowing that there are new foreclosures.

How to read deeper into the Foreclosure Detail Page

At ForeclosuresMass, we pride ourselves on providing the most comprehensive foreclosures information for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. This means there might be more information at your fingertips than you even knew about. Let's take a closer look at some of our features on the website and how you can get the most out of them. Behind each foreclosure on the My Foreclosures page is a Detail Page with more information on each individual property. Let's start by looking at the address on the envelope. If you see a zip code, then we have a valid mailing address for you (as verified by the United States Postal Service) and you have a better chance of a letter getting through. If you do not see a zip code, however, this indicates that we had a difficult time finding a verifiable mailing address for the property. You may not want to spend time sending a letter, as there's a good chance it'll come back to you.

T I P ! For more information on the Legal process and parties involved in the Foreclosure process, see this month's article by Attorney Charles Levin entitled "The Foreclosure Process"

Moving down the page, we come to the headings Plaintiff and Defendant. What do these headings mean? Foreclosures get processed as legal cases raised by one party (the plaintiff) against another party (the defendant). In a foreclosure case, the plaintiff is most likely a bank, but can in some cases be an individual. If an individual has initiated foreclosure, this indicates a personal debt from one individual to another. The Defendant heading can feature the name of a trustee or a company, however, the defendant is more often than not simply the name of the homeowner, and therefore relatively straightforward.

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Below the Plaintiff and Defendant information, you'll see a Tax Record, which gives you some background information on the property. Was the last sale date within the past year or two? Or was it more than a decade ago? A recent sale might tell you that the property hasn't had much time to appreciate, and whatever equity has built up may have already been eaten up by late penalties and legal fees associated with the foreclosure. This is another valuable piece of information to help you in evaluating which foreclosures to pursue further.

On the right hand side of the page, we find one of the most helpful features, the See Also box. The See Also box lists foreclosures filed with the same Defendant or same address. This can give you a lot of clues about the homeowner's situation. The same owner tied to multiple addresses? This may be an investor who's gotten into financial trouble or a home-owner who bought a second home and can't juggle both. The same property and owner with past foreclosures? This may tell you that the property owner has slipped into foreclosure, gotten out, and then back into trouble again. Often, the first time a property owner experiences financial hardship, he or she is able to get help from friends and family to avoid losing the house. If this happens a second time, though, it's not as easy to get help from friends and family, and more options need to be explored. This is where you can help!

Working with Downloaded Foreclosure Data

Now that you have complete data and some new ways to analyze it, you have a number of tasks ahead of you before you'll be in contact with the involved parties (print out letters, make labels, create a phone call list, etc.). The challenge now is how to do it most efficiently. The best way to start is by manipulating the data in a real estate database or in a spreadsheet program such as Excel. Organizing all of your data in a readable format makes it easier to get the big picture about what's happening with the foreclosures in your counties. You can also use programs such as Microsoft Word or Microsoft Publisher to create mail merge letters, mailing labels and more. For more program-specific information on how to do this, search the Help file in your software for "mail merge" and follow the instructions. If you're using a real estate database, you should be able to add notes to the properties you're pursuing, track your progress on each deal, and import new data as it comes out.

Putting It All Together

T I P ! For help on writing a great letter, see this month's article by Ken Lizotte entitled "Letters to Homeowner Prospects: 6 Rules Will Get Them Read... and Answered!"

The most important thing to remember is that foreclosures information is time-sensitive and that ForeclosuresMass customers have the advantage of time. Foreclosures information is best used when it's brand new, so that you maintain your competitive edge by acting as soon as you get your foreclosure notification email. In a few days to a few weeks, these foreclosures may be in the paper or even at the registry. So if you're looking to pursue foreclosures before the public knows about them, visit ForeclosuresMass, download your new data, create your call list, your mailing list, or your door-knocking list, and get working!

One way to help yourself respond to new foreclosures faster is to develop a system for handling your new foreclosure data. Create your letter template, your label template, your phone or door-knocking scripts, and whatever else you need before hand, so that each week when you download your new data, you can simply import it and start work immediately.

Jeremy B. Shapiro, president and co-founder of ForeclosuresMass Corp., has been building web-enabled databases for the past 10 years. Since 1998, his primary focus has been in real estate related databases, which led to his interest in the foreclosure market. Jeremy is also a Massachusetts licensed real estate agent with Exit Realty Center, a Foreclosure Consultant and a Professional Speaker on the topics of Networking and Entrepreneurship.

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