The 1031 Tax-Deferred Exchange

Solano Real Estate Scene: Jim Porter

Article By: Jim Porter – August 18, 2023

Solano County has become a “seller’s market” in the first-time homebuyer price range.

Realtors and lenders have gone back to the basics lately in their marketing and sales tactics as we all struggle to support our families in this low-inventory market. Making phone calls to past clients, asking for referrals, knocking on doors around new and coming-soon listings and good old-fashion farming neighborhoods with snail mail postcards is back in vogue.

I just had a mailing list delivered to me for all absentee homeowners in Vacaville that have owned their property for more than 30 years. An absentee owner is a person that owns a house but has her mail delivered to a different address, which 99% of the time means the house is rental property.

There were more than 1,000 people on this list in Vacaville. My goal is to send all these folks a postcard to convince them to consider selling this old house to one of our pre-approved first-time homebuyers and bank the capital gains or do a 1031 tax-deferred exchange into another property elsewhere.

These 1,000 landlords now own homes that are 30 to 70 years old, and the average age of these Vacaville landlords has got to be over 65 because 700 of the 1,000 have owned these homes for over 40 years. The 40-plus-year-old homes are getting tired and worn down. The 65-year-old retired landlords may want to do like Steve Miller says and “take the money and run” and sell the house to a young family and let them do the roof, fence and plumbing repairs.

One idea is to sell this old house and do a 1031 exchange into a brand new or nearly new beautiful single-story home in a safe senior community on a golf course and then move into the house in five to 10 years when you are ready to move.

If this Vacaville landlord owns the old rental property free and clear and it’s worth $600,000, they may want to exchange into a super-cool $1 million single-story home or condo in Bodega Bay or Morrow Bay with an ocean view. This Vacaville investor can borrow the $400,000 required to close escrow, rent the place out for three or four years to cover the monthly cost and then sell their owner-occupied residence for some free capital gains, pay off the ocean view home and move into the property as their dream retirement forever home and avoid the capital gains tax legally.

Jim Porter, NMLS No. 276412, is the branch manager of Solano Mortgage, NMLS No. 1515497, a division of American Pacific Mortgage Corporation, NMLS No. 1850, licensed in California by the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation under the CRMLA / Equal Housing Opportunity. Jim can be reached at 707-449-4777.