I'm a mid-level vendor, and I'm about to buy a house. What should I know?

Title says it all.

My front it solid, opsec is good, and never had any confrontations with LE.

Is there anyone here working in the banking/mortgage industry that could advise me of some do's and don'ts? Stuff to watch out for, or be prepared for?

Budget is about 1.3M.


Comments


[44 Points] sinn0304:

Budget is about 1.3M
Stuff to watch out for

The feds.


[25 Points] tizztabz:

Do NOT buy a fucking house for 1.3m unless you have legitimate income streams. I ain't even talking about "washed" or laundered money. I am talking about using that dirty money to start earning money in 100% legitimate ways. Not cooking books. You would also be safer buying a large, shitty house, and investing cash into it and fixing it up.


[21 Points] None:

You are a millionaire. Find a lawyer and ask him.


[17 Points] SrslyNotACop:

Why are people taking OP seriously?

OP came in here to jerk himself off and humblebrag about his money, not for real advice lmao. Who would want advice from the internet on what to do with 1.3mil?


[11 Points] None:

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[11 Points] an_illegal_smile:

Budget is about 1.3M.

Buy a hotdog cart and supplies and start making a fake set of books. That should divert all IRS attention away from your ill-gotten mini-mansion.


[11 Points] greeeaasssyyy:

Let me get this straight.

You had 1.3 million in bitcoins, an asset which is impossible to confiscate and can be accessed anywhere in the world anonymously.

And you want to convert this into an asset which is easily confiscated, raided, surveilled, extremely slow to liquidate.

I would be sitting on my ~5000 btc stash, hopping from luxury condo rental to luxury condo rental for years.

Have fun worrying about all your paperwork and your taxes and your big dumb house which keeps you rooted in one place.

That is if you're not just a cop fishing.

GRE-HE-HEASY


[8 Points] undeadhead420:

buy the house in cash


[8 Points] amxsr:

Well you're laundering your money and have a back story on how you got the money, right? So what's there to worry about?


[3 Points] MrCrappy57:

They just announced big crackdown on this. http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/13/462994857/u-s-treasury-cracks-down-on-luxury-home-money-laundering


[5 Points] juschillinn:

Buy the house with bitcoins, sent directly from the DNM to the estate agent.


[3 Points] thrhooawayyfoe:

there's obviously (slightly) increased scrutiny on this kind of thing post-2008, but mortgages are a pretty good washer in and of themselves. above posts that the up-front cash should have a clean source are right on, but from there the bank will essentially do the leg work for you. if one were really optimistic about BTC (and one's cash-out strategy) one might go fucking wild, hoping as coin value rises the payments can be made with free money.


[3 Points] Kazaa99:

Do not buy it with bitcoins...


[3 Points] megatron16:

I think those who know are thinking this guy is about to make the biggest mistake of his life. Dear Sir selling drugs on the Dark Net and buying a house for 1.any million is a terrible terrible idea. I think its in your freedoms interest to rethink the acquisition and re-huddle up. And don't listen to fuck nut armchair semi educated individuals that may or may not be moderators on this drug based clearnet site.


[2 Points] trapboe:

Buy a fake ID off a market and buy said house under it. What could go wrong?


[2 Points] Devoid_:

With that bankroll why buy a house in america? You could go somewhere were the dollar is worth a lot and live like a king. Go tropical


[2 Points] leroyjenkemzs:

Pay in cash. Make them prove you are a drug kingpin.


[2 Points] SecondChanceUsername:

If your money is already laundered and has a paper trail that is completely legal and believable. You should have no problem buying a house. After that you should invest money into a small business. Or even better, get approved for a loan at a bank to start a small business. Im assuming your credit is good. Which reminds me, open a few more credit cards, buy INVESTMENTS on credit(like take new CC loans out and transfer $ to things like stock market) along with paying off your bank loans and CC loans with dirty money you can continue to put money into your legitimate business(es). transferring money around a lot and thru random difficult to trace channels makes it harder and more expensive for LEO to follow it. And theres a point where its not worth it for them if you continue proper OPSEC and laundering. You're also at the pint where you can afford to loose a little money in order to make it harder to follow/trace if anyone happens to want to look into you. FFS, id move money from bitcoin to like 6 different other crypto currencies then finally stock markets and move it around for a while in there, just buying and selling random stocks at small losses or gains (plus the traders fee's) and then finally move it outta there into real estate, fucking donate to charities and political campaigns (get upstanding bankers, your lawyers, small town politicians, churches & charities(red cross etc) on your goodside. What you're dong here is investing in good PR and therefore insurance, in a sense. Just make it expensive and time consuming and make sure the feds will have to annoy a lot of respected people in order to look into your activities. Feds don't wanna run around asking bank managers and Priests and small town politicians about dirt on a guy who makes donations to them.

Tl,DR, Just increase your plausible deniability if someone were to look into you. And invest in things that will protect you and your money. Then go ahead and buy whatever you want. Everyone is corrupt and wants a piece so give em a piece and buy your PR insurance.


[2 Points] powerman15:

Just say you invested/mined bitcoins when they were trading for like 5 cents each.


[1 Points] Udaypbuh:

Ask somebody who knows what they're doing in real life and not reddit. Come on dude lol


[1 Points] Sex4days:

Buy a villa and be happy with the profit you have made. If you have made 1.3mill by shady business one would think that you have achieved everything you ever wanted.


[1 Points] None:

The real question is you made that much from vending? What did you sell? I want to be like you lol


[1 Points] throwmyhoe:

Why is a drug dealer with a spending budget of 1.3m asking for advice on reddit?


[1 Points] Theeconomist1:

So you are confident the money is properly laundered? If so, then you are basically any standard entrepreneur who wants to buy a home.

Banks care about two things - your ability to repay the mortgage and ensuring the monies used came from legitimate means.

So on your ability to repay the mortgage, how long have you been in business? I am making the assumption you are a business owner with business income. If you've only been in business for a year, it may be difficult to secure a mortgage unless you are willing to put a lot of money down. On self-employed folks, banks will ask for 2-5 years of tax and banking records. You need to show growth or stable income over that period of time. If you were banking $30K a year for a few years and suddenly made a million, it'll look odd. Also, banks will compare your income to the indices of similar businesses. If your income looks out of whack with a comparable business, that's a problem. For an extreme example, Pablo Escobar ran the world's most profitable taxi cab company. He had 5 taxis. So obviously a bank is going to see a problem if you have 5 taxis and banking tens of millions a year. But you say the funds are properly laundered, so I assume you have this front taken care of.

Be prepared for the banks to scrutinize big transactions. When I was doing my mortgage, the bank sent a list of transactions they found that I had to explain. These were large transactions, and I was just moving funds essentially b/w accounts. But I had to explain it and show documentation on why I made those transactions. they are checking for two things - that you aren't getting the funds via a loan or debt obligation (they want to make sure you didn't take out some loan and deposit the cash to make yourself look richer basically) AND obviously to make sure the funds are legit. So be prepared to explain any transactions you made over $10K (this is not a firm number at all, they might want you to explain a $5K transaction for whatever reason). I do regular shareholder distributions through one of my corps to distribute excess cash so I just showed corporate documentation on this. So if you do any of that, just be prepared to explain.

Make sure whatever legal entity you have to funnel your cash keeps good records. If you are materially involved in your corporation, make sure you pay yourself, withhold the proper payroll, etc. If you are materially involved in your corp, you should be paying yourself a salary (and hence get a W2) and you can also make shareholder distributions for amounts you want to distribute over your salary. You should be paying yourself the market rate for your role (but if you are laundering correctly, you should be doing this). The IRS doesn't like it otherwise. They could see it as evading payroll taxes. I mean, I'd love to pay myself $1 and distribute everything else as a shareholder distribute to avoid SS and payroll taxes, but the IRS doesn't like that, and hence your bank doesn't like that. If you are not materially involved in your corporation, this doesn't apply.

Basically, if the bank isn't questioning the legitimacy of your income, you should be fine. Depending on your risk profile, you may need to put down more money in the form of a down payment. If you have enough years with your business, you'll be fine. It shouldn't be too hard assuming your credit is good. Clean up your credit if you haven't done so.

But otherwise, should be a standard loan process. If you've done things right, you shouldn't worry.


[1 Points] CookyDough:

Congrats on your success!


[1 Points] None:

If you paid taxes and have a legit sounding story about where your moneys coming from, whats the problem? You better have like faked paystubs and shit though because once the feds show up you need to give them those, and then burn belize and your mailbox, and move next door


[1 Points] darkouterwear:

What I would do is... Bend over and kiss your ass goodbye.


[1 Points] noonehear:

Buy a house 1/4 of that price.

That is what I did with my budget of 9.4Million $USD.


[1 Points] bl4z3d00d420:

Might we suggest an xpost with /r/personalfinance?


[0 Points] None:

As long as you can you prove where every cent came from, I highly recommend you don't buy an asset worth that much. Tax office is going to raise an eyebrow.