Reply to Pre-foreclosure next door- how scared should we be?

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[quote=Anonymous]A friend of mine bought a foreclosure a couple of years ago in SS.  She's absolutely the best kind of neighbor.  She has already put a lot of money into renovating the house.  She's courteous.  She's clean.  She takes care of her yard.

I think it's really elitist and obnoxious to assume that the person who buys a foreclosure will be a bad neighbor because they otherwise wouldn't be able to afford the house.  For one, it assumes that only wealthy people make good neighbors, and personally, I have found that not to be the case.  Two, it's just not accurate.  Plenty of stable people buy foreclosures.  They use the money they save to invest in renovating the house.

Don't worry about who will buy the house.  The biggest concern you have is how long the bank lets it sit and if the bank doesn't tend to the property.

The biggest eyesore foreclosures are not the ones auctioned off and bought quickly, but rather, they are the ones that sit for a long time empty under the bank ownership.

In this region, though, that is less of a problem, especially now when it seems there are lots of buyers out there.

Just get all of the city/county code phone numbers together so you know who to call if you notice the property isn't being cared for (overgrown lawn, et cetera).

You also need not worry about comps or resale.  Most appraisers will not use foreclosures as comps, period.  That is a very overblown worry.  The only time they'll use foreclosures as comps is if there have been no other sales in the area, which is highly unlikely in the DC metro region.

Again, your biggest worry should be how long the bank holds on to it.  If it is going to auction, that is probably a good thing.  Likely a flipper/investor will buy it cheap, do some surface-level repairs/renovations and flip it.

In the end, it will be a good thing if someone who intends to live in the house buys it.  It's far better to have a homeowner as a neighbor than a rental property.  (That's not to say renters are bad, but landlords can be all over the spectrum, ranging from ones who take care of their rental properties to ones who just try to squeeze out as much rent as possible without keeping up with repairs.)[/quote]

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