Anyone here play the real estate foreclosure game?

Bump for opportunity research

Certain properties in my area can be purchased very cheap when dealing in forclosure.
My advice for you from personal experience would be to purchase the property as cheap as you possibly can. (Some properties can be as cheap as 40,000 in some areas because they want to sell fast) Put a fresh coat of paint onto the property, make it look more appealing to a buyer, call up a new real estate agent and put it back on the market for 5,000+. Start small, move your way up. The more work you put into making the property seem more appealing the more money you can squeeze out of it. Goodluck

Thanks for the advise, malaylah.

Anyone else got any tips?

Call the counties you are interested in (the clerk should be able to assist you). Find out when they are holding property auctions. Get an advanced list of assumed properties that should be up for auction (last minute saves do happen) and take a look at a few to judge them. Then attend the auction. Do not buy the first time (suggested) and just watch what happens, who is in attendance and bidding, how much the ones you checked out went for and so on. (research and learn)

Process will give you some insight. When you are ready to jump in go for it. Just keep in mind ussually you will not have much advance notice to check out properties and typically you can not get inside of the houses. So research is crucial, and set yourself a max high big on each one your interested in and do not get caught up. Have your funds ready and be ready to deal with property ASAP.

Yeah. Check out the property tax before you purchase. If you have to sit on that property for some reason, that last thing you want to do, is out of pocket 10 to 20k for taxes at the end of the year.

foreclosure .. love it when couples with a combined income of 53k a year think they can afford a $350k house. buddy of mine sees it everyday (he works at HR Block aka "does taxes").. i thought people had more sense then that..

id say with all the foreclosures that are inevitably coming within the next couple years the market for houses here in california will go down. similar to '96 and it will be prime time to get some nice estates for a good price.

i'm very interested in this as well in the long island, new york area

This is California. Nowhere will you buy anything for $40k or be stupid enough to sell for $45

My parents bought a 400k house way back on a combined income of maybe 65K.

They also had three nice cars. ALl leases, and vacationed every year and livednice.

Its possible if you know how/when to spend wisely.

Buy my video and I will be teaching you how you can be making one million dolla, you be like WHAT, WHAT IN THE HELL, so simple, I should have thought of that myself, take no skill at all. You no believe...........

There is money to be made, but it is a BUSINESS just like anything. It is a lot like stock, you need to know everything that is effecting the market in the area and the surrounding areas. Lots and lots of homework, research, talking to people who know what they are doing and getting them to show you how they make their decisions. If you get in as a hobby that is one thing, but if you are going to do it, then be prepared. After doing that, I would find a good contractor, and by good I mean using lots of *ahem* outsourcing or outsource yourself to reduce the cost of rebuilding and getting your houses back on the market. My dad was controlling 5 properties at a time and using me as free slave labor and investing sweat equity, sure it made his financial life easier, it gave us time together to "bond" and it paid for a pricy education for myself but had he run it like a business I am sure he could have done 10 fold. He is about to retire and getting back in and will be using a more business model, completely controlled by him at the top and doing nothing but funding and commanding, which is IMHO the ONLY way to do this.

DO NOT make the mistake of thinking you are just going to go buy up distressed property, "beating the system", invest sweat equity on a low level, put them back out and have to beat off offers with a stick. A house is worth NOTHING if you can not get rid of it, just like any other physical investment. There are houses much nicer than the ones you are going to pick up that simply sit on the market because of many differant things. The people who are good at this sort of thing use both actual and speculative means to make intelligent investments, they know the cheapest way to get the house back in order and get it back out. They know about zoning, large corporate movements, local and state government plans etc etc, like I said it is a lot like the stock market except insider trading is not a criminal offense.

Remember this is business and it is very much a pyramid. There are those that will play on the ideas that those info-mercials put in people's heads. If you got a property for cheap, think about why it was cheap and know that the easy money was made the second you signed on the dotted line. sometimes when you think you are fucking them, they are fucking you. Good luck

I clip coupons

Nope not coupons. They actually shop at Wholefoods and those all natural places.

Thinking you cant afford a 400K house on a 60K/year income is why such a large portion of Americans are in debt.

Wow, awesome post.

Thanks for the warning. I didn't get this idea from a "Tom Vu" type "get rich quick" ad or seminar, etc. My former boss at the venture capital firm I worked for made his first $10M doing foreclosures and other "creative" real estate ventures. I DO understand that it's a business and I'm willing to WORK. That's why I'm doing some research. I've already called my former boss and he gave me a few basics but nothing more. Now, I'm at the stage of reading up on it and asking for backup info and other perspectives from other people and sources.

Talking about Tom Vu, here's a pic of Mr. Vu

Check out the state. State laws vary greatly. Buying one at auction in MN gives you nothing for 6 months. CA you get the house right now. Most states make the impending sale publish. So if you can find the local legal paper you can approach the owners before auction and avoid a lot of time and legal hassles.

I have done this but it is an ugly business. The people are obviously screwed up and want you to fix their issue. Where as you need to make a good or great price and move them on.

Yep. I see this getting big. Great feedback from the guys so far. Currently, I'm writing a resource book I'll use--contractors, brokers, etc. Basically trying to pin down the numbers and financial formula involved.

Get yourself to realtytrac.com acct / very good for availablity research.
Depending on the area, their database is pretty good.

As for myself, the game is too saturated in my area.
Foreclosed crack houses are going for 550k in my area.

any good sites where they auction or sell foreclosures?

OUCH!

haha good luck, you're better off out of state.
The professionals have the game on lock in NY.

As with any auction, it depends who is there and willing to bid. Eventually your serious competition will just so happen to not be there or will back off for whatever reason.

Five or six years ago a house near me that was worth $250,000 at the time sold at foreclosure action for only $155,000. That's probably a very extreme case though. Nobody could believe it.

I want no part of that Karma...

BAD Karma would be if you CAUSED the foreclosure. I highly doubt that happens in most foreclosure situations. If anything the bad karma would adhere to the bank not to you since you came along much later in the chain of events. I would say its NEUTRAL karma to buy the foreclosed property and free it up for another person to buy or rent out. What do you think?

most of them want you to join for 19.95 its better than selling sex As well, all the super low prices mentioned are come on's for selling lists etc. That is not to say they dont exist,but its designed to get the sheep in the door to sign up for the lists they publish. It is possible to make money doing it, however you have to know the market inside out. Just because the house sells for 30 -40 k less than before , what is to say that its not that much overvalued in the current market. You also have to think about carrying costs reno costs, legals etc, not as easy as it seems from the ouside looking in

Exactly. It would be nice if people posted their WORKSHEET re variables and costs involved. Also scheduling ideas would be nice to know as well. Finally, contingency comparisons would be interesting.

It can actually be good Karma, since you want to use that term.
You can buy the current owner out, if it's preforeclosed and the owner can still profit.

Why do all the $$$ threads die?