An owner walked away from a house in my neighborhood. It sat empty for a couple of months, and then a crew showed up to work on it. They worked around the clock fixing it up.
I found out from the next door neighbor that the crew worked for the bank that owns the house. This house is north of San Francisco, the crew is from San Diego. They stayed in a motel while they were here. I know they painted and redid the kitchen, I have no idea if they got a permit to do any of the work.
The crew travels around and fixes up properties that the bank has taken possession of.
This is the first I here of this. Is this common practice? It makes tremendous sense from a business stand point for the bank. The travelling crew part of this operation kind of blew me away. Apparently they stay in the houses sometimes where they are working.
On another note: In the Sunday NYT business section there is an article about the real estate meltdown in Florida, specifically Coral Gables. The article is chilling to read.
Replies
This is fairly common here, banks contact realtors, realtors contact crews.
I got a call once, house was in Kalamazoo MI, went there to look at it and the house wasn't bad. The garage had 12" of Pit Bull #### in it. I turned it down. If I won't clean it up, I won't ask one of my guys to clean it up.
You are responsible to clean, repair and relandscape the house. Most of them are very overgrown so a chainsaw and brush hog are tools of the trade. THey have been vacant for so long that most of them are a total loss
Woods favorite carpenter
We framed a spec house for a builder last year. We were amazed that this particular builder was going to spec this house because it was in a sub that we knew was going bankrupt. The builder explained that they were in the bank getting funded for a sold job and the bank asked them if they would project manage a spec build on one of their foreclosed lots.
This happened in the early 07. This puts the bank firmly in the building business in neighborhoods that has specs sitting. Their rational was that they were not going to be able to move the raw lot and their best chance was to spec a new house on it.
I don't know if it sold but I suspect that the banks would have much easier lending standards and scrutinize the loan documents much less. I also suspect that they would turn down other applications for specs in that sub and steer them to their spec.
I see this as a conflict of interest but we did need the work and was thankful for the pittance that we framed it for.
Bob's next test date: 12/10/07
We bought a house a couple of years ago that the bank tried "fixing up". We had to get them to stop cause they were doing some real garbage work and we intended to flip it ourselves.
I wouldnt hire their goons to clean my cats litter box.
Hacks.
Here in Alaska in 1985-1986 we lost 20% of our state population and a far higher population loss in Anchorage. We had a foreclosure rate of about 40% here in Anchorage because so many walked away from their homes.
At that time, my husband was a carpenter working for a contractor taking care of bank foreclosure properties (they had 1500 properties). The contractor either boarded up properties (and winterized them), finished them if they were nearly finished, or tore them down if they were a hazard. The bank had so many properties, their goal was to stabilize the property and ready it for auction.
For all the negative things we see in the media about the foreclosure rates right now, none come close to what we had here back in the mid 80's. It took our economy 15 years to get houses back up to the appraisal price that they had back before that last bust. So if you made it through that bust and managed to keep your house, then it took another 15 years before your house was worth what it was back in 1984!
For all the negative things we see in the media about the foreclosure rates right now, none come close to what we had here back in the mid 80's."We aren't at the bottom yet....hold on.Check out propertypredictors.com and look at the individual states and regions. There are some areas that wish they only lost 40%. Bob's next test date: 12/10/07
Can't find that website, is that the correct link?
I wonder if he meanshttp://www.housingpredictor.com/.
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A-holes. Hey every group has to have one. And I have been elected to be the one. I should make that my tagline.
Thanks Bill. I really shouldn't do ANYTHING from memory anymore! Bob's next test date: 12/10/07
Bill gave you the right site: http://www.housingpredictor.com/Heres an article that details MI's problems: According to this article, MI has lost 30,000 and Texas gained 500,000!http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071227/METRO/712270389/-1/ARCHIVEThe text of the article is:
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Michigan population dips 30,500
Census figures show continuing loss of residents; prolonged economic slump blamed.
Mike Wilkinson / The Detroit News
Michigan was one of only two states that lost population last year as fleeing job-seekers accelerated the state's population decline, Census estimates released today show. Only tiny Rhode Island also lost population in the year prior to July 1, as Michigan's population plummeted by 30,500 last year, more than five times the loss in the prior year and echoing the devastating slump that hit the state in the early 1980s. "It's pure economy," said Kurt Metzger, director of research for the United Way for Southeastern Michigan. "It just reinforces that one-state recession." With automakers and their suppliers either buying out or laying off tens of thousands of workers at a time, many expected the state's decline to worsen -- and it did. But some say that the state's slumping housing market may actually be softening the blow as many who want to leave are forced to stay in homes they cannot sell. The nation's population grew by nearly 1 percent, adding an estimated 2.9 million people, for an estimated total of 301.6 million people. Texas had the biggest increase, adding nearly 500,000 people, while Nevada and Arizona had the biggest percentage increases. Other Midwest states had nonexistent to anemic growth. A trained auto designer, Brian Shunk, 38, his wife, Shannon, 36, and their son Nicholas, now 3, left Clinton Township for Florida in 2006 to restart their lives after a couple of years on unemployment and taking odd jobs in retail. Worried about their prospects, both Brian and Shannon went back to school to broaden their job options. They sold their home at a steep loss, incurring thousands of dollars of credit card debt to cover closing costs. Still, they feel lucky they were able to "afford" their departure. "There are so many things that could have kept us from leaving," he said. "It makes you wonder how many people are anchored and would leave Michigan if they could get out." The population estimates, released annually, are based on birth and death rates and international and domestic migration measured using tax forms. For years, the steady loss of Michigan residents to other states was more than offset by new migrants from abroad and from the substantial gap between births and deaths. But while those factors have remained steady, the increase in domestic out-migration has risen substantially over the last three years, climbing from nearly 40,000 in 2004 to more than 94,000 this past year. "There are some positive signs in the state but they are overwhelmed by the negative news," said Don Grimes, a senior economic researcher at the University of Michigan. He just completed a "bleak" economic forecast for the Michigan Department of Transportation but said the Census numbers are actually worse. "It's not a good time," he said. Prompted by the troubled economy, Gov. Jennifer Granholm has sought international investment and has worked with the legislature to enact a new business tax that will offer incentives for research and job creation, said gubernatorial spokeswoman Liz Boyd. "The data underscores that the governor is focused on growing the economy and creating jobs," Boyd said. The last time Michigan suffered such losses was from 1981 through 1983 and the culprit then, as now, was a shrinking auto industry. The difference going forward may be that few believe the auto industry will rebound like it did before. Grimes and others see auto and manufacturing jobs in general declining for years. For several years, state and local leaders have talked about pinning the state's recovery on education, on its "life-science" corridor and in encouraging more people to seek higher education degrees. But the population losses may undercut those efforts: Many of those who are leaving are educated, and many are young. Sarah Klein worked for the Metro Times, an alternative weekly publication, before choosing a startup publication in San Jose, Calif. "I've lost count of the number of friends I have who've moved out of Detroit or Michigan in general," Klein, 31, wrote in response to e-mailed questions. "When I left, a friend commented 'another one joins the mass exodus.' " Young people like Klein have always left Michigan. But she may be joined by an increasing number of peers. "The most mobile people in the country tend to be the most educated," Grimes said. That trend should put the focus back on improving the education of adults, said Jim Jacobs, director of the Center for Workforce Development and Policy at Macomb Community College. Charles Rowland had a long career as a designer for local auto engineering firms before work dried up a few years ago. He shuttled back and forth between Florida, Ohio and Michigan before finally staying in Florida late last year. He got contract work at the same employer as Brian Shunk and rented from a local motel until someone got stabbed outside his room. Rowland, 46, now lives in Cape Canaveral, off the Atlantic coast, and commutes to Orlando each day. His flight from Michigan included a bankruptcy when he couldn't sell his home and he knows several people who, like him, have been forced to go on the road. "It's the same story: running from a lack of work." You can reach Mike Wilkinson at (313) 222-2563 or [email protected].
Bob's next test date: 12/10/07
The interesting thing in that article (besides the raw numbers) was: "But some say that the state's slumping housing market may actually be softening the blow as many who want to leave are forced to stay in homes they cannot sell. "That doesn't bode well for the future. Bob's next test date: 12/10/07