Hi all,
Need to get this off my chest.
Am recently looking to move and buy a home (Doylestown PA area) and am quite disgusted with the condition of the homes we’ve seen so far relative to their price. I can’t believe what some people are pricing their homes at and after we go in to look at them the amount of work involved to bring them into the 21st century!
We entered this foray into the real estate market hoping we’d find a bargain as everyone says there’d be right now. Heck, just last week I overheard a financial expert on TV claim that there are real bargains out there since the housing values have dropped and that it’s possible to find homes in the 250 k range that previously were valued at 1 milliion! Really! I say BS!!!
We’ve seen houses that are 250 K and they’ve got ….. paneling from the 60’s, mishmosh of flooring from room to room that some hack laid down, trim work that another hack contractor put up, falling plaster, dead mice on the stairs, live bats in the filthy attic, musty smells in every single one of the eight houses we’ve looked at, holes to daylight in the roof, paper thin termite damaged main floor beams with undersized sistered beams along side, not even going to go into the horriffic electrical wiring I’ve seen,,,,,AND they have the nerve to ask quarter million dollar prices for these wrecks? I’m totally disgusted and appalled.
Yeah, yeah, I know the old phrase, “Location, location, location” But still these homes are just poorly maintained. Whoever sets these prices and however that’s done is a joke! Real estate and that whole machine/process of buying/selling a home I feel is just overpriced , fee ridden, BS.
For a quarter million I expect to get a clean home that we’ll feel comfortable in that first night we move in. I think that’s reasonable.
AND to make things worse, I fixed up my house over the years I’ve been in it so that it has none of the problems mentioned above. It is clean, all trim work corrected, nice new deck etc and I come to find out that because of some one on my street not being able to financially maintain their house they had to sell it as a short sale and now the value my house I’m about to sell will drop because of their inability to manage their finances or maintain their home. So I have to pay for their ineptness.
What a hassle.
Replies
Consider that you're looking at the homes that haven't sold yet. And the agents are showing you the more expensive homes because they bring a bigger commission.
At least - unlike health insurance, no-one is FORCING you to buy
Yet
TV has been spinning this housing crisis every way possible since the bubble burst, and they have not gotten anything right yet. It sounds like the $250,000 houses you have been looking at are in bad shape. But I am not sure what that condition and price really means. Where I am in Minnesota, values seemd to have declined by about a third. But property taxes keep going up.
You mentione your neighbor's short sale as affecting your values. One think to consider is that as values fall, everybody is going to slack off on maintenance. The motivation to maintain and inmprove a house for its resale potential is out the window now. And as maintenance declines on a widespread basis, values will fall further. What is needed is an economic boom to pull us out of this downward spiral.