$1,000 houses

[powellrj]

A few days ago Yahoo start page had a article about houses that were selling for $1,000. I read it and didn't think too much about it until DS just came over and told me the house down the street from us just sold at auction for $1000. There was one bid on it.

I guess it really hits home about how bad things really are when you can now buy a livable house for $1000.

http://www.google.com/search?source...GGLL_enUS304US304&q=houses+for+sale+for+$1000

added link to story on Yahoo.

 

[PatsMom]

DH and I are watching a small camp near us that was foreclosed on about 2 years ago. We figure if it gets cheap enough we can use our home equity to buy it. Then DH will have a "project" to fix it up - it was a weekly vacation rental at one time so that is probably what we would do until the market improves.

Might not ever happen since it still has to get cheaper before we are willing to take the gamble. But worth watching. There are investment opportunities out there for those with liquidity. I do kind of feel bad if I profit from someone elses misfortune. We knew the owner - he worked construction and when the bottom started falling out of the industry, he just couldn't keep up the payments. He tried renting the place out and living in his construction trailer or with a friend but still couldn't keep up with the payments. But as DH points out to me, if we don't profit, someone else will.

 

[Darcy03231]

According to the article these houses aren't livable. Most of them need major work. According to the article they're fixer-uppers and need plumbing, wiring, heating systems, sheetrock, applicances, etc. One estimate for repairs for one home was between $15k -$20k. While they can still be good deals for someone who had the time and money to put into them, I thought the article made it pretty clear that they're weren't livable homes.

In the mid 90's I could have bought a 4 bedroom 2 bath home in our city for about $20,000.00, and it was in a nice area. It was completely trashed and needed new plumbing (pipes had burst), wiring & heating systems, all new appliances (the previous owners took them when they left), new flooring and walls (huge holes). It was a foreclosure and the people really trashed the home before leaving it. It was a great deal but there was no way we could afford to do all the work and continue to live elsewhere. I imagine that could be the issue with some of these homes.