Buying a home at Sheriff sale

[Hillbeans]

Does anyone have any experience with this? Was it a good or bad experience? A house in my neighborhood is being sold and it's decent. I have done some research on these and know that i'd need 20% in cash the day of sale.

My main question is that if the house isn't vacant (this one is) do you have to evict the current owners or renters? Yikes.

 

[ducklite]

There are a LOT of "if's, and's, or but's" when buying at a sheriff's sale. There could be further undiclosed liens which transfer with the property, clouding the title. There could be environmental factors. There could be a million other issues.

I can't stress this enough, speak to an attorney before you even think about it. The laws vary state to state, county to county, and you could lose big time if you don't know what you are doing. We have friends who bought a house at sherrif's sale, and for what they paid for it and then had to put into it, they could have bought a new house for probably $20,000 more, and saved a TON of headaches.

You can also gain big time. I knew a guy who bought a condo up in Hudson County at auction for about $225,000. Now, less than ten years later, it's worth well over a million dollars.

Anne

 

[chager]

I have never done this but to my knowledge usually (not always)these homes are already vacant due to foreclosure. You need to make sure there aren't any internal problems. I know we had some houses in our area that had pipes burst this winter because they weren't winterized in time. Good luck with it. I have heard of people getting really great deals this way.

 

[nativetxn]

I've never had any experience with this

 

[CJMickeyMouse]

I agree with others.... get the advice of an attorney before you even think about it.

There was one for sale here once where the previous owner had one year to reclaim the property, even though it had been sold.

I don't know all of the legal in's and out's, but I know it was a big mess and the people did end up having to give up the house.

Good luck!

 

[BriarfoxinWA]

These vary by state - here you would have to be able to have a cashier's check for the full amount the day of the sale.