Individuals who never thought of buying foreclosure houses have always considered their decision to do so a smart and practical one. After all, these repossessed houses are the only real estate properties which can provide you with benefits which include savings as well as instant equity.
Choosing the Right Foreclosure
It is important you are prepared with the entire foreclosure buying process in order to fully appreciate your purchase. For starters, you should know there are basically three types of repo homes, namely: pre foreclosures, foreclosures at auction and bank foreclosures.
Pre foreclosures are actually what most buyers prefer since you only need to deal with the homeowner. Because they need to sell the home before the reinstatement period expires, most homeowners are ready to accept reasonable offers almost immediately. The only drawback is that you will need to really spend time looking for these homes since most of the homeowners are embarrassed about their situation and prefer to keep their decision to sell as quiet as possible.
The second type of foreclosure home includes the properties which are already on the foreclosure auction block. Buying foreclosure houses this way is certainly much more convenient since you only need to attend the auction and bid. However, you need to know the auction rules since most of them require you to pay the property in cash.
If a particular property survives the auction block, its ownership ends up being reverted to the mortgage lender. Also known as real estate owned properties or REOs, these homes are also sold cheaply since the lender would like nothing else than to remove them from their inventory of non-performing assets.
Any one of these homes will still guarantee you a way to own a home at an affordable price. Of course, you should expect these homes to be not as well maintained as the other homes for sale in the market. For this reason, you should hire a professional home inspector before buying foreclosure houses in order to unearth all the problems so that you and the seller can negotiate further.