REO STRESS 

Friday was already busy. For me I always run out of week before I run out of things I need to accomplish.  I get to the office every morning at around 7:30, Friday I  cleared my emails and got ready for a conference call at 9 with buyers coming in to look for bulk purchases of stressed real estate. At 8:45 I get a call from a bank asset manager in Atlanta with some leads on commercial real estate opportunities. I had put out some probes earlier in the week trying to find out who to talk to at a number of banks about commercial REO deals.  I have buyers and no deals to show them.  I was excited about the asset manager's call and up-set that I had to cut off our conversation to take my 9AM conference.

I was chuckling to myself about the expression "stressed real estate". Who was stressed now? As soon as I hung up the phone from the conference call I received a call from one from one of my friends asking me to sit in on a meeting with another bulk buyer here from California.  In my office I make outgoing calls on a land line and most of my incoming calls come on my cell.  I felt like a scene from  Groucho Marx movie, "Hello New York?  Sell!  Pittsburg?  Buy!";  a phone in each ear.

Don't get me wrong. I am not complaining. I love my business and I love the pace.

In our market over 70% of the real estate deals involve cash purchases and bank owned property. This means if you are not dealing with bank owned property or buyers of bank owned property, you probably are not productive. In the past four weeks there have been more properties bought and sold than IN ANY OTHER FOUR WEEK PERIOD since we have been keeping records here in Lee County Florida. Prices, of course, area also at record lows.

Bank to the expression "stressed real estate". As I was leaving my last meeting at around 4pm on Friday I received four emails that needed immediate attention. Two more bank owned homes to handle and formal price approval and another two. Since I my last meeting left me closer to home than the office, I headed there to get the paperwork printed. I had time by 6:30 to go to one of the homes that evening while there was still daylight.

I loaded my paperwork, my toolbox, camera, and a new lock set into the car and plugged the address into the GPS. The home I was headed to was not too far away and near a KB homes project that I am familiar with off Bayshore Road.

My mission was to determine if the house is vacant. If it is, I have to "gain access", take a bunch of pictures, begin the BPO process, and change the locks. I also post no trespassing notices, my contact information, and a "For Sale" sign.

As I got close to the house, there was no need to heed the sexy satellite directed tour guide. I could see the overgrown yard up ahead.

The term "stressed asset" normally refers to financial stress, the kind that comes from upside down mortgages, low vacancies in commercial property, or economic extinction of a property. This home on Coon Road had another kind of stress: the stress of a neglect and life after humans.

There is a new TV show on Discovery channel called Life after People. An abandoned house does not take long to start getting this look of "life after people".  I took one look at the front door and pretty much decided that it was not going to be easy to get in: a dead bolt and a key set greeted me, tight fit too. I took out my camera and started taking out side pictures.  I wasn't going to tackle "gaining access" just yet.  I remembered one of the terminator movies where the cyborg Arnold is taught to look for keys above the visor before he rips wires from under  the dash to start the car. I figured I would walk around first, maybe meet a neighbor with a key or spy a hidden one first.  One look in the front window confirmed what I already knew. No one lived here any more. 

Along the side I saw that the air compressors were still there. (A common problem in our area is thieves steal the compressors from vacant homes.) The shed behind the front fence had remnants from a former handyman - some left over tools and yard junk.  No neighbors with keys, just a family of German shepherds next door. There was more long grass, a few empty beer bottles, an old wheel barrow, and a large screened porch with double doors and some painting tools waiting for someone that will never show up again.  I saw grass growing in concrete cracks and a tree frog still alive inexplicably between two layers of glass in the back window.

Ahhh, I could see double doors with a little give into the house from the porch. I went back for my tools and in a few minutes was in: stale air, cobwebs, a few bugs, no electric.  Evidence of a displaced family long gone; photos left on the floor; an orphaned stereo speaker, and a paint scraper.

I went through and took a few dozen pictures. Honest pictures. Not just the ones for show. I snapped the bathroom with the dusty toilet; the kitchen with it's only adornment a lonely garbage can in the middle of the floor. I took a picture of the room that was obviously decorated with love and care with animal character painted along the wallpaper border. Unlike some houses I visit, this home had been cleaned up - or at least picked up.

But there were signs of stress.  The cobwebs across the hallway told me that no one had walked in there in quite some time. The spider that engineered the web was not even there anymore.  His source of food long ago locked out.  There was a layer of undisturbed dust lay in the floor; dead bugs adorned the crooked Venetian blinds; and an inspection sign-in sheet from a property manager that was never filled out lay open on the counter.

This home did not have the sterile feel of never having been lived in.  I could imagine this house becoming a home again. This home has what I call cat pee on the carpet. That is, things wrong with it that are easy to fix.

After I changed the lock, I walked the neighborhood to see what I could learn. I let a few people know the house was being reclaimed and the yard would soon be presentable again. The last thing I did was put my sign in the overgrown yard.

For some reason, I wasn't stressed anymore.

Chinese takeout on the way home to Gail.

Produce Our Way Out of the Doldrums

Right now I handle most of the REO inspections myself, I do the BPO, the listings and take the photos. This I am sure will change soon as we get too may properties to handle,  but I was discussing this with one of my friends the other day.  One way out of our economic malaise is to produce our way out. There is no room for layers of management and directors.  I stopped in to see my architect friend Mike Sheeley this week. He is doing the design for a medical building for me.  He was working on the plans in his office. Two years ago one of his employees would be doing his kind of work.

We can't wait for the wind to change to alter our doldrums. We have to start paddling!

Many asked to be on the REO List

After last weeks blog I received about 10 requests to be "put on the short list" of investors that want to buy REO homes.    I have posted a list - and it's quite long - of new REO properties. Click here to see it.  But to get you an offering list - I need to know what you are looking for:  telling me you want a "good deal" just isn't enough.

I would ask that if you are interested, let's have a phone conversation. We can look at and discuss:

• REO's
• Short Sales

•·        Pre MLS listed REO's (Like the house I described above. I will take offers for these houses while I am working with the bank to come up with the price to list in the MLS.  The last house I listed like this sold three hours after I posted it: mainly because I had already shared the details with my subscribers.

•·        Buying Notes

•·        Fixer Uppers

•·        New Homes

•·        Chinese Drywall Homes

We have a mapping program that is quite detailed. One example is in the link above.

As always, call me with questions or comments:  800-439-1580 ext 52 or email me at GFous@marketamericarealty.com

Gregg