I got a call from a potential mortgage client today who at the end of the call, when I asked her if she had already been looking at houses, informed me that she thought she might have found one on a foreclosure website.  It turns out she learned about the site because they took out a full page ad in the Minneapolis Star Tribune Newspaper announcing a foreclosure auction coming to town in the near future. 

I visited the site www.ushomeauctions.com and found it to be very interesting until I got to the part about the costs and their payment demands.  It turns out that you need to show up at the auction with a cashiers check for $5,000. Probably a common request for most auctions but a tall order for a first time home buyer.  You also need to come up with a total of 5% down the day of the auction.  Again probably common for real estate auctions but difficult for some of the people I talk to on a daily basis who think they are going to scoop up foreclosures with no money down.

All in all, I thought it was a pretty good site and hopefully a real eye opener for some of those uneducated buyers who think that they will be able to steal a house if it is in foreclosure.  If it were that easy we'd all be doing it.