Has anyone dealt with the service that "The Foreclosure Listing" provides?
Has anyone dealt with the service that "The
Foreclosure Listing" provides? The company provides monthly listings of bank
foreclosures (no government foreclosures) within your area of interest. The
sales rep indicated that 20-30% below the listing price is typical of the
actual selling price of homes listed. An agent (it's not clear if the agent
is representing the bank or the buyer) is also available at no additional
charge to assist with getting the best price and terms. The price for the
service is $279/yr. If you purchase a home prior to the end of the service,
the difference is supposed to be refunded on a pro-rated basis. The sales
pitch seems a little on the high pressure side, but just in case this is a
legitamate service, I thought I would toss it out for comments. Comments?
It may not be worth you while. From your desctription it sounds like they
are selling you the list that may be quite (out)dated. What leads me to believe
in that is the fact there is already a (listing) agent available to sell it.
That means the properties are not hot off the foreclosure auction block.
As a matter of fact you can do this yourself. Just get the Y.Pages and start
calling lenders. Ask to speak with the REO manager, that one in charge for
repossessed properties. Since you just need one house, you may invest your
time and saves listing fees.
Or try to talk the provider into 1 month listing subscription.
Can you get them 20-30% below market ? Who knows, you need to start making
offers to find out. Be sure to research what the "market value" is.
It all depends on the market. If the market is slow, there may be quite a few
REO properties hanging on the banks' books, and these banks are anxious to
get rid of them. If the market is hot even the banks won't dump them too low.
If you want to get a bargain you might check into companies selling the list
of properties sold at the foreclosure auction at the courthouses. This way
you'll have the properties that were just repossessed couple of days ago and
be the first to call a lender. That'll be before it gets on the market for
sale through a broker.
The costs could be a little higher. I split with a friend a cost of about
$90/month for a computer subscription to the list of preforeclosures, and
solds. Some of the other valuable information is included, like size, tax
appraisal, owner's address, lender, original loan amount, loan type (FHA,
VA, Conventional), payments if known, etc.