Driving around

I created a table of houses.  I've listed the following:
1.  Picture of the house
2.  MLS #
3. Address/location
4. Foreclosure price - the price the bank bought the house back for
5. Price the house was first listed at and date
6.  Notes/ history and information that i can gather from zillow/redfin
7 The current price
8. Status: This could be that it's "active"/Pending or I've used it to add numbers to help me sort the houses by particular orders.

This table is just in Word but was very helpful in helping me track the houses.  As their status changed to "pending" I would just sort the table and move those houses to a different page.  I am still tracking the houses we made offers on.  If anything, I want to know what they sold for.  Maybe it's trying to rub salt into an open wound but ultimately, I still believe we will end up with the best house at the right time.  So far, it hasn't been any of the other houses.  It's okay.  It really is.  I still got depressed after losing out on the last house and I really feel like the pickings/options have slimmed down tremendously.  In fact, I'm starting to see houses that sold for $80,000 in November or January re-listed at $180,000.  It's crazy to me that there really is still a housing market out there but only for those investors with the money and the means to jump in as soon as a house is listed.  We move a little slower.

So, Saturday we drove around several houses.  I included houses in our budget that were in neighborhoods we had already x'd out.  I think a part of me wanted to see if the houses were in weird awesome pockets and they should be ones we jump on.

We compiled the following list of houses we wanted to see.
1.  The Fire House - This house foreclosed in December and then there was a fire recently.  They listed this house at $80,000.  I walked around the house - the ceiling and roof would need to be replaced in the whole house.  In fact, it was probably a total gut job.  BUT for $80,000 in the town that it was in?  The property was over .5 acres.  The more we thought about it, we could even store everything in the garage and go rent something really cheap while we slowly fixed up that house for the price it was listed.  I even looked at cheap trailers to live in or ways to build garages with a flat above for cheap.
2.  The 1/2 price house - this house was listed at 114k.  It was pending and then 3 days later, it's listed for $64,5000.
3.  The drop house - this house is listed at $156k but it's been at that price for one month.  Therefore, based on it's current schedule, it should drop 10-20k in the next 7 days.
4. The hidden Garage Harp house - this house was surprising.  It's listed as a 2 bedroom 1 bath house - 1380 square feet.  The neighborhood was great!  From the street, you can see the Port of Tacoma.  There is lots of privacy for the house even though it's a corner house.  There was a garage sale across the street.  The lady was selling a harp; my mom has always wanted a harp.  Mike told me to go talk with her.  So, I found out the harp was handmade by her son and she was selling it for $10.  I don't know if it's a good harp, it's pretty.  It needs a little work but for $10 - Mike wouldn't let me walk away without buying it.  He didn't want to hear me say 5 minutes later, "I should have bought it for $10...."
Anyway, I talked with the lady over the sale and asked her about the house.  She said a man lived there by himself for years.  He was finally moved to an Alzheimer's unit and now the house was for sale so he must have died.  She said the neighborhood was great - that the houses on either side of her were recently bought and updated/fixed-up.  As we drove around, the street has new and old houses on it.  It seems like a good neighborhood.

So that's our list for the Realtor...  We'll see what happens Monday night.  

Drivebys from today

These are the houses we went through today and what our thoughts were - would you eliminate them?  Add them to the maybe list?  What would you do?

The PAC House1: This is the first house we saw.  It's on a main-ish road but in a town that is smaller.  The house is brand-new inside.  Because it was only 5 minutes from our Realtor's office, we were able to go see this house.  The garage, if it ever had one, is the master bedroom.  The master bath is also the laundry room.  The selling points for this house: Huge yard, clean, new, location is near safe park and nicer area for the era; off-street parking. Nothing needs fixing. The negatives: No garage.  No instant equity since it's already been fixed up.  

 the Food Bank House: This house was in a not-so-great area.  I would be scared to walk outside at all hours of the day. It's right next to a nice park but I don't think great things happen at the park.  Also, one block away was the town's foodbank and community center.  I'm not ready to live in the ghetto.  This is what this house sadly is.  It's nixed from the list.
The other houses we nixed from the list:

the Corner House: this house was in an okay neighborhood. It's on the corner.  The driveway beside it doesn't belong to the house.  It belongs to the nicer, bigger house behind it.The Hoarder House: this house shared the driveway of the house beside it (they had 3 cars parked there) and it was also next to a hoarder's house.  Mike drove by this one and nixed it very quickly.

The Bad Parking House: this one was in a neighborhood of ALL run-down homes.  My biggest complaint was cars were parked all along the road in all diferent directions. It just was sad and I would not like coming home to it.  Nothing looked good there.  I believe it to be rundown and don't want to live there.

  The TV Tower House:  this house is towered over by a tv tower and next to fast food stores.  It sounded ideal otherwise.  it had over 2400 square feet.  The sizing would be great.  The location is what killed it... but also what made it hit our price range.  it's a catch22!

houses still to see:

I did drive by the red house.  It's in a great neighborhood. The whole neighborhood is cul-de-sacs. It's the cheapest house in the whole neighborhood of almost no foreclosures.  Because of it's condition, they would appreciate an all-cash offer and we might have a chance with this one.  We're going to find out more about this house.  It technically has an offer that has fallen through but the buyer has refused to remove their contract on it.  What an odd world of real estate we have!  The white house below is in a town that we were robbed in - in our 2nd month of marriage. Because of that, we've avoided looking but because this is in the north end of it's town, we still need to drive by it and see if we'd consider it.  We'll do that later this weekend.  

 These houses are almost nixed.  If we're just purely going for the investment and not getting emotional about the decision, then they might be okay.  The top one is in an area that could be considered a great commuter location. It's next to a huge field and playground.  I don't know if it's too close to the ghetto and will have to have Mike drive back by it with me.

this house's backyard looks at the Walgreens and Chevron across the street.  While I like both establishments, I don't know that I want to be that close to a busy street and shopping centers.  I don't need to see them everyday. I doubt the owners of those companies live near their own company stores.  Why should I?

Lesson Learned:

• A house without carpet and appliances doesn't usually qualify for an FHA Loan.  Cash would be a great way to go with these houses.  But you're competing with investors when you fall into that bracket.  

Find Your Needle in a ...stack of needles

I saw this sign on one of the real estate search sites that I frequent:

But just this week, Modern Family used the phrase, "finding your needle in a stack of needles"

It's exactly what we're trying to do.  How do we find our needle in a haystack?  Our hidden gem?  If this house tomorrow turns out to be a great option, how do we know if we'll have competition in the short sale process? It's all unknown at this point.  But I thought I would describe the process we've used to look for houses.  Most of my research, after asking friends for general vicinity recommendations, has been online.  I save the houses under a gmail category of "houses to watch" - If I'm really interested in learning more about a house, I'll open the the house in one browser.  I will then open additional tabs with the following info:
1. House tab from the real estate site that I found it at (let's say estately.com).
2. Zillow.com - this is a great site for learning the history of the site and the estimated current value.  You can also look at the values of the houses in the neighborhood.
3. Redfin.com - owned by Zillow.  This is a real estate site that is great for giving additional information.
4. Google Maps - I do a virtual walk-through of the neighborhood. I look at the house from street level. I travel the road in front, I look at the houses next store, across the street and behind.  You can learn a lot and save a lot on drive time.

Why the virtual walk-through?
Besides saving us driving time, hHere's an example of why I do this. I looked up a house near a popular shopping area that we were told to look at.  It sounds perfect.  It's got some updates and is on a side street.  BUT - when I looked at the house, I found out that the house to the right of it has turned into a business "Dentures sold here".  I don't think that would be so great.  I did end up driving by the house and found that it really didn't have a yard, it was right next to the dentures house (no space) and we would not be comfortable there.

Another very cheap SMALL house was on the corner of an alley.  For the right price, maybe we could do TINY.  I drove by it.  The house made me laugh.  The yard was super tiny.  The house was super tiny.  And the house next to it towered over the yard of the for sale house.  There would be no privacy.  It was pitiful.