HUD Fun
I was reminising about one of my favorite real estate transactions this morning. A dear friend's young adult daughter wanted to make the jump into home ownership and came to me for help. I connected her with a reliable lender and showed her the advantages and disadvantages of a few different homes. She chose a "HUD home," which is a home that had FHA financing that went into foreclosure. My first home was also a HUD home and was purchased for $56K and now has a market value of $325K. It is not for everyone! Like any great investment, it involves risk. A home is like a spouse: "for better or for worse." Sometimes a foreclosure can be a great opportunity to update an under market value property and sometimes it can involve great unforeseen and unFUN expenses. And the bidding is exciting and a waiting game. In this situation, I entered her bid to the HUD system, because I have the Registered Hud Selling Broker credentials. We then await a response. She was not the highest bidder, but we agreed to be a Back Up Bidder in case that buyer were to fall through. Because the HUD system is not fool-proof, I have to check the site regularly to see if there has been any change in the status, which would mean we might get accepted, at which time a very short time frame is provided to get ink signatures!
As it turns out, that day came. I received an email at 8:04AM FOUR MONTHS LATER while in another state sitting at my grandmother's dining room table. My hands started shaking and my eyes got big. "Mamaw!! She got the property!! I can't believe it!!" And as my grandmother looked at me with no concept of the delirium that was setting in, I started making arrangements on getting the contract signed from two states away. Fortunately, I had pre-written purchase agreement with tabs marking where the signatures were to go. I have never been that organized for an unexpected event in my life. I directed my self-less Mother-in-Law where to go in my filing...
