REO: how do I negotiate

[Amiris Brown]

My fiance seems hell bent on sending me to chase MLS listed properties. This past weekend I got us to look at the REO he found on Zillow, of which I figured might be a deal. We went out there with a contractor who is also an inspector for 203K loan properties, exactly who we needed. The REO was horribly neglected, sitting vacant at least since 2013 or longer ... which meant it needs a lot of work, $150K worth of work to be exact. The listed price was currently for $200K, but we still wanted to get 10% bellow that.

Since I am a newbie, I had to run my numbers with everything known, and finally I spent half the day getting quotes from the various types of insiurence coverages for what I'd need to rehab it, rent half of it, and live in the other half all while fully covered. By the time I got back to my agent and he contacted the listing agent, now we're told it is under contract by someone else as of earlier today. Yet, I do not see any sign of it "pending" on any public records, and wonder if the listing agent is playing games and/or will not do business with me due to currently being a tenant who is in litigation of suing that company and my landlord. What do I do to find out if it really is under contract? I'm seriously thinking about calling the bank and just asking, but is that unwise? I do not trust the listing agent nor the company they represent, as that company has proven time and time again they are crooked, especially when it comes to property management landlording. I really think they are in the business of ruining landlords so to then make even more money off of their poorly managed properties by selling, but that's just my personal bias hunch.

Also, check out my pic of us suited up in this mold infested REO lol :-) (I'm the one throwing up a peace sign).

[Tom Day]

Two things to keep in mind. A property is worth what someone else is willing pay for it. People overpay for REOs all the time. Zillow and Trulia are full of worthless information. When properties go to pending or back up status they will still show as active on those sites for weeks. That is why Zillow and Trulia have more properties on their site. Tons of them are already under contract. Your agent can run a history of the MLS activity. That is where the accurate information is.

Asset managers don't usually take back up offers. You can have your agent watch it to see if it changes back to active, but I suggest your move on to the next one.