What's the worst house you ever looked at?

[Rob K.]

I was reading the other thread by Brandon Turner about your worst tenant horror story. It made me think about some nasty houses I've looked at over the years. I have two that really stand out in my mind.

The first was before I ever bought a house. I was 20 years old and found a fixer upper in a C neighborhood for $11,000. I took my dad with me to look at it, as I knew nothing about houses. The family that lived there consisted of a husband, wife, and six kids in a small three bedroom house with a basement. What I remember most was turning on a light in the bedroom and seeing cockroaches running across the beds. I had never seen them before. I can't imagine sleeping in bed and having roaches crawling all over you. When we got to the basement, there was a sump without a pump. There were pipes coming into a crock and then a pipe leaving. I have no idea how it worked. When my dad lifted the cover, the whole crock was full of spaghetti and cockroaches. It was disgusting. I ended up passing on that house.

The other one that stands out was years later. I was looking at a house for sale that had tenants already there. When I walked in, there were four overweight teenage girls watching Maury Povich on TV. At least three of these girls were pregnant. I guess they were watching so the could find out how to go on the show and have a paternity test to find out who the baby daddy was. When I walked down the basement steps, I was overcome with a nasty odor. There was a litter box overflowing. I hate cats! The smell made my eyes water. The funniest part was that the plumbing had been completely hacked. The bathtub on the main floor had a pipe that drained into the laundry tub in the basement. From there, I guess all of the bathtub water would go down the laundry tub drain. I've never seen that before or since.

I've seen other nasty houses over the years, but those two are memorable.

What have you seen?