HUBZU

[Jennifer Taves]

PLEASE help me with HUBZU.com

I have made a few offers on a place on Hubzu. I was the highest bidder once but it did not meet the reserve price so they put it back on for another auction and started at my bid.

Someone then made a few bids and I made one too...but was quickly outbid. I watched thinking it would not meet the reserve and it did not. They then countered me and said my min bid to "still buy the house" needed to be $551k or "own it now" for $591k.  I was not willing to do that so I did nothing.

Another auction was set to end in 5 days at the new highest price fromm the last auction. I then received an email saying now I could buy it for $563k...(much less than the $591k from the previous day "own it now" email).

I again did nothing and then I got a message it was under contract. When I clicked on "make a back up offer" the min bid was now $538k!!! so $562k_+ with fees....it was substantially lower than $563k for "own it now" that  was offered ...

Does anyone have any advice as to what happened? How the "Back up bid min" would be less than the "own it now" amount they offered?

[Sam Sharata]

@Matt M. Hubzu is SCUM.

I couldn't have said more eloquently. These online auction sites are simply gaming with the bidding in order to get buyers at or above to the bank's price. You can even see it by reviewing the bid history on some of the auctions, the numbers and (where available) dates just don't make sense. The best strategy is to set your price, place your bid 5 minutes before auction closing, then log out so they see that you're no longer online and willing to play their game. The fact that they came back to you after the auction closed tells you that you were outbid by the bank. You were the only real person bidding for that property in the first place.