Hoarder house in Vermont thru auction.com

[Jen Salemi]

Hi. I recently won the auction.com auction for a property located in Vermont. Closing over the next few weeks. The property was once owned (obviously).... then successfully foreclosed upon by the mortgage company...and then that note was sold as a package to another round of investors, who listed it on auction.com as well as MLS. The realtor that is "working" for this last group of investors is my only point of contact, and the realtor is far from helpful. When I first inquired about the property he told me the bank has a budget to do a trash-out. And they were also in the process of evicting the former owner. I guess they had gone about it the wrong way the first time around, and were in the process of doing it correctly now. I bid on this house as-is, without having seen it.

Since then, I have been told by the realtor a series of confusing things.  Maybe confusing because this is my first time doing this kind of purchase, maybe intentionally confusing.  I have no idea.  At one point recently I was told that the Writ of Possession was available for pick up, and the realtor would hand-deliver it to the sheriff in this county, as well as the county in which the owner currently resides.  That would start the eviction process/clock.  

That story morphed the following week, and at this point I have no idea where we are with the eviction because the agent is no longer responding helpfully.  Other than telling me that the former owner (the person, not the bank) had not been served, yet.  They just want to close and get their commission.  

In the time between winning the bid and now, I was able to get a better visual of the property.  The house is a hoarder house.  A sort of "clean" hoarder house, but a hoarder house none-the-less.  Furniture and boxes piled up 4' high, narrow aisles through each of the rooms that you can walk through, just barely.  Filled to the max.  Dead mice in the bathtubs, mouse crap everywhere.  In fact, it sort of looks like a high-end antique store that was vandalized by an angry raccoon who liked decorating the piles with ladies shoes.  It is truly bizarre.   

The water is turned off, the heat is turned off, there is recent evidence of frozen pipes, (icicles from the ceiling) etc etc.  There is no way anyone is living in that house.  And in fact, due to the nature of the freezy VT climate, no indication that anyone has even walked down the driveway for months.  And a few weeks ago the realtor changed all the exterior locks so no one can get in.

My questions are:  If no one is living there, and the bank successfully foreclosed (therefore the bank is the former owner) and then the bank sold the note to another set of investors....and the realtor locked everyone out...   do I even need to pick up the eviction ball?  I will mention that the first order of business for me is completely demolishing the place and I would like to get going on that before the **** roaches emerge and the raccoons start decorating again.

[Ron S.]

Originally posted by @Jen Salemi:

To Ron S.  I guess that is where I am getting confused.  What is the definition of "occupied".  No power, no water, locks changed, no evidence of anyone being there for months.  But the house is full of stuff.  

 if it were me....i'd consider it unoccupied based on what you wrote. I'd bring a camera, a backup and a locksmith if your state and/or local jurisdiction has no restrictions from you going and changing the locks and starting your clean-out.

Regarding the eviction...I've done hundreds of evictions but I've never done one for the benefit of the end buyer. Let the new owner evict. Saves the money and the litigation and the hassle.. That person's opinion that there was no way an investor would close if the previous owner hadn't been officially evicted is a huge leap of faith. If you haven't closed yet, you don't own it and can't evict. if the foreclosure has been completed, and the property sold to an investor, only the current and legal owner(the investor) can evict. 

Also, no one sold any note. If the mortgage company foreclosed successfully as you state, and it went REO into their inventory, they sold the home, not the note, to an investor. If the investor is selling the home to you, once you close, again, based on what you wrote, if i were you, i'd be changing the locks and hiring a clean-out crew (I'd be monitoring from behind the biggest guy in the group though...just in case).