Abandon home- where to get info?

[Dave Kennedy]

Hi folks,

Theres been a property at the end of my street that has been abandon for close to a year+ now. At no point did a for sale sign go up but I haven't seen anyone living in it at all. The family just kind of picked up and left. The entire yard is a mess overgrown(amazing how just one year can take over).

Anyhow the house is no more then 10-12 years old so its in relatively good structural shape. I remeber when they built it it was a mod home, quickly/cheaply built, plastic siding...etc No character to it at all. I live in a fairly wealthy town and all the size of this house/lot is up to par with the standard but the quality of it is not. There for some sprucing up could make for some nice profit if its bought under market value.

I've asked some of the neighbors about what happened to the family and they don't really know where they went. Some said they were getting into mortagage payment trouble(ARM reset). If this was the case why wouldn't they put this home on the market and at least make some money...even if they had to sell at a bit of a loss.

I guess in short my question would be where do I go to find out more about the house? How do I find out if its on the market? If its in foreclosure what can I do in terms of finding out an asking price?

My guess is town hall? Would anyone have a list of maybe 4 or 5 important questions to ask about the property? I've never delt with a foreclosure(which is my guess at what happened here).

Thanks for the insight.