As-is off market flip with Underground Oil Tank

[Daniel Karbownik]

I'm wondering how flippers approach something like this. I have a deal in my pipeline that is a classic situation of an older person passing, heirs wanting to sell quick, property being a mess in terms of clutter, never updated, full-gut kinda job. The numbers are pretty great - ARV will be about 210-215, with standard rehabbing being about 50, and I will be able to purchase for around 90. But it has an underground oil tank, and it's very old. The house was built in 1905.

How does a flipper approach something like this?  I can't imagine you'd want to take it as-is with the tank, because if you try to remove it after buying and find the soil is contaminated, and possibly contaminated the ground water, you could be looking at a bank-breaker of a job.   If you ask the seller to test the soil and they do, and it comes back contaminated and the DEP has to be alerted, the seller is going to hate you.  And beside the issue of the tank, the rest of the numbers work out to be a slam dunk.  

Let's assume the seller has no tank insurance or anything like that.  The house is public water and public sewer, if that's make a difference.  How would you handle this?