House Hacking Question

[KC Morgan]

Hi,

I'm a newbie investor with one property that I lived in for 2 years and now I'm cash flowing $600/month on it. The deal literally fell into my lap a few years ago and I'm dying to do more.

I found a distressed and vacant property that my wife and I would love to house hack and live in for a couple of years. I found it last year and after a lot of work, tracked down the owner. She was extremely difficult and essentially said that if I wasn't willing to get her loan current, pay all the liens/judgements ($30k+), pay attorney fees, etc, which shockingly nobody she'd talked to yet was willing to do, then she'd just let it get foreclosed on. It is now in pre-foreclosure and I'm trying to understand my options.

Option A) Buy at the foreclosure options. My understanding is that banks will usually start the minimum bid somewhere around whatever is still owed on the property. Is that an accurate statement? Obviously they want to recapture the greatest amount they can. Which in this case the property is worth less than what I believe to be outstanding on the loan which would mean if the min bid was high enough it probably won't be sold at the auction. Will a title search show how much is outstanding on the loan? Also can I order a title search on my own or does it have to be through a title company? The property ARV is about $500k and the balance on the loan is probably somewhere around $525k. The property needs about $50k worth of work.

Option B) Buy as an REO property after nobody buys at the auction and the foreclosure process is completed. The thing I don't like about this option is that it's likely I won't get as good of a deal. Who knows the bank may decide to become the flipper and do the renovation themselves.

Are there any other options I am not considering? The Breach and Election to sell has been filed with the county so the foreclosure process has begun. Is there anything I can do to try and get the property prior to the auction (which here in Vegas is pretty competitive)? If I can't get it at the auction is there anything I can do to try and get it before it's offered on the MLS?

This property is located in Las Vegas.

Thanks for any thoughts!

KC Morgan