As of April 1st, 2013, all properties that were at risk of foreclosure in Wayne County this year and did not address tax issues are foreclosed and title has transferred to the Wayne County Treasurer. However, there is still time to redeem a property and prevent it from entering the foreclosure auction.
Get Started: Click "Zoom to My Location" to see the properties at risk of foreclosure in your neighborhood. If you click an individual property and go to its page, you'll see a number of resources to assist in foreclosure prevention under the "What are my other options?" button. You can help your community and neighbors connect with resources and stay in their homes.
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110 Atkinson:
Hi Abbey, and welcome to Why Don't We Own This! I'm Alex from the LOVELAND team.
What you're looking at on the "2013 Foreclosure Risk" map are all the properties in Wayne County that are at risk of winding up in the annual tax foreclosure auction administered by the Wayne County Treasurer's Office.
When a property doesn't pay property taxes for three years, the county treasurer is required by law to foreclose on the property and auction it off in an attempt to make up the back taxes. This takes place in an online auction managed by Bid4Assets every September & October. The auction is split up into two rounds:
In the 1st round, bidding on foreclosed properties opens at the total amount of back taxes (in the case of the house you're looking at, that would be $6,139).
In the 2nd round, all back taxes are wiped out, and the opening bid for ALL properties is $500.
Each of the last two years, about 20,000 properties across Wayne County have wound up in the foreclosure auction. About 700 sold in the 1st round, 10,000 sold in the second round, and around 8 - 9,000 go unsold.
Keep an eye on Why Don't We Own This to get more information as the auction approaches.
In the instance of the house you're asking about -- 110 Atkinson -- the property has been "Conditionally Witheld" from the foreclosure auction. This likely means that the occupant reached an agreement with the Wayne County Treasurer's Office to pay their back taxes off a little bit at a time. As long as they pay off a certain amount by the time the auction rolls around, their house will not be foreclosed on, and auctioned off.
Hope this helps! Any further questions, just shout.
-Alex
how do you buy a house like this at auction? What auction? I am new to all of this.
256 Horton:
Did the slumvestor renege then Darin? I wonder if you could make a deal with the County, might be worth a shot contacting someone at the treasurer's office, or presumably the Detroit Land Bank who will be receiving the leftovers from the fall auction...
I know the guy (named Grayling) who began renovating this house and lost it to tax foreclosure last year. It seems like some outta state investor purchased it for $1500 and I haven't been able to track them down. Sadly it has been sitting since the fall... It's along a nice stretch of decent homes
2930 E Grand Blvd:
Naw Bill, just include $3-5k for a Phase I/II environmental site assessment (ESA). Once you have a BEA - Baseline Environmental Assessment, you inherit no liability. You ARE still responsible for protecting the inhabitants from contact/ exposure, however. I wish Detroit's Tax Increment Financing (TIF) worked better to help offset remediation costs... enough acronyms? lol
...and the individual fortunate enough to pony up the money to purchase an old service station will also then inherit the environmental liability that may run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Anyone considering the purchase of any property in the city should do thorough research on its history and use, and be certain to look for potential site of contamination: former industrial, gas stations, dry cleaners, etc.. For example, the Metropolitan building was occupied by jewelers and had to have a remediation done to clean the building of radiation from the radium used in watches. Buyer beware!
If anyone were to lease that property, you'd hope they did their due diligence first since it's headed to foreclosure if no one pays the taxes. And the sale price is really $14,000 when you add in what's owed in back taxes.
-Alex
this property is currently being offered for lease (300) or purchase (4000) on craigslist.
2534 Chicago:
Would like to note the epic limo Google Maps happened to capture in front of this house. NICE
2522 Chicago:
I first started looking at Detroit in March of 2009. A few friends and I were contemplating moving out here. Just went back and looked at a few of those e-mails and realized that 2522 Chicago Blvd was the house we had our eye on. Looks like it's ready for demolition now, and eligible for foreclosure.
- Alex