That is pretty sad that people don't even have enough pride to present themselves as, you know, human beings.

If I'm losing my house, why on earth would I give a frogs flying fuck what you think? I mean really...

We went house hunting in Jacksonville over the summer and some of the houses were disgusting. Dirty dishes piled in the sink AND on the living room floor. One home stank of cigarettes and alcohol, had burn marks in the carpet and trash everywhere.

Ahem. I'll hold back a bit because I don't think Eric's intentions are completely maligned.

As one of said crackers, you may be astonished to know that my mortgage, and a plethora of others in this state are up to date, fixed, and not sub-prime.

Now, as I can't speak for the rest of us, it appears that you have witnessed the typical reaction from some of our less sophisticated residents, who are weary of a bunch of New York Johnny-come-lately's traipsing all over their property offering to 'rescue' their house for $.20 on the dollar.

My apologies if they have not catered to you wishes. Please let me know when you intened to go house hunting again, and in what neighborhood, and I'll inform the Governor.

@Pro-Pain: He's not referring to foreclosures - these are people trying to get out while they can. Frankly, if you want to make to place seem pleasing so you can at least get SOMETHING back, you'd better give a frog's flying fuck.

@Pro-Pain: Shouldn't the fact that they might buy it from you instead of having to go through forclosure be enough to motivate you...?

@Pro-Pain:
Because a buyer would mean the difference between selling the house and getting out with a clean credit report and even possibly some $$ vs. getting foreclosed on and being dumped out on your ass with no $$ no equity and a trashed credit report that will make it hard to even rent an apartment?

@Pro-Pain: +1 for keeping it real

Let's see now...

If I make my house presentable and act like a real seller, you buy my house and I'm on the street with bad credit looking for a place to live.

If I do nothing to make the house presentable and make sure I have a pot of cabbage boiling away on the stove, no one will buy it, Meanwhile I'm living here without paying the mortgage 'cause I defaulted and the bank won't throw me out until the very, very, very last minute.

Does that answer your question, Eric?

@Pro-Pain: You would still like to get SOME of your money back right?

@loueloui: He also took a shot at "ethnic" foods, so I think he is hating equally.

You know that once you buy a house, you're allowed to clean it, right?

@Sir Winston Thriller: But once they do kick your procrasinating butt to the curb, you've got even WORSE credit and you'll be living in your car for the next 7 years.

Does anyone know if Florida is one of those states where they can come after you for the difference between what your house sells for and what you owed?

Are the listing agents not giving their clients enough warning before showing up with buyers?

@strangeffect: Yeah, but if you're buying a house do you want to have to worry that the house is full of stains and smells that maybe expensive, if not impossible, to remove?

It's hard to fall in love with a place that stinks.

Also in Florida:

I caught some people hiding their bong while high as hell. Hey, at least they tried. It's not like we didn't give them a few hours warning that we were interested in looking at their home.

Another time the parents asked their kid to give us a tour of the house. It was a rather honest tour.

@ftrain: Best comment I've seen on here in along time and I know because "I keeps it real."

OP, you have to realize that you are looking at houses in FL.

I went to an open house (in South FL, not a foreclosure and a bit overpriced) a couple months ago. The area was nice, the house looked decent (a little run down on the outside) but the person living there (kind of scary looking) had no idea an open house was scheduled for that day (or the following Sunday, as the realtor had said) and refused to let us in because she hadn't had time to "pick up." I kind of got the feeling the person living there didn't even know the place was for sale.

@loueloui:
I don't understand your point entirely.

So you're doing fine so that means...? what exactly to his complaint? You're not selling your house. He's not talking about you. Pile the dishes and wash your dog. your house.

Less sophisticated = idiot? Free passes on the "Less sophisticated" got them right where they are.

This is not some kind of looking down his nose, at least to me, he's talking about people who need to go to "How to Be School".

Additionally, now we have some kind of carpet bagger situation going down? Trust me, them damn yankees have nothing to do with what makes them weary.

Here's the deal, no matter what. They got screwed OR screwed themselves (different debate). They have to sell the house. Make it happen. Be smart ONCE.

eric -

do you think it's possible that your realtor knows you're approved for more & is showing you specific properties to coax you into looking into more expensive properties - in effect "staging" your disapproval?

just sayin...

My wife was a realtor's assistant and related a story to me. There was a beautiful house that she would show to clients, but the owner of the house had horrible taste in decorating. It looked like something out of the 70's with tacky brown/orange painting, plastic flowers, etc. It sat unsold for quite a while and one day she had gone back to show it to another client - this time, all the tacky decorations were gone and repainted.

When the owner was asked about the change, she told them that she had decorated it with the tackiest stuff she could find - The reason: she was in the middle of a divorce and would have to split the proceeds. She knew that if he house would not sell, the husband would just "unload" it on her. After the divorce was finalized, she cleaned it up and sold it pretty quickly.

I have been looking for a house in ohio, and it is the same here. After 8 months of looking, we have finally found a house. It is my personal opinion that the realtors are not doing their job. Over half of the houses we looked at the realtor knew less about the house than we did. I just don't know how you can sell something and not know anything about it.

This post makes my Wednesday morning full o' chuckles. People are funny.

It's been a while for me; I thought it was a general rule of realty that sellers/residents had to be out of the house when it was shown? Is this no longer the custom anywhere, or is it just in the carefree South?

Perhaps the stinky veggie boil was a subtle invitation to sit down for a healthy light lunch in the midst of a long day of house-a-hunting? Rutabaga soup, anyone?

@Rectilinear Propagation: In that case, the place is going to stink regardless of whether there's a basketball game on, a dog in the sink, food cooking, or ashtrays visible at the time of inspection.

If anything, the current owner could simply attribute any chronic stinkage to what was going on right then. I would be more concerned if the place smelled like it was just crop-dusted with febreze.

Eric sounds like he wants to be treated like some kind of savior buy buying someone's house for half the price. granted you might want to make a house somewhat appealing to the buyer but if I'm gonna be homeless and living on the street afterwards well you better bear the smell of my ethnic boiled vegetables because I'm not gonna bow to you.

@savvy9999: Rutabaga soup? Is Fraggle Rock in Florida?

So basically you want to be tricked into thinking the people who owned the house before you kept it perfectly clean and never made any bad smells in it? I would rather see an honest presentation of what had gone on in the house im going to be buying. I bought a house for a very low price a few years ago. It was priced low because it looked like crap. Some paint and wallpaper and now the value is up over 50% from what i paid.

Maybe you should look in a nicer area? Every house I looked at was spotless and the owners would leave when we looked.

If you are looking at a rednecks house, with his truck on the front lawn, I wouldn't expect much more than what you are seeing.

I share your frustration, but if it makes you feel better, those people won't be selling their house anytime soon.

It is aggrivating that people don't do the bare minimum when showing their house. But my guess is that they are moving under less-than-ideal circumstances and thus, they don't care.

We had similar incidents when we looked for new houses in the fall. On two or three occasions either my wife or realtor walked in on someone sleeping in one of the bed rooms - even though there was a confirmed showing and NO ONE else was in the house.

I'd consider looking elsewhere or get a better imagination. If every house I looked at in an area had this problem, I'm not sure I'd want to live there. Maybe you're just giving us the lowlights of your house hunting tours???

I recently concluded my house hunting trip in West Tennessee and it is most definately a buyer's market. There were some very nice neighborhoods I could previously not afford to be looking in. Due to reduced pricing, I was able to step up to the next level. I ended up getting very nice house that was already priced to sell at for about 30% off asking.

Ben, why in the hell would you publish an article with the word 'cracker' in it? That severely undermines your credibility.

I thought that the owners should be out of the house too. I don't understand why these "crackers" should feel responsible for showing him the house, didn't he have a realtor? I get the idea that a messy house makes the decision harder, but cry me a river and get over yourself, you're not messiah for buying their house.

i don't see what the big deal is. a year ago he would have paid $100,000 more for a "fixer upper" that might have been much worse. this is like someone going to a government auction to buy a repossessed car and complaining that the sales person didn't offer him a cappuccino. if you want to be treated like a high end buyer then don't look at houses being sold out from under reluctant renters and/or people who are probably going to be living in a motel 6 after they leave.

ugh. i'm really getting tired of hearing from some of the whiny, privileged people who get their stories posted here.

pixel: plenty of landlords will rent to you if you're honest about the situation. but why let that get in the way of a rant, huh?

eric: buy an REO. start on ocwen.com and fanniemae.com, or call a realty office and ask to speak to an agent who specializes in REOs in the are you want. you can beat up on the bank all you want, especially if you focus on properties with more than 120 days on market. most home buyers think that's only a strategy for investors. in my large florida city, the MLS has almost a thousand REO listings. Many in prime neighborhoods, like the beach.

is this guy a little racist/prejudice? "stinky ethnic foods" " cracker-asses" ... cmon now.

"area" not "are"

damned bronchitis.

On one hand, it sucks to walk into a house and it be disgusting - and I understand his anger at the fact that people an't seem to get that they will most likely end up in a worse financial state if they don't sell their home.

on the other hand, I think he should've waited a few hours to send this in because I also think him lashing out at "ethnic" foods was annoying...why does it have to be ethnic? Yes, there are a lot of ethnicities in Florida. Get over it.

We put our house on the market just as the bubble was bursting, and again a year later. We're still in the house. Of course, we were trying to get out because we've added two kids to the family and it's getting cramped, not because of an ARM bump. On average we got about 7 minutes warning that someone was coming over to look at the place.

Don't assume the owners just don't care (though I'm sure some of them don't) or are total slobs all the time, in my experience at least half the problems with real estate experiences is that the agents suck and suck bad. Over the years I've dealt with 7 different real estate agents, one of whom was really good, two of whom were mediocre, and four of whom were simply incompetent, uninformed, poorly organized, and mostly uninterested in what either the buyer or the seller wanted as long as they got their commission.

@jenocyde: That's actually not too surprising. Realtors are notorious for not giving sellers notice before a house showing.

@B: *shrug* my mom, a real estate agent, always tells her clients she's showing their property, and works out a schedule when they know not to be there. And she makes sure that they clean the place up and they lock up animals. I guess my experience is with one agent.

@rewinditback: I think when we're angry at other people, we show the nastiest side of ourselves....

I'm seeing the same thing here in SE Wisconsin. We're ready to buy... sellers are not ready to sell.

It does seem like some lazy or over loaded agents.

i could completely understand someone trashing the hell out of a foreclosed property because why the hell not if you don't care? but if you're just selling your house by choice, don't be a disgusting fuck.

to the guy that said for $.20 on the dollar - how do you know what this guy's willing to pay? no one knows what any buyer is willing to pay until they see the house. and if he sees a house in that state the only amount you know he's going to offer is zero dollars.

don't defend dirty people. we're not animals, we have soap. take care of your property. and if you can't do the bare minimum cleaning required to stave off things like fungal infections and the plague then don't expect someone else to want to pick up where you left off.

I sold my old house last month for about 7k less than the appraised value. 2/1 bungalow in a decent part of town, just over 1k sq ft, and made about 45k on the transaction over what I originally paid for the house.

The housing market isn't that bad down here in NE Floriduh.

My fiance and I are having this exact problem in the Northern Virginia area. We actually have one house that we have been to three times and they won't let us in. One guy answered his door and said "not today". We also have ran into the issue of sellers not willing to negotiate their over priced homes.
I never knew it would be difficult to buy a house in todays market.

There is a bit of psychology going here. People, for the most part, aren't motivated to sell their houses at a loss, even if getting out is the right move for many people. I'd guess that's what's causing the lack of motivation in the sellers.

Bubba the Love Sponge territory.

On the flip side, agents are in a crunch too...their business depends on a good market, and it's difficult to care as much as you used to when you've got uncooperative sellers who are annoyed that they have to give up their home, but no matter how much you explain WHY, they decided to ignore you and pout, and sellers who are eager but either just can't get the negotiations down or just can't find something they love.

And then there are the banks. Foreclosures have to be purchased through the banks, which have a ton of paperwork to deal with when they are considering a buyer's offer on a house. They want to get as much back as they can, seeming they're already losing money on the foreclosure. And of course, buyers are trying to spend less, but the houses are already down past market value. No one is the winner here because everyone is trying to stay afloat.

His "ethinic/cracker" comments were for attention grabbing value. Does make him look like a jackass.

In Florida, "cracker" is not the pejorative it is elsewhere. A Florida cracker these days is more or less a native of the state (even more so if they can trace their lineage way back), regardless of skin color.

@UpsetPanda: I work in a real estate office and have some fantastic stories about people who don't even remember their house is for sale. One agent got trapped in a basement by a couple of angry rotweilers and had to climb out a window. One time I showed a house and walked in on the homeowner in an unbelted robe drinking coffee in the kitchen, because he had forgotten it was Saturday. Once the renter of a waterfront house followed us around for the whole showing, and told the potential buyer he wasn't leaving, so they might as well stop looking at it.

It's not just Florida, it's everywhere. And it's not just when people are selling for below market value, it's any time homeowners have gotten used to their houses and dirt and smells and don't realize those are all turnoffs. This is why "Sell This House" and "Designed to Sell" and staging companies can make such a difference with small budgets.

Americans are animals with no pride of ownership these days. You see it all over the place in the form of garbage on the sides of the roads, gum on the sidewalks, and spit everywhere you go. People think it's their "Right" to be idiots.