Distressed Property

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In December 2003 my home suffered some earthquake damage to the tune of around $75,000.00. We were turned down for assistance with SBA and now we cannot get a loan to repair the damage. The lenders will not lend on distressed property, say it has no value.
To make things worse now the whole area that I live in is experiencing a loss of water. I live in the county and the city that is approx. 7 miles west of us is taking our water daily. I know this sounds strange but my problem is that we would like to sell and get out of the area. We were planning to do so when we had the earthquake and were on a 2 year plan to retire. Now everything is on hold because of the mortgage situation. Would we be wiser to keep on hoping that we get a loan to repair and put in a new well which will be an additional $18,000.00 or just sell the property for what we can get out of it now. ? :-(

Comments(4)

  • myfrogger21st August, 2004

    Where is your insurance guy/gal? Didn't you have insurance? You don't give us enough information about what your house is worth now and after being repaired. What is your mortgage balance.

    If you're living in a house worth $30,000 and it needs $75,000 worth of repairs, I would look to get out.

    If you're living in a $500,000 house that needs $75,000 worth of repairs but you have a $490,000 mortgage, I would look to get out.

    If you're living in a $500,000 house that needs $75,000 worth of repairs and you have a $100,000 mortgage, you should be able to fix it up and make out fine.

    You don't give us enough background to give you any advise.

  • brassrodus321st August, 2004

    Sorry, I goofed! The houses our here are going for around $350,000.00 to about $400,000.00 we owe $140,000.00 right now. I hate to get saddled with an even bigger loan and fear of not being able to sell with the water situation as it is. There are 15 people within a one mile radius of us that have had to put in new wells or are on a waiting list.

    We have insurance. Home owners only they do not cover Earthquake damage. We did not get earthquake insurance which is our fault, but it had a 40 % deductible and was very expensive like $150.00 per $1,000.00. There hadn't been an earthquake here ever! I guess we really goofed there didn't we? I know of some people that had it and they said it was not worth the money they paid.

    Anyway, we are in our early 60's and frightened about the future. If we cannot get a loan to repair damages to house and drill a new well, where will we go from there?

  • Stockpro9921st August, 2004

    18K is not a lot of $$ for repairsif the well is the only problem, What is the repair estimate for the rest of the house??
    [addsig]

  • brassrodus321st August, 2004

    $18,000.00 for the well with no guarantee of water the deeper you go the more it costs. The earthquake damage is somewhere in the neighborhood of $75,000.00 the foundation is broken in half with about a 6" gap in the floors and all the walls have moved, the house has dropped on one corner. The main factor in getting the foundation fixed is the cost of steel right now. Everytime the steel goes up we have to adjust the bid for repair. The longer it takes to get a loan the more it is going to cost us to repair the earthquake damage.[ Edited by brassrodus3 on Date 08/21/2004 ]

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