WNY Handyman

I have been told that we will be seeing a flood of foreclosures since the “stay” is coming up. To be frank, I haven’t done too much homework on this, but my understanding is that there are teams of lawyers working crazy hours to process all of this stuff.

Here is a decent gauge: NY HUD foreclosure list.

Select Erie County from the NY State Foreclosure list. On 3/31/2009 there are 10 properties listed. In the past there were probably about 20-40. Let’s see if this spikes.

M&T Bank is a Buffalo based bank. They publish a list of the foreclosures (bank owned properties or REO) that they have on their books. Most, if not all, of their properties can be found on their site at:

M&T Bank Foreclosures

Many of the listings from a bank like M and T will also be represented by a Realtor and found in the MLS (multiple listing service).

If you are really after foreclosures, or want to pay enough attention to the Buffalo area foreclosure market to be in the know when it comes to pricing, you should consider a subscription to RealtyTrac. You will find plenty of foreclosure listing sites online. Most are pulling from similar sources. What is nice about RealtyTrac is that they list pre-foreclosure listings. These are listings that aren’t yet bank owned and might be in line for a distressed sale. Don’t consider yourself a vulture in these situations. The person who is forced into a distressed sale just might be please that you reached out. Imagine if your 2 options were to give your house back to the bank (voluntary foreclosure) or to accept an at the money offer from someone looking to enter the real estate market on the cheap.

You can do a 7 day free trial here:

Start searching for your next home today with RealtyTrac and save money. Start now!

Our blurb regarding foreclosures in NY that was published yesterday turned out to be rather popular.
If you are in New York, and looking for a foreclosure, you might want to look to a bank owned property (REO) rather than something from HUD. When buying from a bank, you will have the opportunity to make an offer and negotiate from that. HUD is an offer/acceptance. You won’t receive a counter offer form HUD.

There used to be a lot of bank sites that listed properties for sale. However, the banking industry has changed quite a bit. Collapse and consolidation due to the housing market has altered the sites showing available listings a bit. One of the sites that offers listings of REO properties (more than just 1 bank) is Ocwen financial.

Visit Ocwen Financial. THis is a direct link to the Ocwen NY listing page. You should be able to navigate the site beyond that to find properties in other states.

Good luck with your foreclosure search.

Are you looking for a house to rent in the Lancaster NY area? If a washer/dryer and a convenient location is important to you, take a look at this home on Broadway. $850/month plus utilities.

Lancaster House for rent

It seems like everyone loves a makeover. We renovated a home in Lancaster NY and never posted the before/after shots. The difference is pretty dramatic. The project seemed to take forever, but we didn’t have the man hours to commit to getting it done quickly. .

Take a look at the before and after photos:
Lancaster NY Renovation.

Garfield before and after photos

We took this chopped up floor plan and opened it up to give it a modern feel. We had to move some windows and add others to make the kitchen functional. Overall, it turned out great. Take a peek.