In response to Quig’s post about the mystery Pacific St. lot going up for auction, Tom wrote in with some tips:
*These auctions happen all the time at 360 Adams Street in downtown Brooklyn. You can subscribe to the listings and get a weekly flyer of all the properties.
*This is not the best way of buying real estate. Most properties have leins you must pay off, and they are in very bad condition. Also, it is rare to find one in a good neighborhood. If it is of any value, bidding is fierce. These autions are so crowded they do them on the steps outside the building.
*You must have a check for a down payment if you win the bid. You must then secure financing to buy the property within a couple of months. Banks may be wary of these properties and you will have a hard time getting a loan.
*Each year, the city has yearly auctions for properties left to the state when no heir can claim the property. These houses are usually looted by the city first, and its contents auctioned off.
*VERY ODD: The city also sells each year at auction Odd Lots and Lots. These are empty lots and sometimes partial lots: “I have seen lots 2 feet wide by 100 foot deep. They are lots that exist between buildings that no one owns.”
Brownstoner picked up on Quig’s find and asked, “does anyone know the best way to stay abreast of both private and public auctions? We’d like to be able to keep an eye on them.”
Helpful and anonymous Brownstoner readers responded that, besides the New York Lawyer website where this listing was found, you can also check with JER Revenue Services Of course, you can also pay Property Shark a subscription fee for their listings, which they collate from various legal publications.
Finally, another anonymous Brownstoner reader noted that, if the lien is small in comparison to the property value (lien of $183K for the Pacific Street lot), “the debtor will find some way to stave off foreclosure by the auction date. Unlikely that the property will actually go to auction.”
Just to clarify a few things – I have gone to a couple of these auctions and you must have 10% down of the final auctioned price in cash (it may start out small but some of these wind up being 4X as much as the upset amount). The auctions are not held on the steps anymore but usually in the jury room (in Kings County Court) and it is a madhouse. The lots are the best thing to bid on. As someone mentioned the homes are usually in bad repair and you cannot inspect them before the auction. JER is the list where you can find the properties that were foreclosed by the City/State for non payment of taxes. The one good thing about JER is that they also have properties for sale that you can privately bid on with the company.