Many banks will pay you a couple thousand bucks not to do this, which is more than you’ll get for the stuff.
I don’t think this is really a new trend. I had a neighbor that did this about 20 years ago. They also dug up the shrubs when they left.
Actually, it's common in some countries to remove everything down to the barewalls when you move ~ Nederland, for example, where the government owns about 90% of the land, has a housing industry that works with an overwhelmingly "rental unit" base. When they move, so do the kitchen cabinets, the floor, the light fixtures (tape off the hot lines), and I've heard of areas where they remove the interior walls leaving nothing but brick, block and timber to look at.
The FHA/VA review sheet includes notations about what must be conveyed at sale ~ but in these foreclosures, it's not an FHA/VA inspection that has to be passed to convey ownership. Under those conditions it may well be the case that removal of all fixtures ~ and I mean ALL FIXTURES ~ may be permitted by law. Be good for someone to dig all the info up for each state and territory and let us know what we can strip when we walk away from the mortgage.
Yep, the stuck a gun to your head and forced you to act like a moron and sign without reading or understanding.
Sad. No one wants to take responsibility for their stupid decisions anymore. If the bank hadn’t given her the loan, what would she have done then?
A friend of mine started a business after he got layed off. He cleans houses but markets his business to banks and real estate companies. He goes in and cleans foreclosed houses after people are evicted. He is just a run-of-the-mill cleaning service but has “foreclosure restoration and cleaning” in his busines profile.
BRILLIANT!
These people should be branded on the forehead and made unemployable social pariahs.
Actions should have consequences. They signed loan documents for a mortgage they knew they couldn’t make in the hope the ponzi scheme would continue increasing 10-15% a year.
You would think that this would, in some way, be illegal and punishable through the courts.
The owner of the home did not strip it. The person who stripped it was a person was NOT the owner. The owner was the bank. The person who stripped the home is nothing but a vandal.
This was done in a foreclosed home in a small town in Maryland, They sold all the fixtures, but left 3 stolen cars in the garage.
The banks should prosecute for destruction of their property. There should be a blacklist of scumbags who do this sort of thing.
People like this should never be allowed to be homeowners. I hope the banks learn a lesson from this, never give a loan unless the buyer has a downpayment of their OWN money or the money of a close relative (NOT taxpayer money). The only exception to this should be the VA loan.
Really is sad, destroying value to get a tiny return. It reminds me of a report I saw a couple of years ago when the copper value was through the roof, about the growing numbers of people tearing down infrastructure to sell for scrap. The road to Somalia, and an example of why community and shared resources should be valued over extreme individualism.
“latest “trend”: people in foreclosed homes are stripping them bare “
Not new, but of course to the lamestream media it is. They never have any full story when it happens and then they get it wrong.
ALL of the homes we looked at this year to buy were stripped. All. We looked at over 50 homes. Not one wasn’t missing appliances, cabinets, even the toilets in some cases. Million dollar homes stripped by either the owner or thieves.
I needed an appliance part and went to Appliance Factory Outlet on Sante Fe drive in Denver. Backed up to their loading docks were Mexicans and yuppies alike selling what was no doubt their ill gotten gains. I was approached to buy appliances at ten to thirty cents on the dollar.
She is exactly correct. However, liberal socialists in power pretty much forced the banks to do this under "minority homeownship" laws and anti-red lining laws. Expect banks to never lend money to the likes like you anymore in the future. And no complaining about it.
stupid is as stupid does.
by stripping out the fixtures, these people are reducing the value of the house and increasing the debt they will STILL OWE after the bank sells the property.
BANKS MUST STOP MAKING LOANS TO DEADBEATS.
Being poor does not excuse lawlessness (unless you’re a socialist).
more involved than just selling scrap for a few bucks....full out rage against the Capitalist machine...they strip all the wiring, pour concrete in the plumbing, and in some cases set them on fire (gotta deny The Man his ill-gotten gains, ya know)
I know someone who knows someone whose cousin went to prison for doing this, which sadly seems to be the exception and not the rule.