Rumor has it that Dave’s Used Car Lot, Marina, and Weed Arboretum has already been auctioned off. A neighbor called one of the numbers on his FSBO sign and was told the house just sold for $192,500.
If that’s true, it’s a disaster for me:just before the bubble started to inflate,I bought my home for $232,000. If Dave’s pigsty sold for any such price, it means my house is now worth less than I paid for it.
On the other hand, why do I doubt this story? Let me count the ways:
- No real For Sale sign ever went up.
- No “Foreclosed” stickers ever appeared on the doors or windows.
- No “Auction” sign was posted.
- Dave has been out of the place for less than a week.
- Houses in the neighborhood, even deeply discounted for-sale-by-lender houses, have sat on the market for weeks and months without moving; it’s unlikely Dave’s would have sold in less than a week.
- As anxious as banks are to unload distressed properties, it’s unlikely that they’d let it go for $65,000 less than a similarly trashed house went for just a couple of weeks ago.
No. This story smacks of disinformation.
Well, we’ll find out soon enough. The place is not habitable as it is, so if someone bought it, we’ll soon see workmen swarming around. With any luck, maybe a speculator will clean it up and resell it at the market price (which still exists, after all).
My estimate for clean-up and updating: about $60,000. Thirty thou’ on the lowest end; sixty thou if you wanted to do a decent job of it.
- Clean garbage and weeds off lot: $800
- Disassemble and haul junk storage structures, the large, dangerously decrepit wooden children’s climbing set, and other large pieces of junk: $800
- New air conditioner: $5,600
- Reroof: $5,000
- Replaster large pool and replace decrepit, probably broken pool equipment: $10,000
- Scrape and paint exterior: $1,500
- Paint interior: $2,000
- Recarpet: $3,000
- Stovetop: $800
- Refrigerator: $1200
- Dishwasher: $500
- Cleaning service: $200 (no one in her right mind would clean out the sty for less than that!)
There’s the bare minimum: about $30,900. That would make the place rentable, but not for much. Now let’s make the place saleable for a decent price:
- Wall oven: $1,200 (viewed through the haze of a filthy window, the oven looks relatively new and might stay if it’s functional and can be cleaned)
- New cabinetry and countertops: $15,000
changes your perspective when you start looking at the houses around you as commodities! But, that is the state of many markets. Are they cheaper if you buy the whole block?
Also, $5k for a roof is pretty low-ball. We’ve had quotes for our simple one-story for 2-3 times that. You’re assessment is right though – rehabbing a house in that state is not cheap.
Five grand is what I paid for the roof on my house three or four years ago; the Arboretum is about the same size as mine. The roofing company has been around for upwards of 25 years, and the owner is “old Phoenix”: a guy whose family has been in the area and running businesses here for a couple of generations. They did an excellent job. Arizona prices are low because labor is cheap here: this is a right-to-work state…i.e., you have a right to work your employees for slave wages.
I also got some higher prices — notably from Home Depot, whose subcontractor proposed to sell me a ventilation system the attic did not need. Some contractors figure if you’re a woman alone you haven’t a clue and so try to sell you any da**fool thing they can. Lower prices came from a couple of fly-by-night outfits, for which Arizona is justly (in)famous.