House of the week: 2139 Baxter in Echo Park. It's a probate, but don't let that scare you.

This week's house of the week, 2139 Baxter in Echo Park, was chosen because 1) it's a cutie that's ripe for a renovation or just great decorating taste, 2) it's in a cool Eastside neighborhood, 3) it has a view and a backyard, 4) the price is affordable (although it will probably go over) at $699,000 and 5) it is special because it's a probate sale.  Don't be scared of buying a probate property.  You can do it. 

Here is the quick story on probates.  The thing you need most of with a probate sale is patience.  The sale takes a long time because attorneys are involved and a court date needs to be set.  First, you line up your loan and do your inspections.  Next, you make an offer, put down 10%, and if the estate accepts your offer, you then wait for notice of the court date (your agent and the listing agent will go with you to court).  The judge will ask if anybody objects to the sale and if not, s/he will open bidding.  Yes, you can be outbid in court, so plan to go higher and bring extra cashiers' checks for the increased deposit just in case.  Once the judge rules in your favor, closing is usually within 10 days.

Yes, this takes a lot longer than an actual sale, and there are more details, but this is the overview.  However, this house would definitely be one worth waiting for.

The Realtor has two brand new experiences. Neither of them were good.

Last week was quite a week.  I had two new situations that I've never had before in my eighteen years in practice.

First, a seller client passed away in the middle of our escrow.  I represent the buyer on this one.  This essentially puts a hold on the sale until all title issues can be cleared up.  It was a complicated deal to begin with as the seller was a FSBO (for-sale-by-owner).  What did I do on this one? Nothing, and let the estate take care of everything so we can close.

Second, I was blithely invited to commit loan fraud.  A potential buyer on one of my listings wanted to get a loan for x-amount of dollars, but also wanted to give the seller a lot of money outside of escrow so he wouldn't have to pay property taxes on the whole amount of the sale. (A property gets re-assessed by the County Tax Assessor when it changes hands.  In a normal sale, it is assessed at the purchase price.)  I pointed out that this is loan fraud, it's a federal crime, and I don't want to go to jail and neither does this buyer.  The buyer plainly didn't care.  What did I do on this one? I refused to write the offer, which would have been much lower than what the seller would have accepted anyway.

Sheesh! What will this week bring?