How do I find out who owns a foreclosed property?

[Lindsay West]

There's a house around the corner from my parents' house that's been abandoned for several years. I'm interested in buying it, so I looked up the tax assessor's records to see who owns it. The record shows the owner as the woman who bought it in 2005, but I'm pretty sure the house has been foreclosed on. The neighbors on both sides told me it's foreclosed and there are papers posted in the windows stating the property is abandoned. Minor repairs have also been made to the property over the last six months(according to the neighbors). That being said, the property has not been put up for sale. So, if it is owned by a bank, how do I contact those who could sell me the property? 

[Frank Chin]

I bought foreclosed houses from REO banks. Although they foreclosed on the property some time back, the local record still did not reflect the change. Only after the auction sale did they record the deeds, one from the foreclosed owner to the bank, and the second deed recorded from the bank to me, all dated on the same date after the sale to me. I know the bank foreclosed on it 2 years before the sale to me.

In fact, the deeds were meant to be recorded the same day, so in the event my deed (2nd one) is recorded before the 1st one (foreclosed owner to bank) , my deed list the name of the REO bank, the grantor, as "XYZ Bank, deed to be recorded..". That's why I knew the local records did not reflect the bank as legal owners for at least 2 years.

I read in the local papers of this controversy, as recently as this year, about zombie homes, where the foreclosing bank would not record change of ownership because they don't want to be responsible for liabilities as legal owners of the property such as slips and falls, squatters being injured. I haven't followed up on it, but in neighboring counties to NYC, there's been proposals that when banks foreclosed on properties, this should go onto a registry so the county knows who to contact if a problem arose. This would not have been necessary if the local records have the real owners name.