Sorry for your troubles but, the only other option is to hire a real estate attorney to go after the bank but, it's highly unlikely that it will go anywhere before the new buyers close unless your lawyer can stop the transaction with a court order. Good luck!
Quote from
@JD Ball:
Ok, so I have a unique situation here. We are long term tenants since 2016 in a 8-9BR 6000 sq ft house in a landmark district. We have lease through mid 2024. House was apparently in foreclosure proceedings for over 10 year. 2016 judgment in court but owner got a stay because of our tenancy and her promise to pay. Well, years go by, then covid and ultimately, goes on the public auction block with ridiculous reserve. Bank buys back on credit last summer. We have investors swarming but reveal nothing. We don't get notice until Oct. One thinks - why didn't the owner just do a short sale - well, her property manager was delusional and kept thinking she could sell the house for $2.3-3m. Yeah right, the house has two decades of deferred maintenance and 85 original windows, a 30 year old roof and we had 200lbs of leaves removed from gutters. Anyway, come January we get a 90 day notice. The house was passed on to a REMIC (Wilmington Trust NA). Provided our lease and all other docs to the eviction attorney, but we asked to negotiate with bank directly and buy the place. From August to March, they had the house up on Xome with over 9 failed auctions. We put in an offer in February with POF and attorney took over 3 weeks to reply with just "Rejected." We then said, well, what exactly doe the bank need? He took another two weeks to reply, 1) Sales contract drawn up by RE Attorney/broker, As-Is, 3-day close, funds in account 60 days plus. Ok, so we got the RE Attorney, put all together and submitted. And we actually submitted above the judgment amount. Though the house needs $1-1.5 in eventual reno, this could be done over time. So then we hear back from the attorney, "Oh, I was busy prepping for a case and hadn't seen that the bank accepted an offer and is under contract. Well, we checked xome and the final bid on the most recent auction that ended over a month ago was $1.5 or about $35k less than our offer. And here we are now 14 days after we were told about this (so what happened to the 3-day close?).
Anyone have experience with Mr. Cooper or Xome in REO? Anyone imagine why the bank would not want to sell to us the long term tenants as opposed to selling a liability of a fully-occupied house with lease to an investor-flipper in NY? Could it be the Mr Cooper Group internal gravy train to their Xome subsidiary so they get the broker fee? I even called Mr Cooper and talked to REO folks who wondered but they had no direct person to contact about this unique situation. Yet when I called Xome, they said that someone at Mr Cooper reviews and accepts/counters/declines offers. Shouldn't the REMIC and bank be seeking best possible offer? The reserve as we learned was $1.8, maybe it dropped into $1.75 right before the auction most recent. So it is possible the bank counter offered on the Xome $1.5 winning bid but, add in broker fee 5% and closing costs and fees and a full house ready to litigate for 1-2 years, plus the house condition/reno costs for a flip........doesn't seem like a wise risk for an investor as opposed to us, long termers who plan to stay for decades. Most buy houses from estates around here but definitely vacant. We are investors but for the long term!! We actually had our own appraisal done for our initial offer and the report noted a $300k encumbrance deduction off the total due to our tenancy/lease so we cannot see what any investor flipper might be thinking.
Advice?
I have a few things to "say" about this.
1. You are trying to rationalize the irrational. I GET IT. It doesnt make sense. Why was this done this way? It is enough to drive a sane person mad.
2. REO's are awful to do bc the "Bank" usually conduct business in a schizso ways and they have such unmitigated power. Decisions are made that do not make business sense and or make things WAY harder than they have to be. Communication is either nill , bad or both. IF, you get a 2nd crack at this, pay and use a good title co. The title co "banks" use are horrible and will add to the stress, the violatility, and most importantly the RISK. They are infamous for doing sloppy title searches and then just telling you thing like "thats what title insurance is for." I too, am/tried to buy a home that would be a win/win but I need the "Bank" to get out of its own way and they just cant or have not been able to do that. It is so FRUSTRATING and I 100% can sympathize with you, especially bc it sounds like you have an emontional attachement to the home. REO transactions are for ppl that do not care much about the property AND who have a lot of patience and tolerance
3. Like you, I have an appreciation for historical homes. In a perfect world ppl would have to sign a doc that reminds them that it only takes one a$$hole to come along and demo out "old things" to lose them forever and rob future generations from seeing and appreciating how things look like back in the day. Things like original hand painted tile, beautiful wood work where they just do not build things like that anymore and it would take a kagillionaire with "crazy" ideals and resources to even restore a home to its former glory and or old light fixtures. It is like they paint over a Rembrant with a paint by #s of a Thomas Kinkade (No offense to ppl out there that appreciate his work but just trying to use a common example) bc it's "old looking" and most ppl like what is in fashion right now. IMO it takes very little expertize to construct or decorate in the "modern-contemporary" aesthetic. Just make round things square, have furniture in bland boring grey, beige or graige, have a white and grey color palette. I call it Swedish Insane Asylum chic.
I considered myself the custodian rather than owner of the historical homes I have had the pleasure and honor to own and maintain. I will hope and pray that a miracle will happen so you get the house and save it from being "raped" by a sh*tty flipper.
4. Keep trying bc you do not really have much more to lose other than your time. You never know. If it could go so quickly and be someone else's good-dumb luck, there might be a chance they screwed up somewhere where you could undermine (legally) and benefit from their dysfunction. Title can be the achilles heel on these transactions, so look into the title history? Maybe there is an issue there that the current buyer is unaware of and so is Mr. Cooper, so if it takes a bit, the buyer could get discouraged. You will have already done your homework and know how to quickly solve the problem.
5. I have dealth with Mr. Cooper and their business dysfunction. The ppl that work for these Asset Management companies DO NOT CARE about doing a good job. They get paid the same amount in their salaried position even if they are inefficent, not pro active, make huge mistakes that cause other ppl $ . The Banks give them work regardless of whether or not they do a good job and or work in an efficent way. The title co are "spoon fed" all these deals, so they have NO reason to be good or competant at their jobs. In my case, Mr.Cooper sold our mortgage to another Asset Mngmt co and that asset co paid off our mortgage in full but Mr. Cooper never filed the proper papwerwork with the county that they were paid. It delayed my getting over 400k until I coud clear it up. It can be so infuriating when ppl that work for these co are flippant about your $. I had a woman tell me I "should get back the $ soon bc it is obvi it was paid but it could take up to a year" if Mr. Cooper doesnt acknowledge their mistake and we have to take them to court to prove to a judge that the Mr. Cooper was made full when the other co took over our mortgage. I thank G*d that we had a good title co and nice ladies that worked for it staying on top of this matter. I would have been screwed If I had one of the many crappy title co Banks use.
6. In the past I have enjoyed success by reading the bad yelp reviews of a "bad player" company and finding the name and number of an employee that was/is incharge of damage control. That or other ppl that this has happened to and how they solved their problem. Maybe if you have time to kill, read reviews and see if you can find someone with a similar experience. Maybe you both can team up? If it was me and even if my case was resolved, I would help you just out of spite bc these companies get away with so much. I could be motivated just with essnetially revenge.
7. Try and reframe in your mind and spirit that cosmos wise, even though you love the house, that it is good karma protecting you from yourself? There is a VERY god chance you prob dodged a bullet. It is becoming more of a buyers market every day. Even though you think this is your dream house and you cant imagine any other house filing your needs as well, there def can be something out there better and with hindsight you will look bak and be glad you dodged the bullet
I hope any part of this helps.