FREE—Some houses aren't even worth it, FREE

FOR SALE—$15,000 duplex, 2br down, 1 br up. Rented!! $125 each side per week, $13,000 per year!

Vinyl siding, decent roof, decent area.

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These numbers, even the picture all look great. What you don't know is that someone has been making meth in this house and that 6 active one-pot labs were removed from the property.

I had a little bit of a scare this week when I found out a property I was scheduled to see was raided by the police, HOURS before I was going to be there and condemned. I thank God that I was too busy earlier in the week to go see the property.

Lessons Learned:

1. Make a list of important sites to check before purchasing or even seeing a property. On my list so far include: Health Department (they list meth lab houses), Assessor's Records, Tax Records and MLS record sheet.
2. When you see a yellow sign on a door of a property, always walk up and look at it! After the showing was canceled I still had no idea why. I drove by on Saturday to take a picture of the exterior and saw this pretty orange sign on the door. I ALMOST let my sense of privacy rule out walking up to these peoples doors and reading the sign...but curiosity won out. Signs on doors are notices to the public, who knows...it could have said "free puppies".
3. Meth is COSTLY. And I don't mean to purchase. If you accidentally buy a meth house, or have tenants who are cooking meth in your property the process of cleaning it from your property is tedious and expensive and there is a good chance that insurance wont cover it.
4. Tenant screening matters! Preventing meth production (or other drug productions) comes down to tenant screening. Be leery of the potential tenant who is waving cash in your face and telling you how they have to move fast because their last landlord just didn't take care of the place and they have to get out of there. It's scary but tenants really do make or break our business. Screen, screen, screen.

Maybe you don't even have meth labs in your area...but we get bored in Indiana and really like how thin is makes us. The rotting teeth and prison time are just bad side affects. On a side note, the house above is still for sale. Buyer beware.

What are some sites/checks you perform before you purchase or look at a property? Were any of these sites found because you learned the lesson the hard way?