thinking of starting

[Vanilla]

From what I've seen in my area, the listing agent/broker of the bank-owned property pays for the electric, gas & water bills. Need those services on for showing & for inspections purposes. For lawn, pool, misc. maintainence fees, & if there were any break-ins or vandalism, agent pays for some minor repairs (need to get bids & authorization first) too, all bills send to escrow, agent get paid back for those expenses when escrow closes. If property doesn't sell & goes to auction, all bills send to bank for payment. That is for residential properties.
For commercial properties, banks would hire a property management company (licensed real estate agent/broker) to maintain, collect rents, etc. The property manager hires contractors or handyman for maintainence & repairs (bids & authorizations too).

I'm assuming that you would like to start a business on cleaning & hauling away junk from foreclosure properties. Your clients would be the real estate brokers who handle/specialize bank-owned properties, they can hire your company to do the work. Your competitions are those who are already in this business & contracted w/ the brokers.

I don't seem to recall bank has those properties cleaned before closing, that's usually the new owners' expenses. That goes for million dollars properties also. Maybe you can advertise to new owners also.

Banks are holding on to a lot of foreclosed properties, they sell off a small % of their holdings at a time. If the banks dump all the foreclosed properties any more rapidly, the housing market would be even worse, I guess that is damage control. There will NOT be a shortage of foreclosed properties in the near future.

[lisaflex]

thanks vanilla. yes, i just want to get out and haul away what is there. as i stated before, no contracting work involved at al - i want no part of that! i am working w/ some friends currently in the real estate biz on my idea ...wanting to know how many foreclosure cleanup biz's are in the area, what is needed, etc...

and, russ, i will certainly keep you posted on the progress as i am just in the beginning phases of this. fingers crossed...dh and i had taked about this biz about 2 yrs ago and should have just done it then! but, who knows, ...one never knows unless they try (with a lot of research involved)

[baltimoresewerservic]

I have been in the mortgage industry for 20 years, but I do not personally have any direct experience with these types of dealings and I don't think the mortgage side is where you want to be looking either. I think you would want to be in contact with local real estate brokers if you want to get this type of business. My mother worked as a real estate agent and the broker she worked for handled a lot of bank reo propertys. The real estate brokers provide the banks/lenders with a BPO (broker price opinion) that is the brokers opinion of the list price, property condition, cleanup & repairs to get the property to a showing condition and also helps the bank determine what real estate broker they want to use to list their property. Once they select the broker to list their property the clean up and repairs needed are usually handled by the real estate broker as well. The real estate broker will accept bids and fwd to the bank/lender to make their determination on what contractor to use for clean up and repairs. So the real estate broker is kind of the middle man for the contractors and the bank. I think contacting and building relationships with local real estate brokers will be the best route for you to get your foot in the door on this kind of business.

[Judi Dial]

I think you'd also be competing with the people who work with auction houses, antique dealers, etc. and "empty houses." There are auction houses here that will "clean up" your space(s) for a fee. I'm sure that whatever they make from your stuff is their profit.

See here:
Palmer Cleanouts & Disposal LLC in Fremont, NH | 706 Main St, Fremont, NH

I don't know these folks, it's what came up in a google search!

Judi