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You Can Buy A House For One Dollar Or Less In Economically Depressed Cities All Over America
Submitted by Michael Snyder of The Economic Collapse blog,
Would you like to buy a house for one dollar? If someone came up to you on the street and asked you that question, you would probably respond by saying that it sounds too good to be true. But this is actually happening in economically-depressed cities all over America. Of course there are a number of reasons why you might want to think twice before buying any of these homes, and I will get into those reasons in just a little bit. First, however, it is worth noting that many of the cities where these "free houses" are available were once some of the most prosperous cities in the entire country. In fact, the city of Detroit once had the highest per capita income in the entire nation. But as millions of good jobs have been shipped overseas, these once prosperous communities have degenerated into rotting, decaying hellholes. Now homes that once housed thriving middle class families cannot even be given away. This is happening all over America, and what we are witnessing right now is only just the beginning.
The photo that I have posted below was sent to me by a reader just the other day. It is a photo of a house in Yakima, Washington that is apparently being given away for free. At one time it was probably quite a lovely home, but now nobody seems to want it...
This piqued my curiosity, so I started doing some research and I discovered that homes all over the nation are being sold off for a dollar or less. The following are just a few examples...
-Buffalo, New York: "The Urban Homestead Program that is offered by the City of Buffalo enables qualified buyers to purchase a home that has been deemed 'homestead eligible' for $1.00 and there are plenty of properties left. There are three main requirements when purchasing a homestead property; the owner must fix all code violations within 18 months, have immediate access to at least $5000, and live there for at least three years. You also have to cover the closing costs of the purchase."
-Gary, Indiana: "Officials say that a third of the houses in Gary are unoccupied, hollowed dwellings spread across a city that, like other former industrial powerhouses, has lost more than half its population in the last half-century.
While some of those homes will be demolished, Gary is exploring a more affordable way to lift its haggard tax base and reduce the excess of empty structures: sell them for $1."
-South Bend, Indiana: "How could you refuse this offer? The city of South Bend, Indiana wants to give this handsome circa-1851 Italianate farmhouse away to anyone willing to properly restore it. Aside from the boarded up windows (the boards are painted to look like real windows), the place is in pretty good shape, with a completely restored exterior, new roof, and all new HVAC, plumbing and electrical systems. All you'll need to do is restore the gutted (but clean as can be) interior."
-Detroit, Michigan: "Now that the motor city has effectively run out of gas and declared bankruptcy, some rather eye-popping deals are presenting themselves to first time home buyers who appreciate the challenge of a fixer-upper.
Hundreds of Detroit homes currently listed on Zillow have asking prices below $5,000, with at least one seller so desperate as to offer his house for just $1, ABC News reported."
-----
And guess who is selling more "one dollar homes" than anyone else?
If you guessed "the federal government" you would be correct.
Right now, the federal government is selling foreclosed homes to low income families all over the country for just one dollar...
HUD's Dollar Homes initiative helps local governments to foster housing opportunities for low to moderate income families and address specific community needs by offering them the opportunity to purchase qualified HUD-owned homes for $1 each.
Dollar Homes are single-family homes that are acquired by the Federal Housing Administration (which is part of HUD) as a result of foreclosure actions. Single-family properties are made available through the program whenever FHA is unable to sell the homes for six months.
By selling vacant homes for $1 after six months on the market, HUD makes it possible for communities to fix up the homes and put them to good use at a considerable savings.
Before you get too excited, there are a whole bunch of reasons why you wouldn't want to actually buy any of these one dollar homes.
First of all, most of them have been totally trashed. Just to get them up to livable condition would take thousands of dollars in most cases. Many of them are full of asbestos, and severe wiring and plumbing issues are quite common.
Secondly, you assume all of the liability for a home when you buy it. So if a homeless person stumbles in and injures himself, you could be liable for his injuries.
Thirdly, many of these homes are in very high crime neighborhoods. In some of these areas, people will literally rip up and carry away anything that is not bolted down.
Fourthly, property taxes are very high in many of these cities. Local governments are desperate to get people into these homes so that they can get the taxes flowing again. In many cases, what you would pay in taxes for a year is more than the true value of the home itself.
So, like I said, these homes are not the "great deal" that they may appear to be at first glance.
But that is not really the issue.
The real question is this: What is causing our communities to decay so dramatically?
And of course a big part of the answer is that the middle class in America is dying.
According to Time Magazine, one new report has discovered that nearly half the country is constantly living in a state of "persistent economic insecurity"...
But as evidenced by a report out Thursday from the Corporation for Enterprise Development, nearly half of Americans are living in a state of “persistent economic insecurity,” that makes it “difficult to look beyond immediate needs and plan for a more secure future.”
That same report also found that 56 percent of all Americans now have "subprime credit".
We are a nation that is losing our independence and sinking into poverty.
Right now, 49.2 percent of all Americans are receiving benefits from at least one government program, and the U.S. government has spent an astounding 3.7 trillion dollars on welfare programs over the past five years.
Millions of our jobs have been shipped overseas, the control freak bureaucrats that are running things are absolutely killing "the little guy", and poverty in the United States is exploding at a frightening pace.
Things are "changing" in this country, and not for the better.
One way that the death of the middle class is manifesting itself is in the death of shopping malls all over America. The following is an excerpt from a recent Business Insider article...
All across America, once-vibrant shopping malls are boarded up and decaying.
Traffic-driving anchors like Sears and JCPenney are shutting down stores, and mall owners are having a hard time finding retailers large enough to replace them. With a fresh wave of closures on the horizon, the problem is set to accelerate, according to retail and real estate analysts.
According to that same article, one prominent retail analyst believes that we could see up to 50 percent of the shopping malls in America close within 20 years...
Within 15 to 20 years, retail consultant Howard Davidowitz expects as many as half of America's shopping malls to fail. He predicts that only upscale shopping centers with anchors like Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus will survive.
And did you catch that last part? Only the shopping malls in wealthy areas will survive because the wealthy will be the only ones with enough money to support them.
For much more on this phenomenon, please see my previous article entitled "What Recovery? Sears And J.C. Penney Are DYING".
At this point, things have already gotten so bad that now even Wal-Mart is having trouble. In fact, Wal-Mart is blaming the recent slowdown in sales on cuts to the federal food stamp program...
Wal-Mart announced today that cuts in a federal food stamp program as well as record cold temperatures hurt its fourth quarter profits.
After previously reporting “relatively flat” sales for the quarter, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. now says that sales for its namesake store and its Sam’s Club locations would be “slightly negative” for the November-January quarter, according to Agence France-Presse.
Wal-Mart’s Chief Financial Officer, Charles Holley, blamed the revised forecast on deeper-than-expected cuts to the U.S. Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and the extreme cold weather occurring in the past month.
This is how far the middle class in America has fallen. So many people are now on food stamps that even a slight reduction in benefits has a huge impact on the largest retailer in the entire country.
And actually, many rural communities could end up losing their Wal-Mart stores in the years ahead as the economy continues to deteriorate. In a recent CNBC article entitled "Time to close Wal-Mart stores? Analysts think so", it was suggested that Wal-Mart should close about 100 "underperforming" supercenters in rural locations around the nation.
We are rapidly becoming "two Americas". In the "good America", the wealthy will still have plenty of retail stores to choose from within easy driving distance from their million dollar homes.
In the "bad America", which will include most of us, our shopping malls will be closing down and the rotting, decaying homes of our neighbors will be sold off for next to nothing.
So which America do you live in?
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Defending it is the kicker.
Righteous and well armed preppers, come together and BTFD!
(Buy The Fucking Detroit!)
I've been tryin' to convince the wife that carpetbagging is gonna be the way to go!
I just bought a house. Nice old house. Two story, two bedroom, one bath. A tenth of an acre backed up to mountains, forest, etc. for a hundred miles.
City utilities: Natural gas, electricity, DSL (or 4g, if that's your thing), water, and sewer.
To be sure, it is pretty remote; I mean, there are only two different Federal District Courts located less than an hour away in opposite directions. Six miles to the grocery store (on major interstate highway). A Wal-Mart about 20 minutes away, if that's your thing.
Nice river a tenth of a mile away. Ski area six miles away; another about 20 minutes in the opposite direction. Both dry powder. Free shuttle bus runs right past the house.
Not too many people there. In my daughter's class, there are two boys and two girls. The local mining companies give very generous scholarships to graduates (with five kids in a graduating class, why not?)
House does need a little work. Nothing I haven't done before. Learned from my mistakes, so this time, I'll do it right.
Was $13,900. Owner even offered to finance with $3,500 down. (LOL) Will be nice not to have a mortgage.
I saw an even nicer house for $13,000 in Rumford, Maine. In fact, it was a really, really, cool big ol' house. You don't have to end up in a Detroit-like sewer, you know, just 'cause you don't want to spend a lot on housing.
Property taxes about $186 a year. For the first time in a while, I won't have to worry about ending up on the front page of the Drudge Report twice a year.
long plywood and drywall screws.
southern adirondacks
quarter acre
backs up to state forever wild parkland with great hunting
combined school and property taxes of 361 a year
needs a bit of work...but not unlivable
well, septic, electric of under 20 a month
for sale 27,000
Always liked Maine, but how's the weather right now?
It's cold as fuck here and I'm in southern Maine. The poster below is right, the state is full of retards. There is a lot of cheap, good land to be had upstate however. With the cold weather I feel pretty sure the starving hordes would die off before finding you, if it comes to that.
Maine is tough. Not a lot if smart people there either. Great place to summer though.
Sounds great! What kind of internet connection do you have?
3 mb dsl.
Detroit is beautiful. Especially in January. Don't let murderous street gangs keep you away from a bargain. Word.
I grew up in Jersey City, NJ and witnessed the Riots in 1967. After that these Unfashionable buildings called BrownStones were on
sale for $ 1.00 . Those same Brownstones now sell for $3-4 million. So do some homework, buy 50 of those houses and will
them to your GrandKids.
hard to live in fifty houses at the same time, but certainly buying when things are cheap is right. might they get cheaper?
Good luck with that idea fool. The property taxes in Detroit on that $1 house are $300+ a month. Then add the cost of remodel which is another 20k plus. Oh what is that you never thought about these MINOR details. There is a reason these shit holes are $1. BTW what are the property taxes on those 3 mil brownstones now? Over $30,000 a year I am sure.
My Bad. I automatically thought that if you could only afford 1 of those houses because of the Minor Details and Elbow grease involved, that you would know to only buy 1.
impotantly, too, purchasing a house in many jurisdiction encumbers you with any unpaid back property taxes - you could be up for 20 grand if the previous owner/s havent been paying since the 2008 crash. This is an old story - i saw $1 houses in detroits online real estate pages back in 2007
Check the property taxes before you do that. My guess is the assessment will not come in at $1.00.
Damn you FreedomGuy. That was fast.;-)
the property tax is based on how much a property's worth, right? so if it's worthless to an extend that it's being flung around at $1, wouldn't it make sense that there's no property tax associated with it? at these dismal states, the purchaser of these houses should be given tax-return!
What you say would make sense in a fair and rational world, but that is not the world in which we live.
There is, or at least can be, a HUGE difference between "market value" and "assessed value". I guarantee you that no city is EVER going to take into consideration the real market value of highly distressed homes such as these when determining their official assessed value for taxation purposes.
And if no one pays?
"Tax Revolt" causes statists to have convulsions.
Hey, are you any kin to the Clinch Mountain Gooches?
I dunno.
It was never easy for me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfAvQp-Uk5I
When the price drops they just raise the mill rate.
It was over taxation that caused the people to move away in the first place.
that and no jobs.
Wake me up when politicians start learning from their mistakes.
"Wake me up when politicians start learning from their mistakes."
First off, pols do not make mistakes. They make money and then leave. Leaving the destruction that they have wrought behind for the people to deal with.
Second, no pol in the history of the world has ever learned anything from their malfeasance. They may question how they got caught while waiting for their turn at the gallows, but they never, ever learn anything. Shit, even Hitler was blaming the German people up to the time he killed himself.
"The guillotine may not teach, but it sure eliminates."
Could it be that this is also a question of biology?
I mean you can pump millions into new homes in Africa and a few years later everything is rotten. And on the other hand nowhere in the world do exist slums of White people.
If a country receives a third world population, one should not be surprised to see it become a third world country.
Politics follows biology.
Um, Apalachia == slums of white people. Please, do some homework.
east germany gets a touch slummy from place to place. there are other parts moving east for the next two thousand miles or so as well.
So what is the murder rate and gang activity like in Appalachia?
I didn't look up the answer to this but I'm pretty confident that it's Apples to Oranges.
Um, Apalachia is spelled Appalachia and it is not a slum of white people. The Appalachian Region is a 205,000-square-mile region that follows the spine of the Appalachian Mountains from southern New York to northern Mississippi. The Region's economy was once highly dependent on mining, forestry, agriculture, chemical industries, and heavy industry. The loss of jobs to mechanization and the closing of coal mines has left much of central and southern Appalachia poverty-stricken.
congratulations on making the most racist comment ive read on ZH this year
"No where in the world do exist slums of white people"--ha ha ha ha Whaaaaa ha ha. You haven't been around. There is no trash worse than white trash--my mother used to tell me (she was Dutch-German).
Check property taxes ... and home owners insurance. One druggie or homeless gets hurt in yoru $1.00 abode..or a homelss starts a fire that destroys the house, kills a few other homeless in it and burns down a few houses next door...and so on...you get the idea.
A $1.00 house may be short path the court room.
I smell a conspiracy brewing. Profit sharing anyone?
Property taxes?
I just can't see any reason to worry. Things are improving so far as I can tell. At least in my area. I was able to get three prostitutes on the super bowl for less than half what one cost just last year. They'll take EBT too and they didn't use to do that. Personally, imho, there's enough feral cats around here that we could prolly get rid of EBT but that's just me. Naw,I ain't seeing the prob that ZH'ers are always crying like little bitches about. what ?
Get your Obamacare up to date.
In our town, there is a whole industrial building in fairly good shape that they will give you ( the town ) if you will just pay.. Part of the Back Taxes
Then some douchebag Code Enforcement Officer will come out and fine you for all the violations you purchased.
Plus state EPA, federal EPA, OSHA, NIMBYs.
Waste of a dollar.
Especially considering that just about every peice of real property the Feds touch, eventually turns into a superfund site.
Don't worry, be happy!
Free house ! FREEDOM! Not! Taxssss!
I wonder if that house comes w/mining rights.
Yakima, Wa. is situated in a valley below a dormant volcano. Last time the volcano blew it took down every old-growth tree in sight and buried those trees under 20' of mud.
Since that time periodically people have gone in and mined out those trees-Big money.
Same thing happened in Lake Superior where logs chained together to take to the mill from Minn. to Mich. fell apart and then sank. Surface temp is 47 degrees year round so on the bottom it's cold. This cold preserves the trees and it too is old-growth.
good luck on that mining claim in Yakima,WA. The water table where that house is is about 15 - 20' at best.
Bailed on Orange County 26 years ago for the Yakima Valley. Bailing out of it shortly for my own private Idawho.
Is the place a little too "native" for you?
Buy house for a dollar, take risk on municipality bond revenue for govenment ubran home rehabilitation programs.
Another prophetic scenario for Detroit from Robocop "I'D BUY THAT FOR A DOLLAR! ...."
That movie was ahead of its time
The closing costs are $2000.
It is a high crime area.
There is possible asbestos clean up problem..
There is likely lead paint problem.
Likely your kids will be beaten up on a regular basis.
Excessive taxation.
At least if the loans default the numbers will look better.
The aggregates. Do it for their sake.
Privatization, deregulation, NAFTA
NOW THEY WANT TO FINISH WITH TPP (Trans Pacific Partnership)
BEWARE
"Stop complainin! Eat your peas!"
The Central Banker's minions have run a couple of Chinese terrorists fire drills without positive results. Sitback and watch more comedy ensuse.
They should start an anonymous online exchange where people can trade these units of homes. Homecoin?
i like how you dedicate 33% of your website width to your article and the rest to ads.
As long as the site doesn't start eating up system resources like Business Insider (and recently seems like Bloomberg gets super laggy).
"As long as the site doesn't start eating up system resources"
While I don't have a racehorse of a machine, it is up to the task of websurfing - yet I have to disable my Flash Player plug-in when I hit these pages. 90% CPU usage (both cores) and all 6 GB RAM in use. Nothing loads and it is la aa gg gg gg yyyyyyy.
But, after disabling flash - flies through the pages.....
<-----Moar flash dudes = greater retail. (record stores and skinny pants)
<-----Moar flash dudes = greater GDP (student loans) and notional scurrity.
What- did you pay too much for your membership, Theos?
Wait... Theos.... That's Greek....
Got it- for a minute there, I didn't recognize the Greek mentality.....
Ironically he'd get more revenue if he designed a site that didnt look like ad spam.
But since ZH has turned into doom porn, w/e.
said the dude with an avatar of a nuclear explosion
Adblock Plus - free, no re-boot, don't even have to close your browser; makes ZH load in a jiffy.
https://adblockplus.org/
But how else would I know how cool ipads are?
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/macbooks
I hope I can get one on ebay below full price when the the fucking dollar collapses and we start smashing each others heads in for the goo inside.
Thanks for the link. Cool.
Five Dollar Foot long or a rat infested crap trap? Hmmm...oh what the hell - here's ten bucks - keep the change 'Murcia!
What is a Jersey Mike's "Sandy Christie" for 1000, Alex.
Let's talk about what really happened to the middle class in America..
I see Agenda 21 is strong & alive. Bondage & Enslavement is the end game with Local Council Criminals moving the Agenda FORWARD!
BTFD, FFS!
Hm. Wonder why the muddle class is dying and the ultra wealthy are prosperinf. It jus possibly couldnt do anything with gummunt could it. Puzzling
Before buying, see a few episodes of "Holmes On Homes." If you have the money to pay a contractor to rehab an abandoned house, you have no guarantee the contractor will not do a crummy job and leave you waiting for a Mike Holmes to fix up the bad work. A Mike Holmes who will never show up, Holmes does most of his projects in the greater Toronto area.
Fuck those asshole contractors. I ain't paying one of them fucks $75/hr for shit work that likes like it was done by a 10 year old kid.
Which America will you live in?
Eh...South America anyone?
"Which America will you live in?
Eh...South America anyone?"
... nothin' wrong with Miami, Cacete! ;-o
"At one time it was probably quite a lovely home"
come on.
Nope, it was a shithole, built in a shithole. Still better than sleepin' under a bridge. If nobody wants this shit, why are we so anal about homesteaders? Wait, I know, banksters.
sure you can....but would you want to live there?
oh there's two America's all right. the "State sponsored America" and then this part:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVay-RfNGv8
what am i collecting taxes on again?
Any ocean front listings?
How about Lake Erie? The water is just as wet.
If the stock market truly crashes along with the real estate market and maybe another Bernie Madoff crawls out of the woodwork, waterfront listings will become abundant again at reasonable prices from Boca through Palm Beach just like what happened in 2008/09.
So will these houses be attached to the new MyRA accounts with thier $15k lifetime limits? Looking forward to my Detroit front property in the sky after retirement. I could eat McCrappers everyday for a year with that $15k. /sarc
I know for a fact that you can scratch out a living as a slumlord in a small midwestern community - I know two people who do it! They pick up these old homes on the cheap, maybe $10k per, do what is needed to get them up to section 8 standard, and rent 'em out to down-and-outers attracted to dinky little towns to live out their lives in a low-cost, low-crime (except petty theft and meth trade) environment. Food, shelter, a cable-package, and a gubmint check, baby! The only way they're leaving is in a squad car, an ambulance, or a hearse.
If you manage right, you can get your money back out in short order. Most everyone in these backwaters is too stupid, lazy, and or broke to offer any competition. Downside is that you spend your days dealing with riff-raff in a management-intensive, depressing environment.
I know a couple guys doing that... buying homes for $10-15k, putting in maybe $1-2k to fix it up... section 8 supported rents, and money back in 2-3 years. Turnover rates are almost nil, they never leave. They're gimmick is 'section 8 to own'. You stay in that house for 15 years on section 8 and it is yours. No shortage of 'high quality' tennants and pretty good roi... lots of diy work though.
You never own it. You just lease it from the municipality.
They should change the name from property taxes to lease fees. Some people pay outrageous taxes. For a $300,000, 2,000 sq ft house well over $9,000/year.
NJ and IL are the states with property taxes.
"Some people pay outrageous taxes."
Tell me about it! Here in Central Texas I have to pay almost $900 a year for 45 acres, a 1,345 S.F. house (built 1999), 3 car, 2 story garage, 2 barns and a 12'X24' shed. That's a ripoff. Oh, and they have the nerve to forgo an income tax here. When will it end? Oh, the horror.
The Texans always chime in touting their low taxes, then I point out their COP bonds exceed CA's, and demographically they're more screwed than CA (in CA we can price them out) with Mexican invasion, and carbon taxes for Texans are coming too.
HAHAHA.
Come to Connecticut my friend. Paying 9 grand on a 2,000 sqft house would be cheap!! And we live over the border from Westchester NY so we don't have to pay their taxes which are double ours. For a 2500 sqft house I pay 15K in property taxes, in additon to 6.5% sales tax, 5% income tax, car tax, highest gas tax in the country.
Why?? Because for a decent commute, I'd have to live in Nj or NY, which are worse.
They suck. I'm an idiot but I'm saving every day so I can someday leave this northeast shithole....
Um, did you really need a 2,500 sf house? Does the whole extended family live with you? I grew up in eastern CT in a 1200 sf house with my parents and brother, and it was plenty big.
That said, I agree that CT is headed for the toilet due to the insane taxes.
"Um, did you really need a 2,500 sf house"
Um, try to find a decent house in lower FF county SMALLER than 2500 sq ft, assuming you don't want a fixer-upper. You can find them, but usually even if you can they need lots of work. In any case, did you really need a 1200 sqft house for 4 people? Of course not, you could have 10 people in that size house. So of course I don't NEED a 2500 sqft house, but it's comfortable for two parents and three kids and a cat, dog, and two bunnies.We have two big fireplaces and heat with a lot of wood. I grew up in central connecticut and have lots of relatives in eastern conn. Lower FF county is much more like NY than the rest of conn, it should be annexed into Wetchester county.
Me, too. Central CT. Agreed about Fairfield county...it's what really drags the rest of the state down politically.
I moved to VT. Same shit happens there. It's nice, serene, quiet. With the advent of 'telecommuting' all these fucks from NYC, NJ, PA, CT - move up there into the small towns. Say they love the quiet, different way of life. Then a multitude of fucks like Howard Dean, carpetbagging fuck, move into the small towns, get into the government then do things like ban walking dogs without a leash, heavy taxes - just check out the gold town tax that forced many long time family farms and properties to have to sell to rich NY fucks because the older families could no longer afford the severely increased taxes.
Savage is right, liberalism is a mental disorder.
Sorry for the rant.
You listen to Michael "Savage" Weiner and complain about others with a mental disorder?
So long as you blame the 'liberals', you've fallen for their divide and conquer BS. End the false division and realize that it's all of us- 99.9% of Americans vs. Wall St. and their policitian puppets. Pelosi, Feinstein, Obama, Boehner, McConnell, Bush ... they all failed to uphold their oath of office- they are all traitors.
Have a beautiful day. :-)
You judge someone by who they quote? I don't know much about Savage, but there is a real trend towards assholes (mostly of the ilk one would call "liberal") moving from the big cities to escape high taxes, high crime, high stress, etc, only to ruin the small towns by doing exact same stupid shit they did to ruin the big cities.
Yes, our politicians are traitors. But we had the chance to keep our state's rights and we let asshole Bush and asshole^2 Obama shove .gov thuggery down our sheeple throats.
Call them liberals, statists, progressives, right-wingers, whatever: anyone who is not for liberty and who is FOR nanny, big government control is to blame. And if you voted for Obama you are a traitor in my book.
"headed"?
Wiecker put the dagger in over 20 years ago.
I worked at travelers the time he was running for gov.
He was speaking at our company for some reason and we ran into him. My friend who was much more political than I at that time in my life, asked him some questions, one of which was about instituting a state income tax. Fucker, bald faced, right to our faces, said he would 'never' allow that to happen. 6 months later we had an income tax.
The sad thing...was seeing all the diners, and small stores that shuttered within the year because that 5% that they took, that was the money people spent at the diners, etc. I watched it happen.
Fuck CT, I got out about 9 years ago, best move I ever made.
Now I feel ripped off. My asbestos-filled house with fire hazard wiring set me back $2.
While taking care of my ill mother in rural N.C. recently, I took a job at a local Walmart for three months. I worked in hardware and stationery. Our side of the store, away from the grocery sections, were relatively dead, excepting Black Friday, of course. As I began to notice where the traffic was really going in the store I noticed that it was the grocery section that was constantly busy. Everything else, electronics, apparel, toys, etc. were dead as doornails, even on the real Black Friday, since Black Friday was actually on Thanksgiving Day. I can see better than most why Walmart would really get hit in an EBT cut. Guess the Walmart business model is on its way out. From my perspective, it's been on its way out for quite a while.
I'd buy this house if I lived nearby and had a wood stove. Free firewood!
Exactly. There's probably some copper and other recyclable materials that are worth more than a dollar. Never give the gov mafia thugs what they assert is their share.
I agree, but I doubt these $1 houses have any copper or anything of worth actually left in them at this point
Perhaps, but as Dave said, the firewood would be worth more than a dollar. Get the lot re-appraised without any structures--or would that actually raise its assessment? Regardless, long middle finger to the would-be property tax collectors. Don't pay, unless the appraised value is the same as the sale price, in which case it'd be pennies. I usually throw those fucking things in the street anyway.
Remember the secret to successful home buying is location, location, location. So $1 for a Detroit home and the chance to bail in one of our failed socialist utopias - too expensive.
Are these $1.00 houses zero down?
Owner financing, too.
Get a 30 year on it.
Commodities for FREE. Copper,brass,lead,aluminum etc. And walk away. If it has a fieplace you could stay overnight. I'm on my way
Illinois home here due to job transfer with a company that is now BK. 5800 a year property tax. 5% state income tax. Toll ways. 9 grand a year in interest on the mortgage on a home that is now worth what I paid for it in 1998. Everything else, priceless. The federal, state and local taxes plus the Board of Education via property taxes are eating the middle class alive. Read your property tax bill. I pay for retirement pension plans for the Librarian, Forest Preserve Police, County Sheriff, Park District, City Employees and God only knows who else. I cannot sell my home as no one has the money. I am looking at getting back in the food service business as the sales field I am in isn't hiring many right now. I was just offered a general manger job in a restaurant at the exact same salary of a restaurant I managed in 1983. 30 plus years ago. We need a return to sanity. We need a return of sound money policies. No inflation? My ass. Wage inflation not so much.
... and yet apartments in the City (downtown/streeterville/Near North side, the whole revamped NW side, and even as far north as Rogers Park) have skyrocketed in the last year to double in most cases to what they were at the height of the boom. I don't get it - property taxes are ridiculous, condo fees are off the charts, there's state income, Chicago sales tax rate is 9.25%, owning a car in Chicago isn't as pricey as owning in Manhattan- yet, grocery stores are few and far between, energy bills are skyrocketing, etc. etc. etc. There is a huge rift between the City and the suburbs these days in Illinois. Further away from Chicago and the communites are dead.
Very funny story!
And actually, many rural communities could end up losing their Wal-Mart stores in the years ahead as the economy continues to deteriorate. In a recent CNBC article entitled "Time to close Wal-Mart stores? Analysts think so", it was suggested that Wal-Mart should close about 100 "underperforming" supercenters in rural locations around the nation.
Sounds like there's a silver lining in there.
Ha! I thought so, too. Then I thought, 'but then all those moms & pops who were put out of business by Walmart, then employed by it, will be out of jobs.. perhaps by now many are too old or worn down to go back into business for themselves.. That's it!--Euthanasia clinics! Convert the closed down supercenters and some of these dollar homes into businesses that benefit the community.
I think I'd hold out for 50 cent houses.
A dollar seems a bit high.
"It is a photo of a house in Yakima, Washington that is apparently being given away for free. At one time it was probably quite a lovely home, but now nobody seems to want it..."
That's not a house, it's a shack. And it looks like it's falling apart.
And the house is a microcosm of Yakima in general, a shithole to be seen to be believed.
Nothing is free. The municipality wants your taxes. Here, the house is free, but your taxes are 10k. Screw. I wouldn't buy in any of these shit holes until they file for bankruptcy and the FSA moves to Mexico.
" So which America do you live in? "
In the Indian reservations one ...
Why, middle class man ?
NOTHING IS FREE MOTHERFUCKERS . TAXES & FEES AND THE COST OF OWNERSHIP.
PRINTING MONEY HAS ALMOST NO COAST. OWNING THINGS SHOULD HAVE A COST. NOTHING IS FREE.