Banks are starting foreclosures and then walking away. It may sound like a gift, but you've got to know how to protect yourself from the legal fallout.
Across the country, banks are starting to foreclose on homeowners and then, often with no word or explanation, failing to take possession of the home. From Ohio to Indiana, from New York to Florida and Missouri, these abandoned foreclosures have become common enough that real-estate professionals have coined a name: "bank walkaways."
For homeowners, this can sound like great news: The bank goes away, you get your house back without a mortgage and life goes happily on, you might think. But of course nothing is that simple.
"I know several people who are thrilled by their situation," says Judith Fox, a consumer law expert at the Notre Dame Law School. "But I don't think they should be that thrilled. I think they have inherited a legal nightmare."
But Fox says her advice on when to move out has changed in recent years: "I used to tell people when they got the notice for the sheriff's sale, 'Move!' But I am not telling people to do this now."
She has several clients who moved out after getting foreclosure notices. Their banks, however, failed to finish the foreclosures. The homeowners, who thought they'd lost their homes, were sued by their cities for failing to maintain the abandoned properties, which were still in their names.
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http://realestate.msn.com/article.aspx?cp-documentid=21782888&page=2
