The second phase of the Wayne County tax auction concluded yesterday. I wasn’t aware the auction was taking place until a friend mentioned it to me at a meetup early this month.
Registration opened on the 10th and the list of homes up for auction was available slightly before. It was a grueling process as there were some ~1,500 homes to sift through. I went through every single one and came up with a short list of 50 houses I was interested in.
I managed to narrow that list down to 35 homes, mostly based on second looks and weighing them all against different areas I know and like. I then used my weekends to drive every single one of those 35 homes, walking the outside of them, videotaping my thoughts and findings, and even getting into several of them either through an open door or broken window.
Here’s a shortened clip of me walking a property I bid on but ultimately didn’t end up getting.
No, most of the properties I was going for did NOT look like this. But this was a special circumstance, and I really wanted to tackle this project. Unfortunately, it went for more than I was willing to pay ($30,000).
Also note: I do not recommend entering abandoned/vacant properties alone like this. This was my first (I ended up getting in about 10 of them) and I was pretty nervous about the whole thing.
After walking the list of 35 I narrowed it to just 10 homes I wanted to bid on. Of those 10 I ranked them from “must buy”, “really want”, “would like”, and “OK losing”.
Ultimately I purchased one of my “must buys” and one of the “really wants”. I purchased one other house for a guy that grew up in it. His family lost it to taxes and he agreed to buy it from me on a land contract if I was able to win it in the auction. It’s a bit of a story, but I’ll write about that later.
Overall, this was a positive experience. I learned a lot about the tax auction process, found some new areas in Detroit that I like, and became increasingly familiar with the ones I already knew. It was fun, and I’m hoping the homes we purchased appraise high enough where we can pull all of our cash out. That’s the ultimate goal.