Posted by Ron (MD) on July 30, 2001 at 12:02:20:
Brandon,
I’m a rehabber and most of the houses I buy are REOs that have been cleaned out. I have to admit, I don’t like to look at houses with a lot of stuff in them…although it should be irrelevant, since I have a pretty good idea what it costs to clean a place out.
When I do buy a house with stuff in it, the last thing I want to do is try to salvage some of it for myself or anyone else. A few times I’ve told a worker that a particular house is going to be cleaned out tomorrow, if you want to look it over for anything you might want, you better get over there today.
So, I think it probably is a good idea to pull out trash…especially if there’s a lot of it. You might spend a few hundred dollars to do this, and it might help sell the place faster. I don’t think you’re going to raise the price by thousands by pulling out trash, but you might avoid turning off a delicate buyer (like me).
I would advise against doing any other repairs, etc. in preparation for a rehabber. I know what repairs cost and I can get them done myself. You’d be wasting money to do something like slap on a coat of paint to brighten up the place…I’m going to paint it anyway (over your paint).
Ron Guy