Why are we paying for this site?

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Permalink Reply by HUD Foreclosed on September 9, 2008 at 12:26pm

Hi Tracey,

The HUDforeclosed social network is 100% free. You are referring to the PREMIUM membership, which is not required for you to reap the benefits of being a part of the social network; you may cancel Premium at any time at http://www.hudforeclosed.com. You are also on the 7-day trial, so you haven't paid for anything beyond a $1 processing fee.

On the monthly, $39.80 fee: Given how fast real estate sells and our initiatives to provide the best listings database on the web, we have to pay large sums of money to frequently keep the database updated. Most sites like our own don't really care about the quality of their listings, so long as you pay them. That's where HUDforeclosed is very different; we do care. We want the best service we can possibly provide our members with, which is why we offer free features like this social network. Thus, part of your fee goes towards ensuring site quality and the rest of the fee goes towards paying the people behind the scenes who: design the website, maintain the network, provide telephone customer service, direct employees, work on developing new features and products to make your real estate search easier, and towards the electric bill, office space, and web space. The fee also helps keep you ad-free, so there are no annoying flashing and talking banners on our website while browsing for real estate.

On photos: HUDForeclosed.com has many photos. There are two ways you can ID photo foreclosures. Look for the pink "See Photos" thumbnails. Now that you know how to spot photos, you can use the "Sort By" feature, at the bottom of the search results, to sort the results by "Photos." This will put all properties containing images at the top of the search results and all properties without images towards the end of the total results. The availability of photos, of course, will vary depending on the area you search in. Keep in mind that foreclosure properties rarely, if ever, contain photos. We have one of the largest inventories of foreclosure properties with photos on the net.

On short-sales: Lenders have no interest in property ownership or management; they want to make money off the loan's APR. A short-sale almost always occurs when a property has entered foreclosure or is about to go into foreclosure. The lender wants to offload the troublesome property and get as much of the money they invested towards the original loan back, before any more profit is lost by other factors such as vandalism, weather damage, and a falling market (like the current one). Therefore, you may encounter many foreclosure properties being offered at less-than-market-value or at-market-value prices in the form of a short sale.

On foreclosure "deals": Foreclosure property does not always sell below list price. For the most part, it's just like all other real estate. Sometimes you can negotiate short-sales or get in on a pre-foreclosure before the owner has gotten so far in debt that the total amount owed gives them a negative equity balance. With research and time, you might just find yourself a great deal on a foreclosure property.

On neighborhood price: Our efforts are spend largely in ensuring that our information is as up-to-date as possible. The neighborhood price listed is the most recent data available for the area.

If you have any further questions about Premium, please feel free to email customer service directly. They are always happy to help you get answers.