So I am looking at the RE web sites and I have bought some property at good prices but not great like all the gurus tell you to. My questions is how do you buy foreclosures? I see on Zillow there is a foreclosure or pre-foreclosure in my area and I am interested but what do I need to do next? Who do I need to talk to? Do I just go see my normal realtor and say I am interested? I causally brought this up to her before and she gave the impression it was too much work and time to try and deal with. Do I somehow find out who has the mortgage on the property and try and talk with them? What steps are you taking to buy foreclosures?

A pre-foreclosure, short sale, and foreclosure are different things. If the house is already foreclosed on, go DIRECTLY to the listing agent. I don't care if your current agent is your wife! Go to the listing agent!

Bank foreclosure or tax foreclosure? I've found that the banks in my area have no clue about our local markets, and the houses need to sit vacant for two or three years before they're willing to deal. In a city, however, their offerings may be more accurately priced.

Tax foreclosures have been successful for me, but it goes in waves-- we can go two years without anything worth pursuing, and other years, we can buy three houses in one day. They're generally sad little fixer-uppers, but the work involved in the rehab scares off a large part of the competition, and you're either left with the poor-and-desperate (who are willing to live in the house even without the renovation) or the people who have vision.

In my state, they do tax foreclosures every other month, or quarterly, depending on how many houses are in the chute. Other states, I hear, only do them annually.

We've bought a few foreclosures & in our market they have to sit a year or 2 before a bank is ready to deal. And by then they are gonna take a lot of work & a lot of money because in our market they have been empty 5+ years.

Legal notices in your local paper are the best place to find sheriff sales. Auction.com also seems all of a sudden to have these listed in our location. Bought once thru Auction.com & I swear never again.

Each State has their own set of rules. The information you find out there works in over half the States, but not all.

Here in California almost all of the "programs" to buy foreclosure's seldom work well. People will over pay or by without the ability to examine the property or buy title insurance. A poke in the dark, bad business.

The worse houses I have bought have been foreclosures, mainly due to what Robert J (CA) just mentioned. I have over paid for them (you don't realize this until you begin rehabbing them), you don't get to inspect them prior to closing, and usually the plumbing and electrical systems all need total replacement.

It depends on the type of foreclosure sale that will be occurring. I have about four separate direct mail pieces that I send out depending on the type of sale and where they are at within the process.