Moving before foreclosure and leaving house - questions!

[eventsdj]

We have lived here for free 10 months, and could do so much longer. But it is time to move on, and hubby got a job offer in another state! We are so excited to start truly putting all this behind us!

We are 9 months past discharge, and house is in foreclosure.. but still "lis pendens" status.

We have BoA and plan to pack it up and leave it end of March.
What are the steps and what do we have to do?

WIll the process move faster if we call them and tell them "Its yours and empty, come get it..."??
What do we do with keys?
Do we have to keep insurance?

I know we could live here at least another year.. they are moving VERY slow, but in this market a good job only comes every so often, and its time to MOVE ON!

Thanks for any advice!

[tobee43]

i can only tell you about our experience...we also left and moved out of state after we rec'd the first summons. our atty advised us to simply "lock it and leave it"....however, i couldn't do that as i had been working with a person from the bank for about if not just over a year on a loan mod..( which never came through).

anyway...to make a long story as short as possible..IF possible....LOL!!..we had an escrow account which had pd up the homeowners for a year...we had the same company for our cars and when we called to cancel and told them we were leaving the state, they also at that time informed us they were immediately removing the homeowners as they would not, at least in this particular state insure a "vacated" home. the insurance company sent us a refund for the remaining months. we found out that the bank uses an umbrella policy to cover vacate houses in foreclosure....however, that was our bank.

we moved and waited almost 24 months to be able to use our new state's wild card exemption. we listed and surrendered the house that was in foreclosure...listing the docket number etc. on the petition.

that was approx 2.9 years ago and chase still has not foreclosed on the property. we left the keys in the house, however, a neighbor, whom we were still in touch with sent pictures and shows up the bank put up a sign...(even tho they didn't even foreclose!)...changed all the locks and put pad locks on all the gates etc.

so here we are...living happily ever after and still no word from chase...we have tried everything...so i guess it's either they had bad paperwork from our refin...or something is really wrong since we had an FHA with PMI where upon the bank could and should collect the balance of the mortgage via the insurance.....provided all their paperwork is in order???

our atty said they may never foreclose and has seen many go on for years...at first i was attempting everything to get our names off the deed, now, really, i don't care...let it stay we have no liability as far as our atty has advised...and now we are under contract and closing on this house we were renting (the owner is financing 100%)...so, as far as we care...let chase keep it...or sell it or not.

good luck on your new life, home and everything! i have to tell you, it's been an REAL experience! (we lived in the house we left for 33 years). but do not regret it for a moment!

[Amy26]

You can move out and "leave" the property but there are risks. Generally, once the bank knows that the property is just sitting there empty they will take a little more of an interest in securing it. They send people to homes to check on them regularly. My bank had told me when I was calling that they knew people were still there (I had renters in my property). Once it was empty I called and told them that the property was empty and kept bugging them on when they were going to proceed. Mine was a condo and it also had a master umbrella policy for insurance on the residence and stuff. However, if the property had been burglerized I would still have been responsible for any damages caused to the inside of the property. So, you are supposed to carry the insurance until the bank takes it back.

After a few months of it being vacant the bank changed the locks on my condo to "secure" it for their interests. It was at that point that I kinda washed my hands of the house because I had no control over it anymore. This sort of annoyed my HOA because they were doing some yearly home inspection thing for water damage or something and said everyone had to allow them access to the homes on certain dates. I had to call them and be like hey here is my bank's number you are gonna have to call them to let you in.

I think of the whole process, the most annoying thing about leaving the property empty and moving on was the HOA. They were incredibly annoying. We also had this community fee thing that we were supposed to pay for access to the "community pools etc"... this was like a suburb thing... I fought with them because I refused to pay for usage of pools and things that I was and had never used.

Some people on the forum were able to do "cash for keys" but my bank basically told me to shove it when I tried to see if I could do that. So, as I said after they changed the locks on it I just threw out my keys.

If you're in a house in a community just make sure (if the property is still yours in the spring) that you have people mowing your lawn etc... you don't want the HOA riding your ass. You will also still have to pay your HOA dues.

[eventsdj]

Thank you for the replies! anyone else's imput always appreciated!

[tobee43]

amy just make a good point about the HOA.....IF you do have HOA you can list past dues from what i understand, however, you cannot list HOA dues after and you will still owe them money.

our house was not in an HOA...so that part we didn't have to worry about...also..city ordinances in different towns require you to keep up your home or you get fines. i know it was mentioned on a few threads before, but it was dealing with investment properties owned by landlords...

can ONLY tell you what my daughter went thru when she was in the process of converting her property to a land contract and is NOT even a foreclosed property, but a property that vacated for a short time and up for sale...the town called her almost DAILY!!! the poor new owners of her home, were changing doors and doing repairs and they kept calling HER telling her she was in violation of city code...finally...but it took for ever she got in through to the town...

(sidebar here amy.....that's why land contracts scared me a bit!! LOL!! my daughter was doing one with her property...)

i just think if i were you evenstdj, i would just check with the town or city you live in and make sure your covered on the maintenance part. also, if the city does have to step in, i have read thread that they bill you and then you just list the bills on your bk....but i have NO first hand experience with that type of situation.

[Flamingo]

The main thing is you are responsible for that property until your name is off the deed and when does your current policy on the house end? You need to find out what, if anything, the bank does as to insurance when you vacate the property as the property is still in your name. You may also want to check with your insurance agent about all this before you move. If you move and two days later the house burns down, you have a problem, just to give you an example.

[debee]

My understanding is that once the debt has discharged, you're not responsible for insurance anymore. If the house was struck by lightning and burnt to the ground, the lender can sell the lot and charred remains and cannot come after you for the deficiency. However, if someone with a legal right to be on the property was injured because of owner negligence, then they could sue the owner. So when possible, getting "personal liability" insurance for this sort of thing might be advisable.

Even if the property is not HOA, some cities have foreclosure ordinances, vacant property code, etc and they will patrol vacant properties and issue fines, bills, etc for yard maintenance, and securing the building (if needed) and graffiti removal. Some cities that I've read about will put a lien on the property if the bill is not paid (which then becomes the bank's problem), others will bill the bank, some will contact the owner of record. I've only read one person on the forum ever actually getting a bill for the city service and by the time it came, the title had already reverted to the lender so he was able to send it back with that information.

The lender will get their own insurance policy for the property which will protect their investment and that is just another cost of doing business for them.

[bulletproof77]

Just Walk...

Just do what you have to do...Short story, same boat in California. Heard all about how "it's still your responsibility until the title changes hands, insurance, lawsuits etc..." At least in California, once the mortgages are discharged in a Chapter 7, you are DONE. Didn't pay a dime after that, called Bend Over America and told them to come get their house...Took them a few months to secure it, but after that it was all downhill. It's just BUSINESS..

[tobee43]

Just do what you have to do...Short story, same boat in California. Heard all about how "it's still your responsibility until the title changes hands, insurance, lawsuits etc..." At least in California, once the mortgages are discharged in a Chapter 7, you are DONE. Didn't pay a dime after that, called Bend Over America and told them to come get their house...Took them a few months to secure it, but after that it was all downhill. It's just BUSINESS..

that was our understanding as well, however, it may vary for state to state??? i honestly do not know. it may be people who are in foreclosure that are renting out their premises?? or staying and not paying?? we left...locked it up and left it...no key exchange, chase wanted nothing to do with it other than an answer to the summons...however, the "summons" says if you intend to fight the foreclosure it MUST be answered and if not, you didn't. at that point we new were going to have to leave due to the fact by that time we both lost our jobs and even IF the bank gave us a mod...we couldn't do a thing, our income had gone from mid six figures to almost nothing in a blink of an eye. we just had to fact the truth and plan and move on.

i cannot ONLY tell you, in nj...it is no longer one's responsibility, however, that being said as flamingo and debee have pointed out before ...one's name is STILL on the record as owner...that is why we personally have gone through great lengths....to NO avail ...to get our home actually foreclosed since that is basically the only way to get one's name removed when the house changes owners...however, my question goes one step further....then....what if at a foreclosure a home does NOT sell......what then....the bank ...does it HAVE to buy it back??? and if so, then the deed with transfer to them...or do they have to buy it back??? personally, i don't know ...i do know there is other than "murder" there should be a statue of limitation sitting in some law book some where you think about this???

i'm personally, at this point going to let it go for the time being, and then re visit it in a while and go full force...our atty keeps telling me let it go, but i just don't like things left "open"...so it really does get me. i want that deed out of our names.

[Amy26]

To actually foreclose, the deed must change hands. So, in my case when the bank foreclosed they took it back in their name and then in a few months they sold it to someone.

[tobee43]

yes, amy, you are one of the lucky ones...at this point anyway i consider "lucky" that it is a done deal for you...finished...what a pain it's been and most likely will continue to be just in my head anyway...until our property is finished with the foreclosure process...if ever??

[AngelinaCat]

As far as insurance goes, in Florida, and I suspect most other states, an insurance company will not insure a house that is vacant. If an incident happens, such as fire, vandalism, etc., and the homeowner's policy underwriters find out that the house was vacant at the time, they will not cover the problem. That is true even if you are living in a camper on the home-site while you are making repairs to your home. If the insurance finds out that you are not spending at least one night a week in the home, they can consider it abandoned.

There is more discussion of this and similar concerns in the Insurance Forum.