Buying a foreclosure

SOFA, SO GOOD Melissa Lewis, left, and her husband, Scott Huegerich, are hunting for foreclosed homes they can completely rehab.

Longtime renters Melissa Lewis, 30, and her husband, Scott Huegerich, 31, are ready to buy—and they figure a distressed property, such as a foreclosure or short sale, will provide the best deal. Their budget? Around $250,000. Their goal? A two-bedroom, two-bath condo with makeover potential. “I have grand design plans,” says Lewis, an interior designer. “Ideally, I’d like a place that needed a whole new kitchen and bathrooms but that were functional until we had the money to replace everything.” We joined Lewis and Huegerich one afternoon as they looked at three very different distressed units with their Realtor, Jay Michael of Estate Properties, in the hopes of scoring a bargain fixer-upper.

LOFTY PRICING
300 West Grand Avenue. Asking price: $329,000
Though he’s still living in the condo, the owner of this two-bedroom, two-bathroom, 1,150-square-foot River North loft is behind on his mortgage, so the condo is in the first stages of foreclosure. The cringe-inducing decor (a dirty fish tank lines one wall of the living room) immediately turns off Lewis and Huegerich, but they dig the unit’s garage parking spot, balcony, tall ceilings and common rooftop deck. The seller’s Realtor estimates he’s shown the condo close to 100 times and has received only three offers, but the homeowner refuses to lower the price. “The bank would kill [the owner] if it knew he was asking $329,000 when he only owes $260,000 right now,” Michael says. “If he is truly trying to sell the property before foreclosure, pricing the property correctly would be a start.” The inflated price is a major detraction, plus Lewis and Huegerich aren’t comfortable with the amount of work they’d have to put into this unit to make it feel like their own.

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