What Is A Probate Sale?

Many real estate transactions take place between buyers and sellers but there are a niche set of transactions that occur outside of the mainstream market. These are known as probate sales and offer many opportunities as well as risks for probate home buyers.

If you are interested in real estate investing, probate home sales may be a good topic to research.

What is a Probate Home Sale?

A probate sale is the sale of property handled through a court. Homes are common pieces of property that end up in probate court and they move through this process as the result of the owner dying and not naming an heir. In other words, when there is no clear instructions about how ownership of the home should be handled, the courts step in to handle the sale.

What is a Probate Home Buyer?

This is a buyer who speculates on and purchases homes that are moving through the probate process. They search for and bid on homes that the court is selling when no heir apparent is found. For instance if a person dies and has no will and no clear relatives can be found to take ownership of the home, the home is then auctioned off. Probate home buyers attempt to purchase these homes.

Why Do People Buy Homes Through Probate Courts?

This may seem like a weird transaction but people do it for some very common reasons. The most obvious one is that they can get a deal. Probate courts are not in the real estate business. In other words, they have no interest in generating profit or being known of selling real estate. Their job is to pass the property along as quickly as possible to an heir or a willing buyer and then move on to other business. This creates an opportunity for home buyers because they can often get real estate for much cheaper than market value.

The Value of Probate Home Buyers

Buyers like these serve a very valuable function in society though they may not even be aware of it. If homes cannot find new owners once someone dies, they sit vacant. This means lost tax revenue for cities and counties, deterioration of the property, and an eventual eye soar for the community if a home falls into disrepair.

Probate home buyers prevent this from happening buy investing their own money to purchase, rehab, and flip homes to other home buyers.

The probate process and its players act as sort of a safety net for unclaimed real estate. They keep property moving through the economy so that neighborhoods can continue to flourish and cities don’t fall into a state of vacancy and distress from loss of tax revenue.