Condos - the good, the bad, the ugly...

So I mentioned in the last post that we had 2 condos under contract. The appraisals came back at $129k each and the loan is good to go. I sent an email out to my buyers list and had a contract in 2 days for full asking price ($89.9k/condo). However, they did not enter an amount for earnest money. Yeah, I'm going to put a property under contract with no EMD?! What the hell?! Anyway, we're submitting a counter offer changing terms.

We also found out that there is no association. The idiot that built the complex never put by-laws in place and never formed an association. This is throwing a wrench into the whole process. Having no association in place makes the complex/units non-warrantable. I don't know the exact definition but it would make it very difficult for people to get a mortgage without 20% down. Who the hell has 20% to put down on a property!? Okay, so we create by-laws to get things going, right? Well, who is going to be on the board? Not me. Is a new owner going to want to be the only board member or part of a board at all? For arguments sake let's say they would consider being on the board, here is the other problem. All but 2 units (out of 12) are going into foreclosure. In order to get a warrantable loan, 80% of the units need to be owner occupied. Because almost all are going into foreclosure they are obviously not owner occupied so we still have the same problem. My loan officer told me to check into changing the condo in to a 'zero lot line duplex'. We would alleviate the condo association/by laws AND the owner occupy problem.

All of this just came up yesterday so we haven't fully looked into the 'zero lot line duplex' possibility but I hope we get something in place soon. If this is a true issue my buyer will back out and understandably so. I would like to get this done and closed (which would be mid-December) and have another credit card paid off. I can't WAIT to be able to put some cash in the bank. We're gettin' there! AND, as I said before, there are 2 more units up for sale with another 2 coming down the pipe. I want to have a resolution on place so if/when we get the next 2 we'll know what to do.

Gotta run...