Chris,
I agree that some are wrongfully being forclosed. Though it's a bit of a long shot for someone to lose all of their belongings like you have described. A general "initial" is nothing more than changing locks (and if it's pre-sale, it's only one lock on a seconday or rear door) and bidding health hazards (chemicals, paints, etc). Some loan tyoes require the property to be winterized which is just RV antifreeze down the drains, pull the meter and blow out the lines. At most the only thing to get removed on an initial is raw food or infestation risks.
It's funny you bring it up though, the Monday before last we repo'd a home that was in fact a wrongful foreclosure. We *always* try talking to neighbors to see if anyone has been there recently, if they've moved out, etc. I tried both next door neighbors, noone home. Went to the guy across the street, "I've been here for 4 years and I've never seen anyone at that house". Other things are usually key indicators, grass height, electric meter locked off, gas locked off (or the meter is downright gone), water is off, etc. In this case, electric was locked off, water was off and the gas meter was gone.
So, me being the smaller of us two, I climb through an unlocked window and open the door, we do a quick survey. A really nice Toro self propelled mulching mower, an even nicer Craftsman walk behind leaf shredder/vac. The rest is just misc little old household items. It's kind of odd, I check with the neighbors again, no dice.
I start cutting the grass while my partner is doing the lock changes and bids. I'm maybe 3/4 of the way done with the entire lawn when the neighbor shows up.
Him: "Whats going on?"
Me: "Repo'ing the property for the bank"
Him: "Oh really? That's odd"
Me: "How's that?"
Him: "That's my house"
After some discussion, he owns that house as well as the one next door. He bought it when the old lady passed back in 99. He was going to knock it down and put in a big pool or rent it out, hasn't had time for either. For those in our area, National City sold out to PNC Bank and First Niagra last year. He has apparently been fighting with PNC to find out simply nothing more than where to send the payment to now. He showed me his log of phone calls, who he spoke with, etc. He has all of the payments with an escrow company until he can find someone at PNC that can pull their head out of their *** long enough to tell him where to send the payments to now. He said he never got anything from PNC or National City on where to send the payments after the buyout, which I believe as I was with National City and was one of the accounts that got sold to PNC, I never received anything either, including new ATM cards.
We appologized, gave him the national property pres. company's name, he said thanks for cutting his grass! lol
