A fire damaged home in Los Angeles can be a nightmare to sell. Most home buyers are not interested when there is visible damage on a Los Angeles property listing, preferring homes ready for immediate occupancy. However, with enough time, inclination, and finances to take on a project, some buyers may take a chance and toss an insultingly low number out to see if it sticks, which can be rather disheartening for sellers in Los Angeles. The longer a listing lingers, the more likely the sellers will realize a lower final sales price.
Fair Sale Homes has advised many owners and purchased many heavily damaged homes. We are sharing a real owner situation with you, so you can see how we have helped owners considering how to sell a fire damaged home in Los Angeles.
Home Owner Situation
In late 2023, a home owner contacted us with a need to sell his vacant land in the Echo Park neighborhood of Los Angeles. The owner had shared that his cousin, lived in the single family home in Los Angeles for over 30 years. Due to health issues, his cousin eventually moved out of the house, leaving it vacant. Due to increasing in homelessness in Los Angeles, squatters moved into the house, started a some fires, and ultimately, damaged the house to a point where it needed to be demolished. As a result, the owner was making mortgage payments on vacant land he could not live in nor rent out.
Property Condition
When the house initially suffered from fire damage, the situation attracted the concern of his Echo Park neighbors, local fire department, home insurance company, and also, the Building and Safety Division. With the house in disrepair and insurance funds being insufficient to fully repair the house back to livable form, it sat damage and unimproved for many months. LA Building and Safety issued multiple code violations because the fire damaged house had become a nuisance to the local community.
After a second fire also set by the squatters, the house experienced structural damage and ultimately, the city’s Code Enforcement division considered it a public danger, requesting for it to be raized.
Home Owner Financial Situation
The owner was still paying recurring expenses such as the mortgage, insurance, and property taxes, as well as rent at at apartment nearby. There was no house standing to possibly rent out and collect income to the expenses.
In addition, the Code Enforcement division of the Department of Building and Safety was sending letters requesting the owner to pay for the cost of abating the squatter situation and raizing the fire damaged house. The city had hired a contractor to raize the house at the expense of the owner and the city levied a lien against the property, to ensure that the city would be repair.
Challenges Selling A Damaged House
The owner understood his increasing financial and code enforcement challenges and needed to sell his fire damaged house quickly. By listing his house with a realtor (agent) on the MLS, this teardown of a house in Los Angeles would sit on the market for a long time, while he paid the morgage, bills, insurance, and property taxes.
Fire damaged houses have a specific type of buyer because most buyers of homes in the market either are looking for a primary residence or are looking for a rental property, which both require a livable dwelling on the lot by the time a sale closes. These buyers borrow money from banks and lenders that require the property to be in good condition at the close of the sale.
Buyers of land and teardown homes are qualified investors and developers who are in the business of repairing, remodeling, or fully building a new property from the ground-up in order to resell or rent out the property. These direct buyers purchase properties with all cash or construction loans in order to buy a fire damaged house as-is.
Fair Sale Homes Helping Owners Sell Quickly
Professional buyers at Fair Sale Homes stepped in to determine the right price and purchase sell the vacant land in Echo Park.
Recently suffered a fire to your house? A direct sale to professional buyers at Fair Sale Homes can further provide you options to selling a fire damaged home in Los Angeles. At Fair Sale Homes, our professional buyers make it easy to sell any home fast, with a guaranteed closing date you can select. The pros at Fair Sale Homes work with a full-service in-house team of professionals to make the process efficient. At Fair Sale Homes, sellers never pay commissions or closing costs. Call Fair Sale Homes at (626) 863-7006.