Crazy Real Estate Stories

Anyone in real estate longer than a few years will have a plethora of hilarious ( and not so funny sometimes) crazy stories of encounters with buyers and sellers. In this episode we share a few that stood out over the years. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Hello everyone and welcome. Happy March. Thank you for joining us on today's episode of Bed, Bass, and Banter, Arizona Real Estate Edition. We are going to have a really fun show today. We're going to talk about the crazy things that we have seen in real estate. Like I've said before, I've been in real estate for uh almost 29 years now. And Ryan's been in so we're excited to share all of our crazy stories with you. Ryan, I'll go ahead and let you start.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Yeah, so so one that still to this day I tell clients when I'm out showing homes with them, uh specifically if we're going out to look at an occupied property, and it just cracks me up every time. Uh, I I went to go show some clients a condo out in Scottsdale, right? And and on the listing, it said, hey, condo's vacant, go ahead and go in. You know, here's here's the code, all that good stuff, right?

SPEAKER_01 0:55

So I really hope someone has this story to tell about S1Bay. Like honestly.

SPEAKER_00 0:59

Oh, so good. So so what happened was uh the the owners, they live in the Midwest. They're in their late 80s, early 90s. The they were having a wedding anniversary, and the husband decided to surprise his wife and plan a little weekend getaway to their snowbird haven here in Scottsdale. However, said 90-year-old dude did not tell his agent that. So I'm always in the habit when I go to open a door, even if I know it's vacant, I just knock just to be safe. So I knocked, nothing, right? Gave it a good 15 seconds. I start to unlock the door, and to my and my client's surprise, there was a dripping wet, naked 90-year-old man about four feet in front of us. He was racing to try to hold the lock shut so that I didn't come in. Um needless to say, I ended up not showing the home. Uh but yeah, I mean, yeah, as you can imagine, uh, it's I mean, seeing uh seeing walking in on anybody when they're naked coming out of a shower is not a good thing. But specifically not an depends on who it is. Yeah, but specifically not a 90-year-old man, right? This was not good water dripping everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

And I can tell you, every single agent that's been doing this for any amount of time has stories similar. Um, I just think it's I think it's of course for him, it was probably horrifying. Sure. But what a fun thing we've been able to share for the last 10 years.

SPEAKER_00 2:25

Yeah, it's such a good story.

SPEAKER_01 2:27

I mean, honestly, lives are fluid, and we all do what we can to, you know, just survive. And uh these little stories remind me why I like doing real estate. You just never know what's around the corner. Um, one year I had a client. Um, now, of course, I'm a lender, so I don't necessarily go out to homes. Um, and we were doing a purchase transaction, and the the home was rented to, you know, what it was the landlord was selling it to my client. So um it was April 1st. So my uh underwriter calls me. I didn't have a chance to look at the appraisal that was done on the property, and my underwriter calls me and says, Hey, you know, everything looks great on the property except for the fact that they need to remove the grow room. Now, this was probably 10 or 15 years ago, so way before anything was legal here in Arizona. And I was like, grow room, like I'm really ignorant. So I at the time I didn't even really know what that was, and he had to explain it to me. So it's April 1st, and I'm like, come on, is this an April fool's joke? Like, I that's not possible. They're renting this house. It was not. The uh tenants literally converted two of the bedrooms and took down a wall to put what hydroponics? Yeah, is that what it's called? And it was professionally done. Clearly, it was their business. Um, and the landlord had no idea. That's why inspections are probably important when you're renting out a house. Uh, we had so much fun with that, but I tried to talk to the underwriter about how much value that added to the property. Uh, he was not, he was not in agreement. Um, so the landlord, needless to say, was not happy that he found that out and they did have to take everything down and our transaction closed. But I mean, fine wild, yeah. That's hilarious.

SPEAKER_00 4:14

You know what's interesting about that? So it's obviously it's legal now in in Arizona and in numerous other states as well. However, a lot of the lending is still federal.

SPEAKER_01 4:23

Yes. So we don't uh in uh mo almost all of our programs do not allow any income that come from what they call um temporary legal or illegal uh actions with regards to, you know, if you work at a dispensary or a um and again, I'm ignorant, so I don't know what all the other places are called.

unknown 4:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:44

Dispensary plus is what we're gonna call it. Um but yeah, super, super funny story. Um and then Ryan, I know you had another one with the pool.

SPEAKER_00 4:53

Oh gosh. The clients with the pool.

SPEAKER_01 4:55

Oh uh so are we talking about uh yes, the ones that were they were you went to go give them their keys.

SPEAKER_00 5:01

Oh gosh. So this poor lady, um, she she came to us through our radio show and she'd never owned a home. I if I remember correctly, I think she was right around 50 years old. Um but we we got her all squared away, got all our finances in order. It was a bit of a process, but we got this home. It's gonna be our first home she's ever owned. She's super, super excited. Um, I go to to give her the keys, and there are people swimming in her pool in the backyard, having their own little party.

SPEAKER_01 5:35

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

Um, it turns out they were uh door hanger people running around for Moon Valley Nursery. Moon Valley Nursery. Right? And they were it was hot, it was in the summer. Yeah. Um, but but yeah, so they're hanging in door knockers and they noticed it was vacant. They saw a pool, they figured, eh, whatever, we'll go and you know, thank God they weren't skinny dipping, they were they had some underwear on. But can you imagine for my poor client? It felt so bad. Uh, you know, this is her first home, she's super excited, wants to get in. Uh she got her grandson with her, all that, and you've got two complete goofballs swimming in your pool.

SPEAKER_01 6:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Right? Like that's that's just awful.

SPEAKER_01 6:11

They and I think you you were like aggressively going after them and they like jumped the fence and ran off or something.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

They did. Yeah. I was I was not happy. I was very embarrassed.

SPEAKER_01 6:19

Uh and I can tell you, if he was running after me, I would be scared as well.

SPEAKER_00 6:22

Yeah, so it wasn't good. Um, we we ended up calling Moon Valley Nursery, my understanding is that they were immediately fired. Yeah, no longer employed.

SPEAKER_01 6:29

So they do understand it's hot out there, but be respectful of people's property. Like, you know, I and who knows how many times that may have happened while the home was vacant. Sure. But she was so excited and it kind of took the wind out of her. Definitely dampened things for her. So we had to make it up to her. But and she's still uh uh this was uh again a long time ago, over 10 years, and she's still an active client and still she's still in the same home and loves it. But whoa, that wasn't fun to walk into. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:55

So I think probably goes hands down is my my single favorite story in the 20 years that I've been doing this. Um, and just goes to show you you never know what you're gonna get. Uh so I was helping a client buy a home, and we were we were getting near the end, getting we had already had the seller made the repairs. Um I was gonna go ahead and walk through the property with my client, just making sure it was in the same condition as when we first offered on it, nothing was missing. It was supposed all the repairs were made, everything was how it was supposed to be. So um the sellers, a married couple, they were moving to California. Uh the wife is a doctor. Uh, she had gotten a new job there, and so she had moved ahead of time. And she's gonna let her husband just kind of wrap everything up, trap all the loose ends, handle the sale of the home. Uh so first and foremost, in this individual's infinite wisdom, he decided that, hey, I'm just not gonna pay the mortgage for the last several months, and that will just be a massive saving for us. We're gonna, you know, it'll help with the move and this and that. Guess what, folks? If you don't pay your mortgage, you still owe it. Yes, right? So there's no getting away from that. And you're talking about hurting your credit, late fees, all that good stuff. So don't know who gave him that advice. Hopefully he came up on it on his own, and there aren't a bunch of people running around thinking that that's okay. Um, but so he did that, right? And all the title, uh, escrow and title communication had taken place with just him. So the wife was unaware, he hadn't clued her in, uh, that he wasn't paying the mortgage and hadn't for about 90 days. Well, his father-in-law was there to help him just kind of finish with final moving stuff and everything. And it just so happened that Title that morning had emailed not only the husband, but the wife as well, and let them know that when they come to sign to sell their home, they need to bring a$7,000 check to be able to pay off the loan. So here they were thinking they were breaking even, or at least the wife was, thinking she was breaking even. Um, and lo and behold, they needed to bring a$7,000 check just to sell their so they had to pay to sell their home. The father-in-law, apparently, was furious that this went down. And so as I go into the home to do the walkthrough with my buyers, they're in a full-on fist fight. They're knocking holes through the wall, uh, they're bloodied, right? Like these guys have been going at it, like just a melee in there. Um, and we said, Hey, do you want us to give you a minute, finish the fight, or whatever, right? Uh and they said, No, no, no, we're good. It's over. Uh we'll we'll fix all the the holes and the repairs. And we're supposed to close the next day. Yeah. Um, and I'll be damned if that father-in-law didn't, he's fairly handy, if he didn't fix everything. He got, I mean, there were several holes. It was really, really bad.

SPEAKER_01 10:01

Very angry.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:02

Well, and I I mean, can you imagine you think you're selling a home and making some money and you walk in and you have to bring a check? Well, and their agent, I mean, this should have been known well before the day of closing, mind you. And their agent didn't follow up. The title company didn't order their payoff sooner. So it was kind of like, or maybe they did and just didn't tell anybody, but it was like a cluster of, you know, just things not going right. That poor wife.

SPEAKER_00 10:27

Oh my gosh. Oh, man. Oh, she was in tears. I'm so happy that wasn't her client. No, she was in tears. She was mad. Uh man, you know, and I just, folks, if you sign on a dotted line to pay X amount of money for whatever item it is, chiefly your home, a car, that kind of stuff, and you stop paying, that's not how this works. You still owe the money. Yeah, you still owe the money, right? Um, it's just just crazy. So, anyways, so that was a good one. Uh, one that I thought was also very interesting, that um I had never come across anything like this before, uh, was I had a client, we put them under contract representing the buyer. Uh, we we go ahead and we perform our home inspection. And you know, home inspector, you know, they're they're checking all the outlets, the water, the make sure there's no leaks to get in the attic, all that good stuff. Well, so in the home inspector's uh journey into the attic, he identified and found kind of not like a drug lab, but like where a drug user would hang out, right? And they had squatting. Squatting, they had heroin, they had needles, they had all that stuff up in the attic. Um, and I'm, you know, the home was vacant. So I'm sure the seller didn't know what was going on. Uh however, some of the neighbors had noticed uh an individual going in and out of the house. So I think that the police ultimately found out who it was and ended up uh having a chat with them, if you will. Um but but needless to say, probably not as funny, but still, you know, again, like to Amy's story with the the grow room, it probably added value. There's who knows what the street value of the heroin in there was.

SPEAKER_01 12:09

No. I don't think there wasn't any heroin. There's probably just used needles.

SPEAKER_00 12:12

Well, no, I think there was heroin too, yeah. Oh no. No, the spoon and the whole thing. Yeah, like so it was like a whole like here's where I, you know, and and on top of it, I mean, thank goodness it was winter, right? Could you imagine how how much you want to do drugs if you're gonna climb in an attic in the summer here in Phoenix? Like how important that drug is to you? My goodness.

SPEAKER_01 12:33

Yeah, that's a completely different podcast. Um yeah, yeah, we've definitely seen some crazy things. I'm gonna go back a few years through when the housing market crashed. I have a couple stories for that. Um, and this is exactly why home inspections are very important, okay? Uh, you know, so back then a lot of people were losing their homes. And some of them, you know, it was to their own doing. It wasn't because, you know, the nasty banks took their home away. It was because they truly stopped paying. Um, and they were very angry about it. Two situations. One, the this house out in, I think it was a surprise. Um, the bank had to foreclose on the home and take it back. Um, they were trying to list it to resell it. They go in and do their inspection and find out the previous owner went through with a chainsaw and cut every two by four in the house. Oh, like in the wall. In the walls and the trusses and the frames. So that makes the home completely unlivable. You absolutely have to demolish it and rebuild. So that was a big F you to the bank. Um, I mean, I wouldn't have thought of that. You know, a lot of people at that time took all of the fixtures and took the cabinets and took all of the copper or is that right, copper? Yeah. Um, you know, they took all of that. And that was unfortunately more common than I ever wanted to do.

SPEAKER_00 13:57

There was even people that were pouring uh mixed concrete down their plumbing.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 14:02

Like anything to damage the house. Yeah, to like just wild.

SPEAKER_01 14:05

Yeah, because they're hurting everyone. You know, because let's be honest, banks don't take defaults, they just raise their rates on other items, like other lending options in order to make themselves full, or I'm sorry, uh, make themselves whole. So, you know, you really only hurt us by doing that as consumers. But Okay, well, and another one really quickly is um same same situation, same time frame. Um the person, uh sorry, not same situation. They weren't losing it to foreclosure, they had to sell it of a because of a divorce situation. The wife went around, and again, I gotta give these people credit for their ingenuity. Yeah. I would have never, I just don't have that deceptive type of mind. And I don't hold grudges, like I just don't think in this fashion. Maybe I should, because it's actually pretty funny. Um, but she took every single light bulb out of the everywhere in the house and put them down the garbage disposal and put them in the toilets and like broke them and put them down every sink and the toilets and the garbage disposal.

SPEAKER_00 15:04

That's not a lady you guys want to date out there. All the male listeners avoid ladies that'll do that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 15:10

Maybe we know why she got divorced. Um, but so of course I was representing the buyer on that property, and we didn't find out until the walkthrough because she did it right before closing, and it did mess things up. It was really unfortunate.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

Yeah, so bad. I know. So, hey, just to circle back real quick. So you had mentioned about during the whole housing meltdown and kind of all the crazy stuff that we saw there. Uh, you know, it's it's interesting. So were there predatory loans? 100% there were. Right. Did loan officers absolutely take advantage of folks? Absolutely. Definitely.

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Well, when they're selling cars one day and then selling mortgages the next.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

And then working at a car wash the next. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:46

I mean, it's that's why it's really important you do research on who you work with. Um, just because you're referred to someone doesn't mean they're a professional loan officer. Now, when licensing came into play as a result of all of this mess in 2010, that did weed out a lot of that riffraff, but you still need to, you still need to make sure you're dealing with someone who's a professional.

SPEAKER_00 16:05

Yeah, no, absolutely. So, what I will tell you though, um, and I just want, I don't know why it bugs me, but I feel like it should go mentioned or should be mentioned. Um, while, yes, absolutely, like I was saying, there were predatory loans, people were taking advantage of all that stuff. The vast majority of people who allowed their homes to go to foreclosure walked away, um, maybe short sold, nah, the short sales not so much, but just out and out walked away, they could afford their homes. Like they 100% could. They just didn't want to because the value had dropped, right? So they stopped paying on it. And man, did that make that problem worse.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

It did, but it's uh ancient history. It's not gonna happen again. No. Ancient history.

SPEAKER_00 16:45

Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_01 16:45

Yeah. So I I don't I think that might be all of our like really fun stories. I mean, I'm sure we have a ton others. All of mine have to do with lending and qualifying and you know, things I've never really seen before.

SPEAKER_00 16:59

But I will say that's not as fun to talk about. And it's not not so much funny as it was very cool. Um, so I was taking a client uh down in the uh central corridor, right? They were looking at half acre acre properties down there, and no mention of it on the listing, but we're walking the property, so we're not in the home, we're actually out in the in the yard, if you will. And we saw this pretty heavy kind of uh cast iron door, and we were curious, so we unwind uh the wheel and lift it up. Oh, and lo and behold, it is a full-on Soviet-era Cold War bomb shelter. Oh super cool, and but super creepy too, because there were no lights, there's no obvious way to turn the lights on, is you're just a ladder going down in. Oh my gosh. Um, and you can see the cobwebs and stuff. Like it probably people hadn't been in it in a while. Uh, but we anyways, we curiosity got the better of us. So we did go down there. Lights still worked while right. So the the bulb came on and it was about 1200 square feet.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

Was it a foreclosed home? Was it empty?

SPEAKER_00 18:11

No, no, it was it was uh just a regular sale, right? But I just found it odd. I mean, the owner had to have known, right? And that would be a cool thing to put in the listing. No mention of it at all.

SPEAKER_01 18:23

So, and I was one of those silly people who actually followed the Mayan calendar thing, and I had a lot of anxiety when uh December of 2012 came along. So I December 21st, 2012. And I'm like, that'd be perfect for us.

SPEAKER_00 18:39

Yeah, we can go escape there.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

Yeah, if you didn't make me watch Doomsday Preppers so much, I probably wouldn't have cared. Um, but that was actually, you know, that's pretty, pretty fun.

SPEAKER_00 18:47

Yeah. Yeah, you know, I forgot about that. What the like the just the level of scared that you became during the she's I'm sure the Mayan calendar was predicting the apocalypse.

SPEAKER_01 18:58

Yeah, well, I mean, I had three little babies then and I had a lot more to lose than when I was just married to you.

SPEAKER_00 19:02

So I think it clues me in a lot more too how you've kind of uh the path you've taken now with she for okay, pull back the curtain. She's a big fan of the afterlife, right? Um, or at least hearing people talk about seeing the light and all that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_01 19:17

I'm very sensitive to the idea of ghosts being in houses. Like I will never buy a house that someone's died in.

SPEAKER_00 19:22

No. Oh, speaking of that, that's not something we can disclose in real estate, right? So yeah. Uh you'd be hard-pressed unless you found a neighbor, maybe, to to let you know that you're not.

SPEAKER_01 19:32

Oh, and they will. They'll find you if there's anything that's happened in that house. We had one there was a double homicide in the home, and of course, we never knew about it. And neighbors came out and told our clients, so they absolutely scurried away from that house as quickly as they could. Wow. Uh really unfortunate. But um, I agree with that. Like I would not buy a home that had history or evidence or ability to be haunted.

SPEAKER_00 19:56

You know, no, not that it matters, but just out of curiosity, was it a murder homicide or was it a okay, soicide.

SPEAKER_01 20:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:03

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 20:03

Yeah. So, anyways, um, but yeah, we were.

SPEAKER_00 20:06

Did I say murder homicide? Did I really say that?

SPEAKER_01 20:08

You did. You did, you did.

SPEAKER_00 20:09

Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

I saved you. You did, thank you very much. Um, yeah, but just uh, you know, houses hold history, and it's just so fun, like all the different decorating styles you see, and all the different living styles you see. I mean, there are I can't tell you how many homes we've gone into that have had stripper poles.

SPEAKER_00 20:26

Tons.

SPEAKER_01 20:26

That's and it's supposedly for exercise.

SPEAKER_00 20:29

Yeah, they had heels all lined up around all the whole. That one was a dancer for sure. And then mirrors all around. He was like, What if I did I walk into a porno? Like, what is going on here? Yeah, no, for real. So uh one other one I just thought of, uh, this is about four years, uh three, four years ago. Um, and this is this was new to me. This was a first for sure. So I I go to show this client a home. Um and it's definitely not in the best shape, it's not in the best area, um, but it was within the client's budget, and so they wanted to take a look and see, you know, they could just you know, do a little elbow grease, maybe uh get it up to where it would be good for them. Well, so I open up the door. Now the the listing said it was vacant, but I walk in and it's fully furnished as if someone's living there. Um and more so than like, you know, you walk into a property, sometimes they're staged, like way more so like this is like someone was living there, right? Uh I go to the dining room table and there is a half-eaten meal there. Um there's dishes still in the sink, uh, you know, like laundry in the in the dryer, in the washing machine. Um it turns out so the owner who was living there had passed away. Well, from what I could gather, what I could surmise paramedics, whoever, whatever showed up took the the individual and they just listed the house from that moment. Oh my gosh. Like, you know, like No one did anything. No one went in and got the home ready in any way, shape, or form. It was like frozen in time. Like this person must have been eating their lunch or whatever, and then just had a heart attack or something, died on the spot. Um, and they just went and took the person out, said, All right, let's put it for sale, whoever the heir was, right? Like they did nothing to get the home ready. It was wild.

SPEAKER_01 22:21

Oh, that's so sad.

SPEAKER_00 22:23

Yeah, no, but I think it's more alarming that no one, no voice of reason came in and said, Hey, let's clean this up a little bit if we really want to sell it, right?

SPEAKER_01 22:32

So again, who you hire matters. That agent probably wasn't super duper active and cared about that the heirs of that property getting top dollar.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

Yeah, no, it was uh that was super honestly. I just kind of creeped out about it. It was kind of creepy for sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:50

Oh, well, okay. I guess we we'll we'll end on that note.

SPEAKER_00 22:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:55

Thank you so much for joining us today. And again, happy March. Clearly, I love St. Patrick's Day, so I'll be in green all month if uh by the way, folks.

SPEAKER_00 23:03

I'm more Irish than she is. Yes, yes, isn't that crazy?

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Um, anyways, thank you so much for joining us today on Bed, Bath and Banter, Arizona Real Estate Edition. You can find us on the radio every single week, Saturdays at 5 p.m. on KTAR News 923 FM. Uh, it's keeping it real estate with Amy B. Uh, we would love to have you join our show and please subscribe to our podcast. Thank you and have a wonderful rest of your day.

SPEAKER_00 23:27

Bye, everyone.