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Feb. 16, 2008
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Home sellers warp time

Foreclosure bus tours take potential buyers to prices of 2000

By JENNIFER ROBISON
REVIEW-JOURNAL
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Barbara Zucker and her partner and husband, Marshall Zucker, stand Thursday alongside their foreclosure tour bus.
Photo by Ralph Fountain.

Sometime this weekend, while you're shuttling the kids to soccer tournaments or picking up milk at the grocery store, several dozen of your neighbors will go back in time nearly 10 years.

There, they'll see a 3,128-square-foot Christopher Homes house in Summerlin's upscale Country Rose Estates on sale for its circa 2000 price of $370,000.

So how, you want to know, will people revisit this past era? Through a time machine? Virtual reality? A tear in the fabric of a parallel universe?

Nope, no fancy physics here: They'll simply hop a ride on a foreclosure bus tour led by Barbara and Marshall Zucker of Prudential Americana Group, Realtors. Such tours have been hot since the fall in distressed housing markets in California, Florida, Michigan and Georgia. Now, they're revving up here.


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    • The Zuckers will roll out their first tours, focusing on Summerlin and southwest Las Vegas, today and Sunday. Prudential Americana Realtors Jennifer Weinberg and Andrew Newcomb guided their inaugural circuit last weekend, also in Summerlin. Other Realtors at Prudential Americana, as well as sales agents at Coldwell Banker Premier Realty, are planning or are already conducting bus rides. Through the tours, Realtors hope to chip away, 10 and 15 properties at a time, at the valley's 7,000-home inventory of foreclosed houses.

    "We just think there are a lot of people out there who want to take advantage of the foreclosure market, but they're not sure how to go about it," Barbara Zucker said. "It's an opportunity to take quantities of people and put them in front of a lot of houses at once, and have everyone from Realtors to lenders there to answer their questions."

    For Jennifer Weinberg, foreclosure tours aren't only about ginning up sales; they're also about public service.

    "It's a great way to stimulate business for us," she said. "But more importantly, I've been a resident here for 30 years, and my house has gone down in value based on (comparable sales prices), too. The only way to recover from this crazy market is to get houses off the books quickly, so we're helping out the community, too."

    Here's a how a foreclosure tour works: Realtors pre-screen foreclosed homes, "cherry-picking" 10 to 20 properties in the best condition, Weinberg said. Potential home buyers meet the bus at agents' offices, and spend several hours stopping at each home, checking out the inside and yard. Some tours bring lenders and title-company representatives along to discuss mortgage terms for interested buyers. The tours are free.

    In addition to the Christopher home in Summerlin -- which last sold in 2004 for $750,000 -- Zucker's tour will take in a 1,470-square-foot home in Summerlin's Hills listed for $212,000. The most expensive house on the tour will be the Christopher property, Zucker said.

    Among the deals offered on Weinberg's tours is a four-bedroom, two-bath home in Summerlin that's been reduced from $500,000 to $320,000.

    It's too early to tell whether local foreclosure tours are generating many sales. But Weinberg said at least one prospective buyer on her first tour was poised to sign a contract for a property. Her tours, with 24 seats on each bus, are fully booked in the near term, as are Zucker's. About half the people on Weinberg's want investment properties, while the rest want primary homes.

    Cesar Dias, a Realtor in Stockton, Calif., has led foreclosure tours there since September, and though business was slow at first, sales rose toward the end of the year. From September through December, Dias said, he sold nearly 40 homes via the tours.

    "The tours are working great," Dias said. "They're bringing home buyers an awareness of how attractive prices have become."

    And though they haven't put down cash on a new home yet, people who have taken foreclosure tours in Las Vegas say the bus rides are useful.

    Las Vegan Karen Goedderz took Weinberg's Sunday tour with her boyfriend, Karl Fonger, and the couple nearly ended up buying a place.

    Goedderz spotted a well-maintained Summerlin home with four bedrooms and nearly 3,000 square feet of space, listed at $320,000. That's down from the $440,000 the home would have commanded two years ago. But Fonger felt the yard was too small for the couple's dogs, so they decided against the purchase.

    Goedderz is undaunted. She plans to join more foreclosure tours next weekend because she likes the volume of properties she can see in one afternoon. Plus, with someone else driving, she and Fonger can skip scouring the streets for signs and addresses and instead study surrounding neighborhoods for troublesome indicators such as a big supply of homes for sale.

    For Las Vegans Tara and Marty Faber, Weinberg's tour was less an opportunity to buy than a chance to get a reality check. "You hear all kinds of rumors, and we thought it might be a good idea, since it was free, to see if the rumors were true," Tara Faber said. "People say, 'There are all these foreclosures, and they're great deals, but they're in really bad shape.'"

    Instead, Faber said, she found "some great deals out there, and they're in a lot better condition than we anticipated." The Fabers, who own a home in southwest Las Vegas, probably will go on future tours but won't buy unless they find the "perfect" floor plan at the best price, Faber said.

    Realtors said they'll keep trying for the foreseeable future to get buyers such as the Fabers off the fence and into bank-owned properties.

    "The more of these houses we're able to sell, the better it will be for all of us," Zucker said. "It's a win-win for the city, the buyers and the collateral businesses, like lenders and title companies. We're all stroking the same oar. We all have the same goal in mind."

    Contact reporter Jennifer Robison at jrobison@reviewjournal.com or (702) 380-4512.

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    bubbie wrote on February 22, 2008 02:27 PM: The realtors are pushing foreclosed properties. That is exactly why there are more and more foreclosed properties!! They aren't trying to sell homes owned by people like me who wanted to sell and stay out of foreclosure. My home has been on the market for 4 months and I have had no bites, in fact my realtor said there has been little, if any showings!! Not until it's in foreclosure! There are 5 foreclosed homes on my street alone!
    I blame the realtors for this mess....they first inflated property values and now are deflating them.
    I agree with moki:
    REALTORS ARE IDIOTS AND FOOLS. PIECES OF CRAP
    and with Robert:
    Many of those happy-go-lucky realtors who were the sweetest people in 2005 are some of the nastiest people today.
    They are the ones who have helped put the housing market in this condition.


    Irma wrote on February 20, 2008 10:34 PM: Realtors must be viewed with suspicion like car salesmen. Case in point, many and any were still "pushing" houses last year at the peak of the market-when sales were slowing...."always a good time to buy". An honest person would have recommend a buyer to hold off. To know what is happening and deceive people is reprehensible...all just for a commission.


    Mike wrote on February 18, 2008 05:20 PM: While it is true there are a few bad apples in the bunch, as far as Realtors go, there are good ones as well. More often than not the general public does not know how to properly purchase or sale a home from begining to end, which is more than just signing a contract and having a good escrow company. If you rely on just that, the people out there that prey on ignorance have a leg up on you. I suggest if your in the market to purchase or sale a home, (especially sale in this market) you need to do your homework, sort out, and pick a quality Realtor who will represent you well. Look for, and interview multiple realtors. Dont let them come looking for you.


    BottomFisher wrote on February 18, 2008 03:03 PM: Too soon to buy. I will wait until they can drive me around on a Firetruck for REAL fire sales when prices drop much more.


    Lynne wrote on February 17, 2008 09:05 PM: I agree, it's going to get worse and we are waiting at least till the end of the year to buy. Unless you need to sell right now, don't use a realtor. We have owned 5 houses and sold four of them ourselves. They try to scare you and tell you that you are selling too high. Well we sold for our asking price. And we have fired a few too. All you need to do is have open houses, and the buyer is the one that has to find their financing anyway and that's easy to do. Don't let the realtor intimadate you, all they want is the listing and they don't care who sells the house.


    Ruh Roh wrote on February 16, 2008 07:38 PM: The Scripps Institution of Oceanography released a report a few days ago that said there is a 10% chance that Lake Mead will be completely dry in SIX years; there is a 50% chance that it will be dry by 2021. (Source: Las Vegas Review Journal, http://www.lvrj.com/news/15581197.html )

    Las Vegas needs to get rid of all lawn watering, and all houses should be forced to switch to desert landscaping. The City Council also needs to start restricting growth. Having abandoned houses might not be a bad thing.

    We live in a DESERT. We are in a drought. And global warming (whether it is man-made or a natural occurrence) is really happening and making it worse.

    Furthermore Mesquite (hour and a half drive away from Vegas) is going build a coal burning power plant. (Source: Las Vegas Review Journal http://www.lvrj.com/news/15436816.html). That's really stupid and is going to make the air unnecessarily dirty. Coal is an enormous pollutant, and we have plenty of sunshine (and land) for solar energy production (think Nevada Solar One).

    Dirty air and no water...sounds like a great place to live!


    moki wrote on February 16, 2008 04:04 PM: Now matter how you disect it, REALTOR still comes out...low life, self centered, money grubbing worm. People no matter what they tell you, YOU DO NOT NEED A REALTOR TO BUY OR SELL. A contract and good escrow company.

    REALTORS ARE IDIOTS AND FOOLS. PIECES OF CRAP


    Robert wrote on February 16, 2008 02:11 PM: Posts like those below are good news to investors, especially contrarian investors. When the hysteria of 2004-2005 lead many to jump into the Housing Market, the smart money was cashing out or trimming back. Now the hysteria is stay away from real estate, and the smart money is quietly accumlating. Better to be slightly too early to the sale than too late. And no I am not a real estate agent, developer, builder or real estate tout.

    John O'Neill--you make a very good point. Many of those happy-go-lucky realtors who were the sweetest people in 2005 are some of the nastiest people today.


    John O'Neill wrote on February 16, 2008 01:00 PM: Anyone notice how much time realtors have on their hands nowdays?


    Jake Valentine wrote on February 16, 2008 11:22 AM: The current depressed prices will seem expensive in another year. I am so glad I cashed out in early '05. The writing was on the wall then for what was going to happen to the housing market. This housing market isn't going to recover anytime soon, unless employers suddenly raise wages in the valley. Riggghhhhhtttt..........


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