Foreclosed Homes for Sale: Top 5 Free Places to Look

There’s no reason to pay to find the best foreclosure deals in your area. Most banks and government agencies allow you to search foreclosed homes for direct sale. It’s not always easy to find them and with all the clutter online it’s hard to tell which ones are legitimate. I have been involved with foreclosures for the last 7 years of my life, so I learned a couple of tricks of searching.

Let’s start with my personal favorites list.

1) Fannie Mae – Also known as the Federal National Mortgage Association. Fannie Mae is the largest buyer of mortgage notes in the United States. This means a lot of foreclosures and a lot of really good deals. Fannie Mae has a foreclosure website “homepath.com”. Search is available to anyone.

2) HUD – Also known as the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. HUD is a government agency. Most of the foreclosures here are on FHA type loans. FHA-insured loans fail, HUD bails out the mortgage company and sells the foreclosures. hudhomestore.com

3) BOFA – Also known as Bank of America. Bank of American is the largest bank holding company in the United States. They also bought the largest bankrupt mortgage company from a past life in the entire county. bankofamerica.reo.com/search/propertysearch.aspx

4) PASREO – Premiere asset services. PAS has an exclusive client who happens to be Wells Fargo. Also a very large bank and mortgage provider. PA handles Wells Fargo foreclosures. pasreo.com/pasreo/public/propertySearch.do

5) REDC – Real Estate Disposal Group. Also known as Auction.com. They are now the largest real estate auctioneer in the nation. Most of the inventory can be viewed online.