As an established real estate team in Montrose, we often run into unique situations that require out-of-the-box thinking and make for memorable transactions. While these true stories are often unbelievable, they certainly keep things interesting! Here are just a few honorable mentions from our real estate memories:
Back in the Montrose foreclosure boom of 2010, I remember showing SO MANY foreclosure homes. I remember one month where 40% of our sales were bank-owned properties. The adventure was that you never knew what you were going to see when you cracked open the door. Broken windows, missing light fixtures, gnarly toilets… I definitely have two favorites. The first was in a house we as realtors affectionately called “Fort Knox” because of the massive fence around the property. This home had a charming toilet in the basement with an AQUARIUM for the back water tank! The second was a home located “out in the boonies” with a shop that had very special plumbing. The plumbing piece I would like to label the “Red Neck Urinal.” Yes, you heard right. It was a rubber hose threaded from the inside to the outside with a funnel on the one end! Good times.- On one gorgeous 80’s home I listed with over 3,000 square feet of living space, we went under contract after a fairly short time on the market. Things went smoothly until the inspection process. The inspector found evidence of an animal, presumed to be a packrat or squirrel inhabiting the attic that had done some damage. The buyers balked, wanting to back out of the deal because of the problem. The seller happened to know a wildlife biologist and brought him out to take a look. It was then discovered the intruder was a Northern Flicker bird, also known as a woodpecker common to Colorado. This mother Flicker bird has a habit of returning to the same area to nest every year and had taken up residence in the attic in recent years. Fortunately, the protected mother Flicker wasn’t currently inhabiting the nest, so the biologist was able to remove the bird remnants and the transaction was able to move forward and close on time. So, if you think a mother Flicker doesn’t have the potential to derail a real estate transaction, you would be wrong!
During the Great Recession, Montrose had its fair share of foreclosures. One of my favorite foreclosure stories turned out great in the end but was a wild ride. I was representing the buyer of a really nice higher-end foreclosed home. We were under contract and still within our inspection period. One day I get a call from the buyer. “Diana, we have a problem. Someone stole the appliances out of the house.” These weren’t nasty appliances. These were expensive stainless steel appliances. I met the sheriff at the house with the seller’s agent, and we gave him all the details we knew. The next day, my extremely sharp and clever buyer calls me to tell me he found the exact appliances, pictured in the actual house (with the very noticeable kitchen tile visible) on Craigslist. The thieves actually took a picture in the house of the appliances before they stole them and posted it on Craigslist that night with an email and phone number! Needless to say, these culprits were caught before they kept up their foreclosure appliance theft tirade. My buyers are now friends of mine, and, to this day, we still laugh at this crazy experience!
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Copyright 2021 Atha Team at Keller Williams Colorado West Realty, LLC. If you have a brokerage relationship with another agency, this is not intended as a solicitation. Equal opportunity housing provider. Each office is independently owned and operated. For sale by owner data not included in research findings. Sales data reflects sales from homes not limited to the Atha Team LLC. This information was gathered from Keller Williams, The National Association of Realtor, CoreLogic data analysis firm, Montrose Association of Realtors, and the Mortgage Brokers Association. This data is considered accurate, but is not guaranteed. All Rights Reserved.