A condemned house, and no budget or skills to repair it? Joke, right? The town will bulldoze it under their neglect ordinances, bill you for the service, and you'll be left with the lot to pay property taxes on if you don't unload that to the first ''we buy ugly houses'' investor that comes along. Sell it at a loss now, or lose more money in the long term.

" the small PA town seems to be mainly comprised of welfare and disability money gatherers."

An interesting social assessment, from someone with a condemned income property.

"The last tenant we had, (also on welfare (4th tenant in a row like this!))"

You are aware that there are housing agencies which, had the property been in qualifying general repair, have systems and methods to have alleviated most of your difficulties.

"broke 8 windows,"

Malicious or retribution?

"cracked the foundation,"

Spent their leisure time with a sledge hammer?

"siding, one door, walls and left the house so badly in shape the township condemned it!"

And you had included the letter of condemnation in your post?

@snoonyb

You are very judgmental and snobby. I came to this forum for help, if you cannot do so then I do not need your snarky attitude. Did you think yourself smart and humorous?The "social assessment" came from facts which I have encountered these past few years. Had you bothered to read my post, the house has obviously become condemned recently, up until then it has been rented out for years. People go thru ups and downs at times, especially the elderly find themselves in a "when it rains it pours" situation and one straw is enough to break the camels back. Who the hell do you think you are judging me? What does having a condemned property to do with stating that many people seem to be on welfare? My parents even thru the toughest times have never taken welfare or what they think of as charity- if you are implying anything by that.
You have to be pretty dumb to sit there and make snarky comments like, 'did they use a sledgehammer' when you do not know the full story. Obviously in such a forum posters keep it short. Knowing such should you really have made smarta@@ comments? Not so smart are you?
I never said we have no budget to repair it, I said it is difficult putting down money upfront after being cheated once. My parents are "ekeing by", I did say, but I also asked for advice or ideas on how to proceed, again obviously we will be spending money.
No I am not aware about housing agencies that would help alleviate my problems. If I were would I have come to this forum to ask for ideas or knowledge? Obviously, you do not want to share any knowledge you do have, or you would have skipped the smarta@@ behavior and written to tell me more about these magical agencies that help private homeowners.
Thanks, for your worthless commentary to someone who was asking for advice, there are many harsh words I'd like to give you but I'm letting it go.

Thank you for affirming my original assessment.

The community development reinvestment act was started during the carter administration, used during the clinton administration to induce homeowners to offer residential properties under section 8 program, which are operated in virtually all municipalities in this country and continues to this day.

These programs there benefits and shortcoming have been in the news consistently from their beginning.

A single phone call will answer your question,

Maybe you could share the method employed by the "welfare recipient" to crack the foundation.

This post was edited by snoonyb on Sun, Jul 20, 14 at 0:05

My advice:

- join a local homeowner association where property is located. Become involved in fixing the urban blight. Good place to trade sources and knowledge. These organizations could have easily enlightened you on local reinvestment opportunities for the area.

- join an angieslist or something similar for reputable contractors. Get references and contact them.

- stop renting to high risk tenants.

Real estate is an investment that sometimes pay off and sometimes it doesn't. Sounds like yours is the latter.