[Revi]

I was wondering why some of these areas aren't occupied. I would think that a house for a dollar would attract people, but the property taxes probably scare them off.

The crime is a major factor as well.

I live in a semi-alive mill town and am thinking of moving out if the crime rate doesn't go down some.

It isn't the Bronx yet, but it's not getting any better either.

[MarkJ]

Many dirt cheap city homes at tax auctions aren't purchased due to back taxes, water/sewer bills, liens, high property taxes, small or nonexistent yards, no room for expansion, zero/limited street parking, zero/limited off-street parking, shared driveways, close neighbors, no privacy, no insulation, no ventilation, leaking roofs, 3/4/5 layers of shingles, crumbling chimneys, single pane windows, fuse boxes, knob and tube wiring, antique furnaces/boilers, crumbling foundations, no drainage, water infiltration, dirt basement floors, structural issues, water damage, fire damage, lath, plaster, lead piping, lead paint, lead solder, asbestos on furnaces/boilers/piping, asbestos siding, shingles, flooring, roofing, plaster and adhesives, neighborhood blight, crime, poor school systems, poor roads/streets/sidewalks, poor water pressure, cracked/root-filled sewer piping...too much to list.

Many homes have also been stripped of copper piping, wiring, cabinets, plumbing fixtures, electrical fixtures and vandalized. Many homes haven't been winterized properly, so water/boiler piping cracked causing water damage as well.

Renovating homes in bad neighborhoods is challenging due to theft or vandalism of finished work, materials, tools, equipment, vehicles, hardware etc. Working on city properties with limited parking is challenging as well since you don't have room for trucks, vans, commercial vehicles and equipment, dumpsters, trailers etc. The extra security measures due to theft and vandalism add a lot to the cost of a job when you can't leave trucks, tools, materials and equipment onsite.


The properties become huge liabilities since the new owners have X months to bring the properties up to code. Since you can't view the insides of many of the homes, you have to assume that they'll have to be completely gutted, completely retrofitted, or even demolished.


Since these homes have been vacant, building, mechanical, safety, fire and local code violations are no longer grandfathered in. Even if the owners still perform some of their own work, they'll have to hire licensed plumbers, licensed electricians and licensed/certified lead/asbestos abatement contractors to perform much of the work.

The cost of bringing these older city homes up to modern code is often substantially more than a much newer, much better existing home in a much better area. Your reward for renovating these homes is a high assessment and high property taxes.

Many buyers are afraid to buy existing homes since they're currently grossly under-assessed, so the assessment will increase substantially due to the much higher purchase price, plus renovations.

In the high tax urban areas, property values are very low, and there are so many vacant, abandoned or condemned properties that they have to raise tax rates to compensate for lower values and loss of tax base. This makes it extremely unattractive to build new construction homes. This also makes it much more difficult to grieve property taxes on existing homes since they have more people than ever grieving their taxes and fewer taxpayers to absorb the property tax reductions.


The loss of commercial and industrial water customers has also increased water/sewer rates.