THE OVER-EAGER FORECLOSURE CONTRACTOR

We train our REO ResQ™ franchisees to be incredibly efficient. They pride themselves on delivering trash out services on deadline and getting the job done on time.

But a recent story that came to my attention demonstrates that maybe a property preservation company can be too efficient!

Ted Poetsch, a man who lived his entire life in the same Minneapolis house, had been fighting legal battles for three years to keep his home. He ended up losing his final chance to avoid foreclosure this past May, and, in the middle of having lunch, he found out the city inspector, who had deemed the house unsafe to live in, had given him an hour’s notice to pack up everything and leave.

That’s almost an impossible task when you’ve been in the same place for 53 years. But Ted gave it a try.

As he was packing a few things, he happened to hear the noise of a power drill near his front door…

…and he discovered the house had been boarded up – with him still in it! And he had no way to get out.

Ted called his lawyer, who came over with a cordless screwdriver to unscrew the boards so Ted could finally escape – but then the lawyer discovered that special screws were used to board up homes and his screwdriver wouldn’t work.

So basically Ted was trapped inside a home that had been declared unsafe.

Finally, two hours later, a neighbor managed to pry off a board large enough so that Ted – and his 12 year old cat – could finally escape.

A representative for the contractor said that it was company policy to yell inside to see if anyone was in the house – apparently this particular crew didn’t yell loud enough. To be fair to the contractor, this was apparently the first time they had boarded a person inside a home. But they might want to invest in a bullhorn before the next house boarding – because apparently yelling just doesn’t do the job!

All I know is that we’d be doing some yelling at our own property preservation franchisees if one of them ever did anything like that. But we’ve got some awesome people with REO ResQ™ – and I can guarantee that’s not the kind of mistake they’re ever going to make. Visit us at www.REORESQ.com for more about our franchise.

Incidentally, they finally allowed Ted back to the house to get the rest of his belongings – but they wouldn’t take off the boards first. Not too helpful!

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