The story of this couple, the Hosers, isn’t all that different from the others’.  They had their own contracting business, which, unfortunately, they began in 2007, just as the economy really started rolling downhill.  So they established a division of their business performing foreclosure trash outs – and soon discovered that new division was making most of the money.

If they hadn’t gone into the property preservation business – they might not have a business here in 2010.  It’s clear they discovered, as many others have, that property preservation is the biggest foreclosure business opportunity in today’s economy – and that discovery made all the difference to their bottom line.

Many others haven’t been so lucky in recent years.  But the fact is the property preservation opportunity is still out there – and even bigger than ever before.

Instead of foreclosures going away, as many so-called experts predicted last year, now they’re expected to continue in record numbers for at least the next two years.  All those vacant homes will require foreclosure trash outs as well as ongoing maintenance until they’re sold.  And that’s the job of property preservation companies.

If you’re in need of a new line of work – and looking for one that’s both easy and, in most cases, highly profitable (all you need is a truck and some basic tools) – think about property preservation.

With the right “insider” training, you’ll have an immediate competitive advantage – and no shortage of available work, depending on what area you’re in.    My brother Scott and I can give you that invaluable insider training – we have 20 years of experience in the field between us and we know what it takes to succeed.

If you or someone you know needs a new money-making career, please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join the fast-growing and lucrative property preservation business.

Well, this past July, the Los Angeles city council passed an ordinance requiring banks and other asset management companies to perform prompt foreclosure trash outs on abandoned properties they were responsible for, making it the biggest city to date to pass such a law.

There is usually a limbo period between the time when a mortgage holder is notified that they’re in default and the time when the lender actually takes possession of the property. That’s when the abandoned home begins to become an eyesore and a health hazard. As more and more foreclosures have been piling up all over the country, the longer it takes for lenders to take title.

The L.A. council is insisting the lenders begin attending to the properties as soon as the mortgage default notice is sent out. And they’re willing to fine the banks up to $100,000 if they don’t comply.

Other cities hit hard by foreclosure are considering similar laws, including Chicago and, one of the country’s biggest foreclosure hotspots, Las Vegas.

This means that the foreclosure business opportunity of property preservation is going to continue to heat up. Increased, urgent demand for foreclosure trash outs will be forthcoming from lenders suddenly under the gun.

Prompt property preservation is really necessary to help neighborhoods and even help public health. Read the story of this deceased woman’s home in Oregon at http://tinyurl.com/2drkftx – where neighbors are forced to live next door to mountains of rotting garbage and a home without power containing multiple refrigerators filled with spoiled food.

Obviously, we need to prevent these kinds of situations from happening – and swift foreclosure trash outs is the answer.

If you or someone you know needs a new money-making career, please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join the fast-growing and lucrative property preservation business.

In my new article, “Powering Up Property Preservation,” I quote Robert Klein, chairman and founder of Safeguard Properties, a national property preservation company, who talks about how selling foreclosed homes has become much more competitive.   Which means a whole new level of property preservation is required to restore foreclosures to a state comparable to other conventional real estate for sale.

It used to be enough that REO (Real Estate Owned) homes sold for less.  That was their main attraction to buyers.  Now that there are millions of REOs out there on the market, sellers want them to look better – and even smell better.

Believe it or not, language is even changing.   Safeguard, which does about 1 million property inspections a month, is beginning to call foreclosure trash outs “maid service” (no, I’m not joking) – and “cash for keys” is becoming known as “relocation assistance.”

When they start changing the words like that, you know it’s serious.  And you know it just means more of an expansion of work for property preservation companies.  The more they want to upgrade the look of an REO, the more they’ll need from foreclosure trash out companies…oh, excuse me, I mean “maid service” companies.

All kidding aside, no matter what they call the service we perform, they still need pros like our REO ResQ™ franchisees to deliver.  My brother Scott and I train our people to make sure they know how to handle any property preservation challenge – and that’s the kind of experience and expertise that outfits like Safeguard appreciate.

If you or someone you know needs a new money-making career, please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join the fast-growing and lucrative property preservation business.   We promise – nobody has to wear a maid’s uniform.  Yet!

But when it comes to the overwhelming number of vacant homes in communities all across America, there is something government can do right. Particularly local government.

I’ve written extensively in my articles and blogs about the blight of foreclosed homes that have yet to be processed or dealt with by the banks and financial institutions that now own them. These homes just sit empty month after month, becoming a bigger and bigger eyesore due to theft and vandalism, a bigger and bigger safety hazard, and driving local property values lower and lower.

This certainly does the banks no good – the homes end up losing more and more value by falling into increasing disrepair.

Fortunately, communities continue to fight back. In Aurora, Colorado, they began charging banks a fee to register foreclosures ($50 a year) and forced them to perform the necessary foreclosure trash outs. Those that did not register or hire property preservation companies to secure and maintain empty homes were fined $150 every 90 days.

To date, Aurora has collected $230,000 from this program, much-needed revenue in these tough times, which they partially use to clean up the homes that the banks are ignoring.

One such home, vacant for a year, was tackled recently by a local property preservation crew. They encountered four feet tall weeds – which were hiding a number of tires, an old air conditioner, three barbeque grills and a ton of trash, all of which had to be removed before they could even attempt to mow the grass (which more closely resembled a jungle at the moment). Imagine having that next door to you!

More and more counties, cities and towns are taking this approach to vacant homes. It’s effective, it keeps neighborhoods safe and it helps the areas in question bankroll clean-ups when necessary.

That’s a win-win for everyone.

Please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join the fast-growing and lucrative property preservation industry.

To begin with, the foreclosure crisis in America is far from over. As a matter of fact, signs point to it getting increasingly bleak.

In the first half of 2010, the number of foreclosures again broke all records – in large part, because old foreclosure inventory is finally being dealt with by the banks. There are millions of homes in that inventory still to come. That’s the past that’s continuing to haunt the housing market.

At the same time, there are a record number of mortgages that are in delinquency – that’s the future. The economic recovery is sputtering and homeowners who can’t find jobs are falling more and more behind on home payments. Many of them find it’s easier to just walk away from their houses.

All this adds up to more vacant properties than ever before sitting in America’s neighborhoods – continuing to drive down property values and hurting the well-being of communities.

Promptly performing necessary property preservation services and timely foreclosure trash outs goes a long way towards fixing these problems – and gets these homes back on the market for resale quickly.

Folks, property preservation is not only the biggest foreclosure business opportunity around – it’s also how we’re going to clean up neighborhoods and get the housing marketing back on track. It’s easy to get started in this business once you know what you’re doing – and once you do get started, the potential is amazing.

My brother and I have years of experience with foreclosures and property preservation. And we’ve trained many beginners who have had incredible success in this low-cost high-profit industry.

If you or someone you know needs a new money-making career, please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join the fast-growing and lucrative property preservation business. It’s good for the country – and great for your pocketbook!

One of those I wrote about in my article, “Foreclosure Trash Outs: When Lawns Turn into Jungles” – the transformation of an ordinary suburban lawn into a studio backlot set for a Tarzan picture.

Anybody remember the old “Oklahoma” musical lyric? Well, instead of the corn being “as high as an elephant’s eye,” it’s now the grass.

But just as big a problem, if not bigger? Air conditioning units are getting ripped off – and ripped out of the walls. It’s not just the A/C the thieves are after – it’s also the copper wiring, an incredibly popular target for vandals breaking into unoccupied homes.
Brokers all across the country bemoan the fact that this is happening – one broker just gets around the entire problem by not bothering to reinstall the A/C an hour before escrow closes!

Here’s a better idea – and it involves property preservation coming to the rescue again! Camille Swanson, a broker at Realty Executives in Phoenix, Arizona, figured out that using a contractor to create a barrier around the A/C unit, either a locked gate or wall with no other exterior access, kept it safe from prying fingers.

“A/Cs usually aren’t installed in the front of properties so it’s not like they are right out on the street visible to everyone. Putting up a barrier if none exists may be just an added cost, but I think those costs are outweighed by the additional security gained,” Swanson said. “There are inexpensive ways to do everything. It just takes some creative thinking to come up with the right solution to the problem.”

Those of us doing property preservation and foreclosure trash outs have to find new and affordable ways to keep ahead of the vandals. With 3.8 million new foreclosures forecasted for this year alone, it’s pretty clear we’re going to have a lot of opportunity to innovate!

Please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join this fast-growing and lucrative industry.

But the other big thing to consider about our line of work? In a way, we’re singlehandedly saving America’s neighborhoods.

Maybe that sounds egotistical, but foreclosures are at all-time highs. When our property preservation services aren’t utilized, when foreclosure trash outs aren’t performed and these vacant homes are not secured, they become a completely destructive element in neighborhoods – attracting crime, vandalism and becoming more and more of a safety hazard.

In my new article, “Just Like a Good Neighbor,” I talk about a property services company that began leaving door hangers on homes next door to foreclosures that they secured. The door hangers featured an 800 number residents could call if they saw something fishy happening at the foreclosure next door.

How smart is this? Incredibly smart – on several levels.

First of all, you suddenly have these people helping your company out – they’re watching the home for you and letting you know if anything has gone wrong. And they’ll do it because it’s their neighborhood and they have an investment in keeping it in good shape.

Second of all, their name and services get advertised all over the place. They become synonymous with foreclosure trash outs and property preservation services.

Third of all, they position themselves as the good guy – they’re the ones actually maintaining these homes and holding the neighborhood together.

To sum up, in one fell swoop, they enlist free help, aggressively market their names and make a good name for themselves in neighborhoods all across the country.

All of us property preservation specialists can learn a lot from this example about how to both market ourselves and also help neighborhoods stay safe. We all need to remember that, at this historic point in time, being a good neighbor and being a successful property preservation company go very much hand-in-hand.

Please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join this fast-growing and lucrative industry.

But in a lot of areas of America, there’s no legal obligation to perform them either. Which is a big reason that a lot of local legislators have now decided to create that obligation, as you can read in my new article, “Foreclosure Trash Outs Battle the Blight.”

When vacant homes are allowed to sit without any repairs or maintenance, they quickly become an eyesore and a safety hazard, as local communities all across the country have sadly learned in recent years. That’s why more and more city councils, county governments and state legislatures are passing more and more laws to hold the big banks who own those properties accountable.

That’s good news for all of us in the property preservation field. Yes, it’s true that property preservation is already the biggest foreclosure business opportunity. But the fact is that there are still hundreds of thousands of houses out there that still need foreclosure trash outs and repairs – and hundreds of thousands more on the way.

But it’s not just good news for us. It’s also good news for everyday Americans trying to keep their neighborhoods safe and secure.

That’s why I hope to see more lawmakers take action to keep foreclosures in compliance with city and community housing codes. Not because it means more work for us – most property preservation companies have all the work they can handle these days – but because those of us in the business know how quickly homes can deteriorate when they’re both unoccupied and uncared for.

Again, we have one of the largest foreclosure overloads in our country’s history happening right now – one that’s continuing despite the economic recovery. Anyone who saw the recent “60 Minutes” report on people walking away from their mortgages realizes that (you can view the story at http://tinyurl.com/28muqcc).

So let’s make property preservation the law of the land – so we can save neighborhoods and keep these houses fit for resale. It’s really in all of our best interests.

Please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join this fast-growing industry.

Well, the economy continues to give us a lot of difficult “lemons” – including an incredible number of home foreclosures, with another record number hitting the real estate market in March.

Consider these facts:

• 29% of all home sales are REO properties (homes that have been through foreclosure). In Las Vegas, that figure is 49%.
• More mortgages are currently in default that ever before
• Official estimates say that there are at least three years worth of REO properties that are still to come through the pipeline
• JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America both expect their REO portfolios to increase by double-digit percentages by December

While the stock market is doing well at the moment, average working Americans still are not – and it will be increasingly difficult for them to keep up with their mortgages. Real estate prices continue to fall and that will put more and more homeowners “underwater” – and in a position where the only realistic option for them will be to walk away from their homes and their loans.

That’s a lot of lemons, people. If you look at the data from all sources, it paints a bleak picture. And one of the only ways to make lemonade from this kind of bad news is to enter into the biggest foreclosure business opportunity available – the property preservation business and performing trashouts on these vacant homes.

These foreclosures, of which another massive wave is expected in the coming months according to both the big banks and real estate analysts, will all need trashouts, securing, repairs, and ongoing maintenance until they are resold. And that’s the job of property preservation specialists, which we train on an ongoing basis at our nationwide franchise at REO ResQ™.

Even though no one wants to see massive amounts of foreclosures, they do at least provide an opportunity to those who desperately need it in a time of high unemployment.

Our franchise, REO ResQ™, was designed to help anyone who wants a shot in this profit-making business get trained and set up in a matter of weeks. You don’t need experience, you don’t need a ton of money, you just need to make the move. Find out more about us at www.REOResQ.com and contact us through the site if you want to make that move.

And it’s been growing uglier and uglier over the last few years. Because the foreclosure process was traditionally slow and cumbersome – and totally unequipped to handle the massive amount it’s been forced to digest during the Great Recession – more and more vacant homes in more and more neighborhoods have become more and more rundown and in desperate need of a trashout.

Graffiti. Gardens and lawns overgrown with weeds. Insect-infested pools. Broken windows. Unsafe interiors. Copper pipe ripped out of the walls. Appliances stolen.

This is what many Americans, who pay their mortgages on time, have had to deal with sitting next door to them; unsightly, unsafe eyesores that bring down the value of their homes, threaten the well-being of their kids and attract crime and unsavory elements.

As I reported in my recent article, “More Foreclosures Trash Outs Coming Faster,” HUD has recently closed up some bureaucratic obstacles to vacant homes actually being classified as foreclosures and abandoned homes. Banks and financial institutions are finally beginning to process the backlog of REO homes they’ve accumulated.

That means it’s time to put property preservation professionals and mortgage field service companies on the job to perform trashouts and necessary repairs as soon as possible to clean up the face of foreclosure.

2010 is going to be a very challenging year – because the incredible numbers of homes that will require property preservation services and foreclosure trashouts will undoubtedly break more records. The amount of work is going to be overwhelming. But it’s necessary.

It’s time to face the face of foreclosure. And bring pride back to the American neighborhoods that have been negatively affected by the housing crisis.

Please visit our REO ResQ™ franchise site at www.REOResQ.com for more information about how to join this fast-growing industry and learn how to perform foreclosure trashouts.