Deal or No Deal?

From the Sacramento Bee:

With a high-energy show of rock music, auctioneer chatter and free coffee for all, an Irvine-based foreclosure liquidator sold more than 100 Sacramento-area bank-reposed homes Saturday to the highest bidders.
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The spectacle showed a regional housing market in distress with mounting foreclosures.
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Winning bids Saturday ranged from $105,000 for a Sacramento house to $810,000 in El Dorado Hills for a property once valued at more than $1 million.

Winners, many of them real estate investors throughout Northern California, said they were happy with their bargains.

"I was going for $275,000 and I ended up bidding $300,000," said Bill Weldon...a retired English teacher who dabbles in real estate, ...who bought a 1,770 square-foot foreclosed home in Galt. "I figure instead of saving $100,000 I saved $75,000. It's still a good deal."

From the updated article:

Bob Somal and his real estate broker father, Narinder Somal, bought two houses, paying $240,000 for one in Stockton and $400,000 for another in Elk Grove. "We were going to go to $350,000," said Bob Somal. "We decided to go to $380,000. And our winning bid was $400,000."...The Somals plan to resell both houses.

Investor Heman Lee of Sacramento bid $350,000 for an 1,844-square-foot house in Elk Grove and plans to rent it. He called it a "good price.
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[S]ome overpaid, said watchful real estate agents. Seeing one Stockton house sell for $460,000, veteran Stockton agent J. Richard Sabbatini shook his head and said the house was not worth that much.

Some came to watch for practice, assuming there will be more auctions and better prices later this year or next. Others said they decided not to bid after seeing heavy traffic at open houses and such a large crowd.

"I just figured it was going to be prices higher than I'd like to pay," said Mesut Koch of Rocklin. Watching the frenzy, Koch said: "I don't think I would do well here. I'm not coming back." He said it looked easy for people to lose themselves and go $10,000 too far.

From News10 (also video):

Many homes valued at nearly $500,000 opened to bidders at just $250,000. But it didn't take long for the hot homebuyer competition to quickly drive many of those prices up. "I haven't heard of that many steals here," said Andy Adams, who drove to the auction from South Lake Tahoe.

But there were some bargains to be found. Pat and Satya Chaterjee won their bidding war for a Roseville home, paying about $15,000 under market value.

From KCRA (also video):

Auctions have become more prevalent as banks struggle with foreclosed homes. In the past year, homes in foreclosure jumped 212 percent in Sacramento County, 198 percent in Stanislaus County, and 192 percent in San Joaquin County.
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Alexis McGee, president of foreclosures.com, gives a warning to buyers. She said auctioneers have been known to put shills in the audience whose only purpose is to bid up the price of foreclosed homes.

CBS 13 video here.

From the Fresno Bee:

On steep courthouse steps partially shaded by 100-foot elms, a public auction crier called for bids Friday on Laci and Scott Peterson's former home. No one but the the local newspaper showed up.

So Julie Grimm, a foreclosure auctioneer with Dual Arch International, closed the bidding, closed her binder and walked away. And Modesto's most notorious piece of real estate became the property of a Simi Valley bank. The lender is owed more than the house is worth, documents suggest.

What a change from July 2005, when Gerry Roberts proudly announced to the world his triumph in steep competition for the rather humble cottage-bungalow...Roberts, a single father and real estate agent, bid $10,000 more than the asking price of $380,000 and declared he had just purchased "probably the most controversial home in the world" and moved in.

Roberts soon found himself out of a job and put the three-bedroom, two-bath home on the market, asking $479,900.

A few weeks later, Roberts tried hawking the home on eBay with full reference to the Peterson drama. An unidentified couple working with another broker later agreed to buy it for nearly $350,000 for their college-aged daughter and her friends, but backed out 35 days into escrow.

Countrywide Financial served Roberts a notice of default in October and set a February foreclosure date, postponed until Friday's public auction. Roberts filed for bankruptcy protection in February, listing $340,000 owed to the lender as his largest debt.