There’s a glimmer of hope for the “Sunshine State” housing market, which is among the five “hardest hit” in the nation.

It was hit so hard, in fact, that investors near and far are now snatching up cheap deals left and right with cold hard cash.

Miami Herald reports today that a staggering 60 percent of South Florida purchases have gone to foreign buyers, pushing pending home sales in July up more than 40 percent in Miami-Dade county alone when compared to the year prior (2009).

Jack H. Levine, chairman of the board of the Miami Realtors, is “encouraged” with the latest numbers.

Here’s a snip:

“We are encouraged by the statistics for pending home sales in the South Florida real estate market even after the expiration of the homebuyer tax credit. While the number of pending sales has dropped slightly month-over-month, they are still significantly higher than they were a year ago.”

Unsurprisingly, more than half of the sales involve short sales or bank-owned foreclosures. These are typically deeply discounted — anywhere from 30 to 60 percent less than market value — because banks are eager to balance their books as quickly as possible.

That’s the reason cash is king right now.

But even if you don’t have $100,000 sitting in the bank, it doesn’t mean that you still can’t find an awesome deal. The foreclosure pool in South Florida is deep, but as you can see, the best deals are skimmed off the top early and often.

You need to act fast!

A great way to stay on top of the latest and greatest foreclosure listings hitting the market is to subscribe to our free email alerts. To the hottest deals in your area delivered to your inbox click here.

Buyer beware!

It’s perhaps the most important nugget of advice as it relates to investing in and/or buying foreclosed homes.

What you see isn’t always what you get, especially when distressed properties hit the auction block. Whether it’s a structural problem that costs thousands to fix or an encumbrance on the title that is virtually not fixable, foreclosures are inherently risky investments.

The Strand family, which purchased a deed at a foreclosure auction earlier this year for $96,000 cash, found out the hard way.

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

“Apparently, unbeknownst to us, Wachovia sold us a worthless second mortgage that was part of a piggyback loan made to the” previous owners. Both loans were originated, signed and recorded on the same date. Rather than foreclose on both loans at the same time, Wachovia chose to foreclose, market and sell the worthless junior lien, purporting it to be the real property, which is what we purchased.”

That’s right, $96,000 on essentially, a worthless note. The first mortgage, which was worth about $298,000, was later reclaimed by the lender after it failed to sell at a separate auction.

The good news is that the Strand family and the lender “negotiated a confidential settlement.”

Nonetheless, the lesson is clear: Do your homework! Sure, there are loads of great deals hitting the auction block every day, but there are also a fair share of land mines that have the power to blow up your bank account.

To be safe rather than sorry, the report offers up these helpful tips for bargain hunters:

• Engage a real estate attorney and/or a professional investor.
• Hire a title company to make sure there are no liens.
• Observe some auctions before bidding.
• Research the property history at the county recorder’s office or subscription websites like RealtyTrac and ForeclosureRadar.
• Be prepared to pay cash.
• Understand that the property has no guarantees on title or condition.
• Consider buying a bank-owned property instead.

For more detailed information about buying foreclosed homes at auction we recommend that you also check out “Outsmart Experts at Foreclosure Auctions and Win!”

Good luck!

Get ready Missouri, Ohio, Utah and Wisconsin deal seekers:

RealtyBid.com, which has sold more than 25,000 foreclosed homes to investors throughout the nation in recent years, has more than 400 bank-owned properties hitting the auction block from Jan. 22 to Feb. 2, 2010.

It’s a 12-day super sale with inventory from one major lender. These properties MUST be sold!

Check out what’s available (For complete details click here):

• Missouri (CLICK HERE)
• Ohio (CLICK HERE)
• Utah (CLICK HERE)
• Wisconsin (CLICK HERE)

It’s a 12-day super sale with inventory from one major lender that has RealtyBid.com Executive Vice President Mike Keracher very excited for homebuyers/investors in the area.

Here’s a snip:

“As always, we have discount properties from around the country available on our website. However, one specific lender we are working with has supplied us with dozens of Ohio, Utah, Wisconsin and Missouri foreclosures to auction. This is a banner opportunity to buy homes in these states at unbelievable prices.”

All inventory will be auctioned at the lowest possible prices.

Remember that you have to submit your bids online. So head over to RealtyBid.com right now and familiarize yourself with the bidding process while you zero-in on the property that’s right for you.

Bidding is safe, easy, and compliant with all legal regulations. And you don’t have to be an experienced real estate expert to purchase a property.

To check out the homes for sale at the upcoming foreclosure auctions in Missouri, Ohio, Utah and Wisconsin, as well as to see when RealtyBid.com will auction homes in your area, click here.

Good luck!

It’s that time again.

REDC, one of the nation’s most reputable and successful real estate auction companies, will conduct public foreclosure sales from this Saturday (Oct. 10) through Thursday (Oct. 29) in several states, including Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee.

It’s six more consecutive days of super sales on condominiums and townhomes, as well as single- and multi-family properties. All told, 467 properties combined must be sold in less than one week.

Bids can start as low as $500 because everything must go!

If you’re looking to take advantage of the best real estate deals in these areas then definitely check out REDCs foreclosure lender auctions.

Here are the locations (For complete details click here):

• October 24 – Cobb Galleria Centre in Atlanta, Georgia
• October 25 – Raleigh Convention Center in Raleigh, North Carolina
• October 25 – The Westin Charlotte in Charlotte, North Carolina
• October 25 – Wilmington, North Carolina
• October 26 – Knoxville Convention Center in Knoxville, Tennessee
• October 26 – Savannah International Trade and Convention Center in Savannah, Georgia
• October 27 – Mobile Civic Center in Mobile, Alabama
• October 27 – Nashville Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee
• October 28 – Memphis Marriott in Memphis, Tennessee
• October 28 – Sheraton Birmingham Hotel in Birmingham, Alabama

Remember that you can bid in-person or online.

The process is safe, easy, and compliant with all legal regulations. And you don’t have to be an experienced real estate expert to purchase a property.

To check out the homes for sale at the upcoming foreclosure auctions in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee, as well as to see when REDC will be coming to a city near you, click here.

Good luck!

We hope that you take advantage of these rock-bottom prices and easy financing at today’s low interest rates while they last!

Five states, six days.

This weekend signals the start of huge opportunities for house hunters and investors in the Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri and Ohio markets looking to take advantage of the best real estate deals in their areas.

REDC, one of the nation’s most reputable and successful real estate auction companies, will conduct public foreclosure sales from Saturday (Oct. 10) through Thursday (Oct. 15).

That’s right: Six consecutive days of super sales on condominiums and townhomes, as well as single- and multi-family properties.

All told, 342 properties combined must be sold in less than one week. It’s the reason bids can start as low as $500 — everything must go!

Here are the locations (For complete details click here):

• Oct. 10 — Hyatt Regency O’Hare
• Oct. 11 — Indianapolis Marriott Downtown
• Oct. 12 — The Seelbach Hilton Louisville
• Oct. 13 — Renaissance St. Louis Grand & Suites
• Oct. 14 — DoubleTree Hotel Springfield
• Oct. 15 — Kansas City, Missouri Convention & Entertainment Facilities

Remember that you can bid in-person or online.

The process is safe, easy, and compliant with all legal regulations. And you don’t have to be an experienced real estate expert to purchase a property.

To check out the homes for sale at the upcoming foreclosure auctions in Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri and Ohio, as well as to see when REDC will be coming to a city near you, click here.

Good luck!

We hope that you take advantage of these rock-bottom prices and easy financing at today’s low interest rates while they last!

This is a big weekend for house hunters and investors in the Florida and Minnesota markets looking to take advantage of the best real estate deals in their areas.

REDC, one of the nation’s most reputable and successful real estate auction companies, will conduct public foreclosure sales on Saturday, Sept. 19, with bids on homes that start as low as $500.

Condominiums and townhomes, as well as single- and multi-family properties, are all on the block and up for grabs for ridiculously cheap prices.

You can bid in-person or online.

The process is safe, easy, and compliant with all legal regulations. And you don’t have to be an experienced real estate expert to purchase a property.

To check out the homes for sale this weekend in Florida and Minnesota, as well as to see when REDC will be coming to a city near you, click here.

Good luck!

We hope that you take advantage of these rock-bottom prices and easy financing at today’s low interest rates while they last!

Classes meet every Thursday morning at the Palm Beach County Courthouse in West Palm Beach, Fla., at 9:30 a.m. ET. Call (866) 382-2439 today to reserve your spot!

Boca Raton, Fla. — Foreclosure.com (www.foreclosure.com) today announced that it has detected a 30 percent increase in sheriff/trustee sale cancellations when it compared March 2009 data to figures from exactly one year ago, signaling that banks and lenders are having success resolving loan situations with distressed borrowers in default.

It’s a positive sign that could mean more people are avoiding foreclosure and staying where they should be: In their homes.

“While not the smoking gun that the housing market is on the road to total recovery, it is good news nonetheless,” said Foreclosure.com Vice President James Houston. “Being in the midst of a foreclosure situation is a very difficult place to be. And the fewer homeowners who have to experience it the better it is for everyone.”

Foreclosure.com breaks down the foreclosure process into three simple steps: preforeclosures, sheriff/trustee sales and post foreclosures/REOs. Sheriff sales — also known as trustee sales in states such as California that primarily observe non-judicial foreclosure laws — are homes facing foreclosure that are scheduled to be put up for public auction.

These public auctions typically take place at county court houses or other public places such as libraries. It is often the last chance for a homeowner who has defaulted on his or her mortgage to cure the loan before it is either sold to a new buyer or repossessed by the bank/lender.

And the fact that sheriff sale cancellations are up means that distressed homeowners and their lenders are finding common ground.

“Refinances, loan modifications and short sales are all great options that can rescue cash-strapped homeowners from foreclosure situations,” said Houston. “Most loss mitigation departments nationwide have been flooded with these types of requests. Now it appears that progress is being made … baby steps.”

Houston also points to the recently introduced “Making Home Affordable” program, which is a federal program created to help millions of homeowners refinance or modify their Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac mortgages as a possible reason for the jump. The goal of the plan is as its name suggests — make mortgages more affordable to short circuit the foreclosure process before it even happens.

There are five top reasons that people end up in foreclosure, including unemployment, Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARMs), illness, divorce and death. Houston indicates that these factors and all others have clearly contributed to the current foreclosure situation; however, unemployment and “balloon” mortgages are the primary culprits.

“It’s a scary situation out there right now — people are hunkering down and doing what they can to get by on a daily basis,” said Houston. “But it’s not all bad news. Sheriff sale cancellations have increased and will hopefully continue to do so as the market begins to correct. It’s a small step in the right direction.”

Practice what you preach.

That’s the motto here at Foreclosure.com because it is impossible to run the most successful distressed real estate Web site on the Internet without everyone at every level having a firm understanding of the foreclosure process from the bottom up.

So it’s Thursday morning and instead of braving the commute south to our corporate headquarters in Boca Raton, Fla., I am headed east for the weekly “class trip” to the Palm Beach County Court House in West Palm Beach to provide Foreclosure.com staff members with a refresher course on the auction process.

It’s company policy that we offer this type of activity annually to introduce some of our new employees to the actual experience, as well as keep the topic fresh on the minds of our more experienced team members. From customer service to human resources to programming, all personnel types from every department at Foreclosure.com are invited to participate in the weekly excursions.

Let’s quickly take you through a typical day for us at the court house.

We try to keep the group size manageable so we don’t disturb the file room while going through the latest lis pendens filings. While checking in we are asked to leave a driver’s license in exchange to review the files, which is always amazing because of the sheer amount of paperwork that is involved.

As we sift through various files, I will take the class through the process of identifying the subject property, which takes a few page flips to pinpoint actual address and not the legal description of the property. This is a bit cumbersome, but it makes everyone appreciate what we are able to do at Foreclosure.com, distilling all the important information and presenting it in an easy-to-read, understandable and accessible format.

In short, most people just don’t realize how complicated and time consuming this process can be if they have to do it on their own manually.

After we give everyone a chance to review a file and try to find all the data that we report on our site, we take a few minutes and review a few of the files actually going to auction on this particular Thursday. As you would expect, the files are thicker because of the additional court filings for each foreclosure.

When we finish with the files we head downstairs into the cafeteria where the Sheriff Sale is already taking place. It’s real easy to tell who the area investors are, taking over one corner of the room with their eight-inch thick binders full of possible purchases.

In addition, there are usually several bank and lender representatives on hand in suits who are there to protect there assets — these representatives will typically place the minimum bids required on the homes to ensure that opportunistic investor’s don’t walk away with properties for pennies.

In fact, most sales these days go back to the bank … but not all them.

There is excitement in the room as a couple of the seasoned investors who are at the Sheriff Sale every week bid on properties every so often. These are calculated offers that the investors have spent weeks researching. And if the bids get too high, the investors usually back off right away and begin to feverishly search their notes for the next possible gem.

Of course, it’s common to also see former homeowners in the room to observe the proceedings — sometimes it’s just out of curiosity and for others it’s because they are there to stop the sale. In fact, just last week a homeowner was successful, delaying the sale because a motion had been filed to rescue the home.

We’re seeing more of this lately, actually, because more and more sales are being canceled as banks are inundated with short sales and bankruptcies.

All in all the foreclosure court house auction experience is unique and one that you must see with your own eyes to truly understand and appreciate. It changes from week-to-week, which is among the many reasons we encourage our employees to check-in from time to time.

As the auction winds down, the class is dismissed and we all head back to the office with a better and renewed understanding of the process and the value we provide folks like you on a national basis. And we’ll do it all over again next week.

And so, too, should you.

To check out upcoming foreclosure auction sales in your area visit Foreclosure.com today right here.