Saturday's Adventure

So, I wrote a contract last week.

This 1916 property was touted as a home with a "detached guest house." Located in a highly-questionable South Phoenix neighborhood, it was already rented, so as is convention, the contract stated the buyers would have the ability to view the property prior to opening escrow. Which is what we did Saturday afternoon.

By Arizona law, when one is faced with this situation, the tenants are given a two day notice someone will be traipsing through their home. Typically, this will also have the added benefit of notifying the tenant that their home is house is for sale. Normally, with circumstances like these, the selling agent--that would be the agent who represents the owner of the property--would be present because 1) the tenants might have unkind things to say about the home they live in and 2) it is his job. But, this was far from a typical situation.

The home, which is 101 years old, is a mish-mash of rooms, which apparently were added on throughout time when someone had nothing better to do. The family who is renting this place, is using the living room for a master bedroom, because to be fair, it is the largest room in the home for a bed. Both bathrooms were added on, as an afterthought, at one point or another. If someone added a guest house, they must have removed it, because we couldn't find one. And we looked.

On top of all this, the tenant was chatty, and shared with us all of the variables he could see associated with the home. He had lots of opinions about the maintenance, plumbing and insulation. He pointed out the hot water heater is barricaded with plywood and is in a room addition that serves no purpose, but was probably a back patio originally. Maybe. He didn't point out the lack of cleanliness or the fact the AC filter was conspicuously absent and his landlord's two-year-old AC is not going to last much longer if he doesn't get a filter.

While we--did I mention I brought Marty along with me?--were at the property, we were welcomed to the neighborhood with one of Phoenix's finest who made the rounds very slowly, several times. We didn't see him after a while because he might have had to tarry off to find out about the gun-fire that was happening right behind us. Oh, the tenant also pointed out the gang symbols graffiti on the front wall of the home that nobody had bothered to paint over.

In the end, wiser heads prevailed. My client, who wants to be in that neighborhood (that's for another blog) opted against the home because it doesn't have a guest house. And yea, it was the guest house that was the deal breaker.