“I truly would not have my home if it wasn’t for RealtyTrac. Your website is awesome. My new home is killer beautiful.”
Lisa Hanson
Stockton, Calif.
A Beautiful Foreclosure at a Killer Price
While she was growing up in Birmingham, Ala., Lisa Hanson remembers her mother frequently repeating the following phrase: “The roof over our heads is our security blanket.”
It’s a timeless aphorism that recently helped Hanson, who was seeking a new start in life after a divorce.
“As a single woman, I wanted a gated community where I felt secure,” said Hanson, who was looking for a large home in the Stockton, Calif., area where she could easily run her wholesale business selling women’s hats. She also wanted a newer home with lots of living space to easily accommodate her twin boys and entertain her family and friends.
“I was doing research exclusively on RealtyTrac when I came across the home I’m currently living in,” added Hanson. “I was using the maps and zeroing in on neighborhoods I liked,” she said, referring to RealtyTrac’s interactive foreclosure search map.
In August 2008, two days before a ‘for sale’ sign went up, Hanson noticed a foreclosure property on RealtyTrac in a neighborhood she liked. She jumped in her car, drove to home and couldn’t believe what she saw.
“It was amazing. The two-story, Mediterranean-style home was located on an 18-hole golf course. It had full granite countertops in both the kitchen and bathrooms,” she said. Nestled in an exclusive gated community north of Stockton, the 4,700 square-foot home also had five bedrooms and four-and-half bathrooms, with a huge courtyard and an outdoor spa overlooking the links.
Hanson wrote an offer right away, bidding $11,000 over the list price of $524,900 — and got the home. Two years earlier, the same house sold for $1.2 million. “I truly would not have my home if it wasn’t for RealtyTrac. Your website is awesome.”
Hanson describes her home as “killer beautiful,” and she said she feels extremely secure in its cozy gated neighborhood. The businesswoman is planning a house-warming party soon so that “all my friends can see my beautiful home.”