There was plenty of time for people to line up for a possible foreclosure bargain in the Westville hills. No one ended up taking it.
Instead, the ranch-style house at 250 Kohary Dr. went to the bank in a foreclosure sale Saturday. The bank had no competitors bidding against it.
The house has been in foreclosure since April. In July, a judge ordered the house sold at auction. Saturday, as court-appointed sale attorney Peter Lachman (at left in photo) stood by the curb, the noon deadline came and went: No one showed up to bid. The home, with an appraised value of $185,000, went by default to the bank, Wells Fargo, that foreclosed on the property. Lachman said the bank had faxed him a bid of $157,067.13 before the sale.
Lachman said he believes the high bid had scared off some potential bidders who called his office to inquire about the auction.
“It’s really all about the amount of the mortgage debt versus the appraised value,” he said. “If the bank’s bid had been just a little lower, I think there would have been some interest.”
Other bidders, he said, might have been put off by the fact the house was locked, making it difficult to see whether there was any damage inside.
“I put in a request for a locksmith to the court, but they didn’t get to it,” he said.
The house, he said, appeared to have been vacant for some time, and former owner Kenneth Kaplin did not appear in court to fight the foreclosure proceedings.