Squatters, holdovers and the difference between them
The two situations look alike from the street and are not quite the same. A holdover tenant started out lawfully. There was a lease, it ended, and the tenant stayed on. Squatters never had a right to be there at all, or had one that lapsed a long time ago.
Either way the practical position for the owner is identical. Somebody is in your property, you are carrying the costs, and getting them out is not fast. We buy in both situations and we do not ask you to work out which one you have before we make an offer.
Making an offer on a Wyandanch house we cannot enter
We make offers on houses with squatters that nobody has been inside for a long time. That is normal work for us rather than an exception, and it is a large part of why owners in this position call a cash buyer first.
Give us the outside, the age of the property, whatever you knew about the condition before the occupancy began, and anything you have been told since. That is enough for a written number.
Why local knowledge changes the number
A four-bedroom on Mt Avenue. A three-bedroom on Beech Street. A two-bedroom on Irving Avenue. All of them in Wyandanch, all bought by us.
Wyandanch is roughly 12,046 people in Suffolk County, ZIP 11798, and the housing stock is mostly cape cod, ranch, multi-family. Around Wyandanch LIRR station and Geraldine Park, most of it is old enough that the mechanicals are on their second or third life. The Wyandanch stop pulls buyers who commute, which supports the good houses and does very little for the ones that need a roof. We have bought enough here to know which streets take water, which blocks still have oil tanks in the ground, and what the Wyandanch Union Free School District does to a resale price.
Listing a house with a holdover tenant still in it
Most contracts require the seller to deliver vacant possession at closing. For an owner facing holdover tenants that is a promise nobody can safely make, because the date depends on a court rather than on the seller.
So the sale becomes conditional on something outside your control, and those deals collapse. Ours is not written that way. We take the property occupied and the occupancy becomes our responsibility at closing.
How we help Wyandanch owners with squatters or holdovers
Owners sometimes call us apologetically, as though having squatters in a property reflects on them. It does not. It happens to careful people, particularly with a house that sat empty after a death in the family or during a renovation.
We take it from wherever it is. Tell us what you know, we will tell you plainly what we can pay and what we would do next in your position, and we will put you in front of an attorney if that is what the situation needs.
How selling a house with squatters or holdover tenants in Wyandanch works
- 1
You tell us about the house
An address in 11798 and a rough idea of condition. Two minutes on the phone or the form. We do not need photographs, a clean house, or anything fixed first.
- 2
A quick look in person
We visit once and it rarely takes more than half an hour. On the cape cod or ranch houses that make up most of Wyandanch, we check the roof, the boiler and the electric before anything cosmetic.
- 3
We put a figure in writing
You have a written number within 24 hours, a single figure rather than a "somewhere around". Feel free to check it with a Suffolk County agent. When a house is ready to list as it is, listing can beat us, and we would rather you knew.
- 4
You choose when to close
Soon, or months away if probate, a tenant or your next move has to come first. You also avoid the 87 to 102 days a listed Wyandanch house typically takes to find a buyer and get through the buyer's mortgage.
Selling a Wyandanch house in the middle of a case
Owners who have already started a holdover case often assume they are committed to seeing it through. Usually they are not committed to seeing it through personally.
We have taken houses on mid-proceeding more than once. The costs and the waiting from that point become ours. What matters for the offer is an accurate picture of where things stand, including anything that has not gone your way, because surprises late in a deal help nobody.
What you do not pay when you sell a house with squatters or holdover tenants
Every line below is a cost of listing a house with squatters or holdover tenants the retail way that simply does not arise here.
- Agent commission
- $34,250 at 5% of the Wyandanch median none
- Seller closing costs
- About $13,700 on a $685,000 sale. We can cover these. none
- Repairs to make it listable
- The work it needs to show well, out of your pocket first none
- Cleanout and removal
- Charged by the truckload, and done before the first showing none
- Carrying costs while it waits
- Taxes, insurance and utilities while you spend 87 to 102 days finding a buyer and waiting for their loan none
The comparison, made honestly
The honest comparison is our number against what a listing on a house with squatters in it produces here. Months of carrying a property that earns nothing, commission at the end, and a buyer pool limited to people who can close without a lender.
The median house in Wyandanch sold for $685,000 and took about 42 days to go under contract, then another 45 to 60 days waiting on the buyer's mortgage. That is 87 to 102 days in total, for a house that was ready to show on day one. We are happy to walk through it with you even if the conclusion is that you should wait.
Common questions
Will you buy a Wyandanch house with squatters in it?
That is work we do regularly. Tell us what you know about who is in there and how long they have been there, and we will put a written number on the house.
My tenant's lease ended and they will not leave. What now?
That is a holdover situation, and the first call is a landlord-tenant attorney, because the New York rules here are specific and they change. We can give you a name. Alongside that we can make you an offer on the house as it stands, so you can see both roads at once.
How long does it take to get somebody out?
Longer than owners expect, and that is the honest answer. Proceedings in New York are slow. If the uncertainty is the part you cannot live with, selling moves it off your side of the table entirely.
Do you need to get inside before making an offer?
No. We make offers on houses we have not been inside regularly, and we will not ask you to force access on anyone. We price conservatively where we cannot see and say clearly what we assumed.
Will the neighbors know the Wyandanch house is being sold?
Nothing about the sale is public until it closes. That matters more than usual here, because a property with squatters in it does not need the extra attention.