Bargain Home Buyers: Get On the Bus!

Photo of bungalows in Monrovia by Living in Monrovia via Flickr

The City might not want to help you buy a home, but the Repo Bus Tour will help you find one.

A driving tour of SGV neighborhoods has been assembled by Pasadena-based LTV Real Estate, reports the Pasadena Star-News. The tour takes prospective home owners through parts of Duarte, Covina, West Covina, Monrovia, and Pasadena, and shows them homes that are in foreclosure and on the market for less than $350,000.

The tour's founder, Cesar Dias, has been called opportunistic, while others herald him as being clever. While it is perhaps a bit unsavory to make a living off the misfortune of those current home owners who have fallen prey to the housing market and financing woes of the nation, if the homes ultimately need to be sold, it remains for a realtor to bring buyers to the properties.

Dias is also getting in on the cash-potential by marketing the bus tour to other real estate companies, and selling them the concept as a bundle, including the logo, marketing materials, and so on. Tours have been happening for the past several weeks in Vegas, Orlando, Jacksonville, and San Diego, among other cities. Cringeworthy? Perhaps. Clever? Definitely. So if you want to buy a house under market value from under someone who had to give theirs up, you might want to get on the bus.