Below Market Value (BMV) property offers the buyer a significant discount on its Open Market Value (OMV) but where do they come from?

 

Knocking 25% off the OMV is sure to increase the chances of a quick sale and there are many reasons someone may wish to sell a property cheaply including death, disability, retirement, an inherited property or moving abroad. One other source of BMV property is the responsible family who encounters financial challenges and decide it is best to sell their property to get out of the debt they can no longer afford to service. Finally, there is repossession, a last resort and never entered into lightly by any responsible lender as, apart from the social consequences, it is expensive and can damage hard won reputation. 

 

Following a reduction in or loss of income any mortgage payer can find themselves facing repossession. With no other sources of adequate income available, most honest people seek to resolve their situation by appealing to the lender, extended family members, or social benefits. Every caring person wants them to turn things round but sometimes, repossession is the only outcome.

 

Then there are others who shameless flaunt society's sense for decency and the following true story was reported by a lender (though the identity of the parties has been changed). 

Mr Smith died 8-years earlier. Mrs Smith was left to care for her wheelchair-bound son and couldn't pay the mortgage. Eventually an eviction notice had to be served. Mrs Smith reported she had had a brain haemorrhage so the lender dutifully deferred eviction in anticipation of medical evidence. Nothing came. A further eviction notice was served. The sister of Mrs Smiths informed the lender that her sister had been diagnosed with terminal breast cancer. More medical evidence was requested. Nothing arrived.

 

A third eviction notice was served. This time the lender was informed Mrs Smith had received a severe stroke.  On the day of the forth eviction notice to quit, Mrs Smith's mother died in the house and her sister informed the lender that probate had been delayed as there was a criminal investigation into the circumstances surrounding the death of her mother. On the date of the fifth eviction notice, Mrs Smith was carrying out her mothers funeral arrangements, nearly two years after her death, as her body had only just been released following Inquest.

An agent was dispatched to the Smiths house. He met Mrs Smiths sister and was told the family was waiting for probate and that her wheelchair-bound nephew was still being cared for. Later enquiries with neighbours revealed that Bob and Barbara Smith were at work. A phone call to their employer confirmed that they were indeed alive, and well.

Photographs were submitted to the hearing where Mrs Smith admitted she was the person in them, that she had no sister, and that she had hung bereavement cards in her window even though her mother had died 20 years before in France and, that she had no wheelchair bound son. During the hearing, Mr Smith collapsed and was taken to hospital by ambulance where he was instantly discharged. 

 

They had missed over 70 mortgage payment!

 

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