How to Buy a Foreclosure

You want to buy a foreclosure? Remember, there are both great opportunities and great pressures and pitfalls in this market.

First, you have to decide at what stage of foreclosure you want to buy. There are three options: 1. pre-foreclosure; 2. sheriff's auction; 3. repossession, called REO (for real estate owned by the bank).

"The safest and best way to buy is when it's a bank-owned property," said Rick Sharga, a spokesman for RealtyTrac, the online marketer of foreclosure properties.

Click to read: How to buy a foreclosure...