Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: Tenant living in foreclosed home

OK, let's take this line by line, as there are a lot of questions and issues presented:

If you are still in the old property on Day 61, you will probably be served with an unlawful detainer lawsuit, as your presence is now unlawful. If you don't respond to the summons and complaint in the relatively brief time allotted, the new owner will enter your default and ask for a default judgment and a writ of possession. A few days after that, the sheriff will carry out an eviction, if necessary carrying you out too. All this may take more than two weeks, but it might not, depending on how fast the new owner moves and how crowded the court's calendar is...I don't do very many UDs and I don't have a good feel for the odds of your getting an additional two weeks, so if you can negotiate a deal where the owner doesn't file a suit and you pay rent for an additional two weeks, this would be much to prefer.

The rest of your inquiry sounds as though you are trying to buy two places at the same time. If you indeed have the cash and credit to do this, more power to you, and showing this to the new owner at your present residence might take some of the heat off you. If you only want to be in contract to buy one property, however, it sounds to me as though you are running some risk of being over-committed.

There can be a two or three business-day lag between a sale at which "the bank" or some other new owner is the successful bidder at a foreclosure sale and the date the successful bidder actually has the recorded trustee's deed firmly in its clutches. The new owner's ownership, however, dates back to the date of the sale, but it may not be in a position to deal with third-party buyers until it has a hard copy of the deed, showing recording.

I assume the person you refer to as the "realtor" is acting on behalf of the financial institution that now owns the property. Keep in mind that this person is retained by them to work on their behalf, and there is a natural tendency to think of tenants in repossessed houses are problems, not opportunities. If you are a qualified buyer (i.e., have the down payment and the credit), show her or him; that'll get you due respect. Another possibility is to hire your own buyer's agent who is responsible to you, not the seller.