What if you gave away a house....

... and no one wanted it!

TWICE!

Local car dealer tried giving away a Kia and a home in Florida, pass.

NISKAYUNA -- Billy Fuccillo gave away a dream home on Tuesday. He called it that in his commercial while waving a huuuuuuuuuge key he called "the key to happiness, the key to pleasure, the key to ecstasy." But here's the question: Did anyone want it? Winners Frank and Shirley Sicko said they did, and were excited to own their first vacation home. But the Clifton Park couple won't move to Florida, and after learning more about the home's history, Frank Sicko sounded unsure about accepting it. That's because the "dream" three-bedroom house awarded Tuesday inside the Fuccillo Automotive Group store in Niskayuna had once fallen into foreclosure. It is in Cape Coral, Fla., which has been described as an epicenter of the nation's shattered housing market. The 1,400-square-foot home already was turned down once, by an East Syracuse woman who won a similar contest held earlier this summer. "I wasn't aware of that," Frank Sicko said about an hour after Fuccillo told him by phone that his name had been randomly drawn from about 10,000 others. "I would be sort of concerned about it." said Sicko, a retiree from the Norton Company in Watervliet. The Sickos won the Florida home and a car as grand prizes in a popular giveaway called Huge-A-Thon that drew thousands to Fuccillo's showrooms during August. Fuccillo said Tuesday that the store sold more than 1,250 vehicles during the promotion. At 7 p.m. Tuesday, about 50 people and several Fuccillo employees gathered inside the red-white-and-blue-decorated automotive dealership on State Street to observe the drawing for the home and car, which Fuccillo valued at about $150,000. "I'm really excited about changing someone's life tonight," Fuccillo said just prior to 7 p.m. Built at the height of the housing boom in 2006, the Cape Coral home fell into foreclosure before being purchased by Fuccillo's company for $70,000. The home could come with considerable cost to the winner, too, because for tax purposes its value will have to be claimed as income. The home sits on the northern fringes of the Florida city, which has a population of about 162,000 and is famous for its more than 400 canals. Such an abundance of waterfront property made it prime territory for development as the housing market hit its peak. This house, though, is on a dry lot about 30 minutes from the beach. "That's an area that was really built up in the boom," said Paula Hellenbrand, a past president of the Cape Coral Association of Realtors and owner of Encore Realty Services. The area also was one of the hardest hit during the bust. The house was first assessed at $167,830, according to the Lee County tax assessor's office. Records show the home was purchased with a mortgage valued at about $220,000. When the market went bust, the house went into foreclosure -- not an uncommon occurrence in Cape Coral. During July, the Cape Coral-Fort Myers area ranked second in the nation for foreclosure activity. A Fuccillo company called WBF Florida Properties II LLC bought the house in May at its listed price. Fuccillo said he bought the home while shopping for a company in the area. Cape Coral real estate agents estimate the property's value at between $70,000 and $90,000. By comparison, just a few years ago the 0.23-acre lot itself was worth at least $80,000, said Century 21 Sunbelt real estate agent JC Curbelo, who brokered Fuccillo's purchase of the house. "We were at the epicenter of the foreclosure problem," Curbelo said. But when a similar contest was held in Syracuse in June, the East Syracuse woman who won decided not to accept the house, a Fuccillo spokesperson said. Had she accepted, the woman would have had to claim the value of the home as part of her 2010 income, according to a spokesperson with the state Department of Taxation and Finance. She also would have paid a Florida tax of about $700, real estate agents said. The home's annual property taxes are about $1,700. The home was given away as part of a contest that began in July. With no purchase necessary, anyone 18 or older with a driver's license could enter to win at Fuccillo locations. Frank Sicko entered the contest a few weeks ago. "I never thought in a million years I would win." The Clifton Park man had purchased a Buick and a GMC from Fuccillo. He tried to buy a Hyundai Sonata earlier this year from His Hugeness, but the dealership didn't have the color the family wanted. As winner of Tuesday's huge drawing, Frank Sicko will now receive a free car, and they have chosen a Hyundai. He thanked Fuccillo. "I think he's a great man," Frank Sicko said.

when it said they were concerned with the history of the home i figured there was some bloody rape filled massacre there, not a foreclosure in its past... that sicko guy is a wuss if he is afraid of a little foreclosure.

patgizz wrote: when it said they were concerned with the history of the home i figured there was some bloody rape filled massacre there, not a foreclosure in its past... that sicko guy is a wuss if he is afraid of a little foreclosure.

He is probably afraid of the taxes due on $150k or whatever the assessed value is.

It would still be cheap for a vacation home and he could rent it out the rest of the year.

Well, seeing as it's in the North end of Cape Coral, it's about to be hit by Water and Sewer Assessments too. That could tack another 15k on to the price. The property tax quoted in that article is EXTREMELY low for a house that size. Mine is over that, and my house is only 1144sq. ft.

Just about half the houses on my street went into forclosure. Mostly because people started buying them as investments, and when the market tanked, they just walked away from them.

It's a free house!

You pay taxes ot whatever to own it, then you flip it. Selling for half of what it is assessed for is still a fair amount of FREE money.

And you get a Kia car.

Dan

914Driver wrote: It's a free house! You pay taxes ot whatever to own it, then you flip it. Selling for half of what it is assessed for is still a fair amount of FREE money.

No market to sell into from what I gather

It was assessed four years ago, maybe more. The value of the house right now is about $70k. If you could sell it amongst the other 150 houses in Cape Coral that are for sale at that price.

In the seven years I've lived in Cape Coral, my house has doubled in value, and then turned the other direction, to currently being less than 50% of what I paid.

I was thinking that if you paid $10 - $20,000 in sales tax, deed swap, Title search etc., sell it for $40,000 you win.

Wrong?

Doesn't matter, I didn't win.

Dan

The house might be VALUED at $70,000, but it's ASSESSED at nearly three times that amount. I have a house in Jacksonville, Fl. and agree, that the property tax amount quoted in this article sounds WAAAY too low.

For a second/vacation home, this isn't a great prize. However, the Sickos are not all that smart if they can't move into it as their primary residence (Fl. has a "Homestead Exemption...or did have one, that allowed a portion of assessed value to be "forgiven" as long as you actually lived in the house) or if they can't "flip it" for a reasonable price.

don't want a free house? what a bunch of Sickos.

really, somebody had to

Florida has Dual homestead exemption. A house of that assessed value would get $50k worth of value knocked off before taxes were calculated. I think there is more to the story in some way. Otherwise the pay the taxes and flip it for $55k would be so simple even those Sickos could figure it out.

Pay the taxes, fight the assessment at the proper time(it's real value is $70-90k)file amended tax forms and get your overpaid taxes back. The real problem, as I see it is having to take the free Kia. Donate it and take the write off. End result= you now own a home in Fla. in a half empty neighborhood for not a lot of money. What's the problem with that? The lady that won the contest here in Syracuse was just stupid.

Here in the midwest we haven't really been hit much by declining values and foreclosures are still fairly rare (although there is one on my street). Still, it's bad out there. I've been kinda eyeballing around for a new house and have watched a very nice 2000 square-foot 3br/2bath in a decent location drop from 180,000 to 70,000 in the past few weeks. Short sale, and it looks like they have to get out from under it ASAP. Scary stuff.

I was tempted, but I don't like the land it's on.

I think they're freaking on the income tax hit - winnings count as income...the IRS will want about $25K or so on a 70,000 house/income. The dealer was valuing the deal at 150k (or about $50k in taxes)- so probably going to create a fight with uncle sam over value or they didn't want to deal with a mortgage on a free house if they didn't have some cash laying around to cover the gubment costs.

Tim Baxter wrote: Here in the midwest we haven't really been hit much by declining values and foreclosures are still fairly rare (although there is one on my street). Still, it's bad out there. I've been kinda eyeballing around for a new house and have watched a very nice 2000 square-foot 3br/2bath in a decent location drop from 180,000 to 70,000 in the past few weeks. Short sale, and it looks like they have to get out from under it ASAP. Scary stuff. I was tempted, but I don't like the land it's on.

SW Ohio has been hit pretty hard - we nearly couldnt buy our new house when a appraised (comp based - significant drop over 3 mos due to local foreclosures ) value < list price issue hit us with regards to our lender agreement (pre-approval conditions etc)...kinda scary indeed. as it is, the wife and I really have no choice but to stay put for a few years so that when (if?) the market rebounds, we have a shot at making a puny profit on our renovations (self labor = cheap = profit potential). theres the slim chance that if push came to shove, we could get out from under it for what we owe, but not really get anything for the paid principal. its a good house, just not much room (I want land and a workshop BAD). We are prolly stuck here for a few years, but its not the end of the world.

After my previous post I realized as others have here, the REAL problem is that "upfront" tax bill. Sure, if you sell the house you can get it back and more, but who has $70K they can lay their hands on? UNLESS....they borrowed it (could borrow it?) using the house itself as collateral on a short term loan?

Gotta admit, anyone looking to win a Kia, probably doesn't need this tax problem in their life.

There are several ares in Florida like this. Lehigh Acres on the west coast, Port St. Lucie on the east. I looked around a bit on the web and found one in Cape Coral listed at 12,500.00. In 2005 it sold for 120,000.00. Most neighborhoods have sale prices in the low 50's. Not a bad time to bring your money to Florida. My area has taken a bad hit,but nowhere near that bad.

I had been all too happy to forget about the HUUUGGGGGGGGGEEEE comercials