Real Estate Agents Eligible For Combat Pay? Squatters In Vacant Foreclosures Increase The Hazards In Showing Homes

In Contra Costa County, California, The Mercury News reports:

• [S]elling homes in East Contra Costa these days seems tough enough without walking into a squatter's den or break-in party pad. But that's what brokers say they find more often lately with the huge glut in bank-owned and vacant homes — raising safety fears among some agents and possibly crimping home values even further.

• Agents at one East County real estate office now tote pepper spray on walk-throughs and showings, in case they come across a belligerent dweller. More than a dozen agents have signed up for self-defense training, said Kirsten Amodeo, a Realtor with Coldwell Banker who is organizing the classes. During the Labor Day weekend alone, Amodeo said, she entered four houses to find destruction or signs of squatting.

• "It's absolutely absurd. Theft and vandalism and squatters. It's all over the place. The holiday weekend was the worst," she said, armed with a canister of pepper spray on a visit to one house. "I'm not trying to be a vigilante. I'm pretty tired of going into these houses and wondering. We don't know what's on the other side of the door."

For more, see Squatters in abandoned homes raise fears among East County Realtors.

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