You can find a great deal on your next home by looking for pre foreclosure homes. Pre foreclosure homes are homes that are in the process of being foreclosed on. The homeowners have the option of paying all of the past due mortgage payments on the home in order to keep it, but at this point the owner may not be able to pay, or may just want to get out of the home and start over somewhere else. If you can find pre foreclosure homes and talk to the owners, they may be very willing to sell you their home for just what they owe on it in order to save their credit from the horrors of a foreclosure.

Finding pre foreclosure homes is not as difficult as you might think. There are many web sites that compile this kind of information for you. You can also check with your county clerk to find out where the records on pre foreclosure homes are kept and search them yourself. Records on pre foreclosure homes are public and you have every right to look at them.

Once you have found the pre foreclosure homes that you might be interested in, draw up a proposal for the homeowner that will help them get out of the foreclosure process. Don't take too much time, though, because once pre foreclosure homes are on the books, the foreclosure process is already in play and you may end up waiting for the home to go on the auction block, which will certainly cost you more than the homeowner was willing to accept for their pre foreclosure homes.

Some of the web sites that compile lists of pre foreclosure homes will charge a fee for this list. Make sure you do some research on the web site before you spend your money on their list. Find out what people are saying about their service by searching the name of the company on the internet. Check with the Better Business Bureau for complaints. Some of the sites that offer lists on pre foreclosure homes aren't updated and the time has already passed on the pre foreclosure homes that they have listed. But once you find a good list of pre foreclosure homes it is well worth the price of the list in order to save the time and hassle of searching county records on your own, and often these sites are able to find things that you may not.