Empty houses and cottages
Selling a vacant house or second home in West Michigan
Get your cash offer
About two minutes. No obligation, no fee, and your details stay with us.
An empty house is never really idle: the tax bill, the insurance, and the furnace running for nobody all keep costing you, and each winter takes a little more out of the place. We buy vacant houses, cottages, and tired rentals across West Michigan, and you can sell one without making the drive back.
A local team, no obligation, and a real answer either way.
What does an empty house actually cost you?
An occupied house mostly looks after itself. Somebody notices the drip under the sink, the furnace that will not light, the door that stopped latching. An empty house has nobody. The tax bill still comes. The insurance bill still comes, and once a house has sat vacant beyond a couple of months, many policies restrict or drop coverage entirely. The vacant-home policy that replaces them costs more, not less. The utilities stay on, because a Michigan house with the heat off is a burst pipe waiting for January. Somebody has to mow it in July and clear the drive in February, or the neighbors start calling the township.
Empty houses also attract attention. Break-ins and vandalism find the place with the dark windows and the untouched porch. In an empty house, one bad winter or one broken window usually does more damage than whatever kept the owner from dealing with the house in the first place.
What does twelve more months of holding add up to?
Sit down with a piece of paper and run it forward one year. Twelve months of property taxes. Twelve months of vacant-home insurance at the higher rate. Twelve months of keeping the furnace running through a West Michigan winter so the pipes do not freeze, plus the electricity to keep a sump pump alive in the spring. A season of mowing and a season of plowing, paid for or done yourself. Then add the trips: every drive across the state, or every flight from wherever you live now, just to confirm the house is still standing.
None of that adds a dollar to what the house is worth. Most of it works the other way, because a house deteriorates faster empty than lived in. That is the real comparison: not our offer against some perfect future sale price, but our offer now against that price minus a full year of bleeding.
How did the house end up empty?
Some vacant houses were inherited: a parent's house in Muskegon Heights, empty since the funeral, with three siblings in three states and nobody wanting the job of dealing with it.
Some are seasonal places. The cottage outside Ludington or the second home a few blocks off the channel in Grand Haven that the family used every summer for twenty years, until the kids grew up and the trips stopped, and now it is a chore with a tax bill attached.
And some are rentals that wore their owner out. The last tenant left, the repair list got long, and putting the place back in service means spending money on a house you no longer want. If any of those sound familiar, this page is for you.
Can you sell a Michigan house without coming back to Michigan?
Yes. If you live out of state and we need to see the house, a neighbor with a key or a lockbox on the door covers it. Michigan supports remote closings, so you can sign from wherever you live; a mobile notary or remote online notarization handles the paperwork. You do not need to book a flight to sell a house in Kalamazoo from a kitchen table in Arizona.
One thing worth knowing before you commit to anything: proceeds from a second home or vacation property are taxed differently than proceeds from the home you live in, so put an hour with a tax professional on your list. This is general information, not legal or tax advice.
How does selling a vacant house to us work?
Call (616) 300-2586 or use the form on this page. We ask a few questions about the house and how it came to be empty, then take a quick look if we need one. That is generally under half an hour, and easier when the house is vacant, because we are looking at structure, roof, mechanicals and water, not furniture. You get a cash offer within 24 hours. If the number works, we can close in as little as 14 days, and you stop paying to keep an empty house alive. If the number does not work, you have lost nothing but a phone call, and we will say so plainly rather than string you along.
When we're the wrong call
A good house in a good market doesn't need us. If your cottage in Grand Haven or Holland is clean and dry, would pass an appraisal, and you can afford to carry it through a normal listing, an agent who knows the seasonal market will almost always get you more than we can pay. An empty house even helps you there, since showings are easy and there's no tenant to work around. We make sense when the carrying costs, the distance, or the shape the house is in are costing you more than a quicker, simpler sale is worth. If that isn't where you are, list it, and if you call us anyway, that's exactly what we'll tell you.
Straight answers
Vacant house: questions sellers bring us
How fast can you buy a vacant house?
You get a cash offer within 24 hours, and we can close in as little as 14 days. If we need a look at the house at all, it is a short one, generally under half an hour, and an empty house makes it simpler: nobody to schedule around and nothing to move. The practical limit on speed is title work, and we will tell you the realistic timeline for your house on the first call rather than quote the best case.
Do I have to travel to Michigan to close?
No. If we need to see the house, a neighbor with a key or a lockbox covers it, and Michigan supports remote closings: you sign from wherever you live, with a mobile notary or remote online notarization handling the paperwork. Plenty of vacant West Michigan houses belong to owners who left years ago and had no plans to come back. You will not need a plane ticket to sell this house.
Do I need to clean out the house before selling?
No. We buy vacant houses as they sit, and if we look at the house at all, we are checking structure, roof, mechanicals and water, not what is stacked in the garage. If the house still holds thirty years of belongings nobody in the family wants, take what matters to you and leave the rest. Clearing it out becomes our problem after closing, not yours before it.
What about taxes when I sell a second home or cottage?
Proceeds from a home that is not your primary residence are taxed differently than proceeds from the house you live in, so talk to a tax professional before you commit to a sale. We cannot tell you what your situation looks like and we will not pretend to. What we can give you is a firm number and a closing date, so the professional has something concrete to work with.
Will insurance still cover my empty house?
Many standard homeowner policies restrict or drop coverage once a house sits vacant beyond a couple of months, and the vacant-home policies that replace them cost more. Call your agent and ask where you stand before assuming the house is covered. A fire or a burst pipe in an uninsured empty house is the worst version of this problem, and that gap is one of the main reasons owners decide to stop holding.
Whatever the situation, start with the house.
Start with a call or the short form, and you'll have a number within 24 hours and a date that works for you. If a different route would serve you better, that's what you'll hear from us first.