I'm a new college graduate from Davis, California who's gone through hell for 6 months and am in desperate need of some tangible security and a place to expend my creative energy. I joined this forum solely to ask the beginner's questions about buying an "ultracheap" house in detroit; as awful as it is, I only found out within the last week about the ongoing prevalence of house vacancies in detroit and the "blank slate" atmosphere that's beginning to draw creative people in droves. I'm highly educated and I spent the last year of my time at university designing communitarian systems for repurposing stagnant suburbs on the ultra-cheap, and I hope that settling in detroit might put me at the location of a like-minded community. I hope that even if I do not find answers to the below questions, this forum will serve to connect me with resources that can facilitate my possible entrance into detroit.


But before I get my hopes up, I want to try to answer the most basic question: can I buy a house in detroit?


Here's my questions in rough order of priority:
1. How do I find out what repairs are necessary to make a particular ultracheap house in detroit legal to inhabit? Is there a website or government office that can provide a list, and if so how accurate should I expect it to be? Is there a high likelihood of finding very costly "surprises" after buying?
2. How do I find out what repairs I would be legally obligated to perform after buying the property even if I just give up and leave without inhabiting or renting it?
3. What risk is there of me ruining my credit score or going to jail due to buying an ultracheap house in detroit and being unable to fulfill the liabilities for repairs, etc?
4. Where do I find the property taxes for a particular street address? Is the data always up-to-date, or might the property taxes change drastically?
5. Where can I find some real-life examples of poor people like me who have bought ultracheap detroit houses, how much money they have had to put into the house, and what hurdles they have had to clear throughout the process of buying and owning it? Is there an online community of these people?
6. How necessary is it for me to visit detroit in-person to in order to investigate an ultracheap house that is listed for sale on the internet?
7. Is ebay the best bet for ultracheap detroit houses, or something else?