Detroit house auction crashes website

**emu steve** · May-31-14, 05:58 AM

Interesting story. Good story that there was a lot of activity, but enough to crash a website???

Can't make that story up - demand to buy houses in Detroit [[Detroit Land Bank auction) too much for a website to handle.

Does make a nice, encouraging headline certainly better than $1000 Detroit "homes" unsold.

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2...rashes-website

**antongast** · June-01-14, 09:06 PM

You know what other website crashed shortly after launch? Obamacare. This is what it looks like when creeping Kenyan sharia socialism takes over every facet of our lives.

Also, I'm sure this is connected to #BENGHAZI somehow.

**emu steve** · June-02-14, 04:40 AM

Originally Posted by antongast

You know what other website crashed shortly after launch? Obamacare. This is what it looks like when creeping Kenyan sharia socialism takes over every facet of our lives.

Also, I'm sure this is connected to #BENGHAZI somehow.

Funny you should mention healthcare.gov as I also thought of it.

I forgot the numbers but apparently MILLIONS of folks tried to access healthcare.gov the first day.

I thought like why? Seven million were expected to sign up over six month and seven million [[or whatever the number was) [[tried to) access the site on day one?

Sounded pretty crazy to me.

My best 'theory'

is that Karl Rove got to some Russian adolescents and got them to overrun the website with traffic. Lol.

Does Fox News have a Moscow bureau where they can recruit Russian hackers for nefarious purposes [[maybe hack into Hillary Clinton's medical records?)?

I always wondered what Karl was up to these days...

**animatedmartian** · June-02-14, 06:39 PM

The would-be winner of the house is upset to find he didn't win the house due to the website glitch.

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2...r-disappointed

**DetroiterOnTheWestCoast** · June-02-14, 07:41 PM

If the bids were going back and forth between two bidders for the last hour, how was the site "overwhelmed" by bidders? It just doesn't make sense.

**Jimaz** · June-02-14, 09:19 PM

Originally Posted by emu steve

Funny you should mention healthcare.gov as I also thought of it....

My best 'theory'

is that Karl Rove got to some Russian adolescents and got them to overrun the website with traffic. Lol....

My theory is that they seeded some moles into the team of website designers to sabotage healthcare.gov from within, i.e., it was an inside job.

No website could be that screwed up otherwise even by accident. Error messages intended to be read by the user were quickly erased before the intended recipient could possibly read them.

Here's a quickly captured screenshot of one of those mysteriously vanishing error messages:

Attachment 23629

Attempting [[and failing) to conceal an error message from its intended recipient exposes an astonishingly amateurish attempt at deception.

How embarrassing.

**Cincinnati_Kid** · June-03-14, 04:49 AM

Originally Posted by animatedmartian

The would-be winner of the house is upset to find he didn't win the house due to the website glitch.

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2...r-disappointed

Unless he knows something we don't, he's crazy for bidding $135,000 on that house in the first place. They showed it on the news, it's huge and needs major work. At least another $25,000 to get it up to snuff. I just don't see how you're going to profit when the value of the house will still be negative, even after repairs. Not to mention ridiculous property tax bills. Some of the houses offered might be deals, most won't be, especially when other variables are factored in like crime, taxes, maintenance, insurance rates etc..... To each his own.

**Goose** · June-03-14, 08:08 AM

Originally Posted by Jimaz

My theory is that they seeded some moles into the team of website designers to sabotage healthcare.gov from within, i.e., it was an inside job.

No website could be that screwed up otherwise even by accident. Error messages intended to be read by the user were quickly erased before the intended recipient could possibly read them.

Here's a quickly captured screenshot of one of those mysteriously vanishing error messages:

Attachment 23629

Attempting [[and failing) to conceal an error message from its intended recipient exposes an astonishingly amateurish attempt at deception.

How embarrassing.

please let us know of the other conspiricy theories you believe... im sure tops on your list includes the sealed college documents and birth certificate of our leader....

**Goose** · June-03-14, 08:12 AM

Originally Posted by Cincinnati_Kid

Unless he knows something we don't, he's crazy for bidding $135,000 on that house in the first place. They showed it on the news, it's huge and needs major work. At least another $25,000 to get it up to snuff. I just don't see how you're going to profit when the value of the house will still be negative, even after repairs. Not to mention ridiculous property tax bills. Some of the houses offered might be deals, most won't be, especially when other variables are factored in like crime, taxes, maintenance, insurance rates etc..... To each his own.

whomever buys that house will go through $25,000 in a sneeze.... remember, the City spent over $400,000 on each of three houses on Edison in their rehab program... and we know the government has economies of scale and is able to obtain the best prices via bidding that the average joe can't.....

**mercyme** · June-03-14, 08:24 AM

Originally Posted by antongast

You know what other website crashed shortly after launch? Obamacare. This is what it looks like when creeping Kenyan sharia socialism takes over every facet of our lives.

Also, I'm sure this is connected to #BENGHAZI somehow.

Oh please tell me you're just messing with us! Nobody in their right mind could really believe that crap.

**animatedmartian** · June-03-14, 09:15 AM

The bidder is suing DLBA. As a freep commentator pointed out, DLBA did send him a confirmation email, glitch or otherwise. Even if he hadn't actually won the house, he should have some reimbursement or something if they're going to put the house back up for auction. Seems only fair.

**ABetterDetroit** · June-03-14, 04:13 PM

Originally Posted by animatedmartian

The would-be winner of the house is upset to find he didn't win the house due to the website glitch.

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/2...r-disappointed

If more that one "winner" was notified via e-mail to win at the 135k price then supply the proof of that major malfunction before a new auction. If not, then sell the guy his house.

**animatedmartian** · June-04-14, 10:34 AM

Originally Posted by Cincinnati_Kid

Unless he knows something we don't, he's crazy for bidding $135,000 on that house in the first place. They showed it on the news, it's huge and needs major work. At least another $25,000 to get it up to snuff. I just don't see how you're going to profit when the value of the house will still be negative, even after repairs. Not to mention ridiculous property tax bills. Some of the houses offered might be deals, most won't be, especially when other variables are factored in like crime, taxes, maintenance, insurance rates etc..... To each his own.

I dunno, it looks pretty good through the photos they showed on curbed. $135K might be a pretty good deal and I'd find it hard to see this generating a net loss for the buyer [[not including taxes and insurance). This house seems in pretty good condition.

http://detroit.curbed.com/archives/2014/06/chicago.php

**Cincinnati_Kid** · June-04-14, 01:29 PM

Originally Posted by animatedmartian

I dunno, it looks pretty good through the photos they showed on curbed. $135K might be a pretty good deal and I'd find it hard to see this generating a net loss for the buyer [[not including taxes and insurance). This house seems in pretty good condition.

http://detroit.curbed.com/archives/2014/06/chicago.php

Whatever floats your boat.

**DetroiterOnTheWestCoast** · June-06-14, 10:56 PM

Does anyone know if the original "winner" won this auction again? Whoever won got a much better price this time: $97,900.

http://www.buildingdetroit.org/Listi...5-Chicago-Blvd

**HelloIDistance** · June-06-14, 11:18 PM

Originally Posted by DetroiterOnTheWestCoast

Does anyone know if the original "winner" won this auction again? Whoever won got a much better price this time: $97,900.

http://www.buildingdetroit.org/Listi...5-Chicago-Blvd

Yes he did and saved 35K.

**DetroiterOnTheWestCoast** · June-09-14, 09:43 AM

Originally Posted by HelloIDistance

Yes he did and saved 35K.

Yes, you're right its the original buyer. I'm glad for him. Interesting article in the freep and its nice to see that he has family in the area. And he's hitting the ground running. Really seems as though this house will be a success story; I don't see him bailing any time soon.

http://www.freep.com/article/2014060...auction-glitch

**swingline** · June-09-14, 11:10 AM

115 Chicago Blvd is an architectural gem. So much Arts and Crafts style. A sizable six figure renovation budget will be necessary to bring it back, which does make the $95K winning bid kind of eyebrow raising.

One question. Is anybody familiar with the stucco addition on the SW corner of the house and know when it was built? It's brutally inappropriate architecturally, although it looks like the responsible builder and owner went to the trouble to install/reuse one small set of older leaded glass windows. Weird. One hopes that the addition predates the 1974 historic designation of the neighborhood. If not, and it was actually approved by the Historic District Commission, well, that would be pretty sad.

Presumably, the also sadly out of scale and context "colonial" next door to the west with the attached garage also predates historic designation. The construction of these kind of homes in the 1960s and 1970s in architecturally significant neighborhoods around Michigan was a catalyst for enacting the state legislation that enabled the creation of local historic districts.