<prompt> Human: Hello! So I need to buy the house from my landlord so that my mother isnt stuck with that rat for the rest of her life. My brother and I have really good, but short lived, credit history. I have a pretty well paying job, and my brother is working on getting something. The house is oldbuilt in the 1920s, only 720 sq ft, but its got a good bit of landno more than an acre, maybe half? The house has age damage, a raised foundation, basically no insulation, and slight structural damage from earthquakes over the years. We have talked with the landlord a few times over the years about buying the house from him. He always liked the idea, but theres never been any follow through. However, Im getting serious about this. My mother is getting older, and she just cant swing rent and her car payment every month with the amount of work shes capable of. My brother and I both really want to get out of the nest, but were not going to leave or mother in the sorry financial state. If we can buy the house, the monthly payment to a bank should be less than what weve been paying for rent. Now, the potential problems: First, the landlord is an idiot, lazy, has no follow through, and is terrible with his own finances. These factors make him hard to work with, because he will give different answers to the same questions, avoid answering questions directly, and things like that. Second, He has claimed to have taken out a second mortgage on the house that we are renting from him. He claimed that he has to pay 1175 per month to the bank he runs through. However, we only pay 950 per month for rent, so I dont see why he would do that, because hes losing money on the house every month. Third, Hes started up some project in another state, and its run him dry on money almost. Hes getting desperate and very pushy about rent. He, our landlord, has offered to do house work for us if we pay him. The man is getting desperate, and its making me dislike him even more so.So thats my scope of the situation. Now, I need to know where to start with the process of buying the house. Do I get an appraiser? Where do i find one of those? So on and so fort, i really dont know where to start with this process at all. ThanksEdit:A lot of you have been saying find another house. Trust me, I want to. But my mother raised all her kids in this house. Weve been here for a decade or a little over now. Shes not letting this go, or if I did try to force her, shed get really depressed. Shes an older woman, shes emotional like that. tl;drLandlord sucks, how can i buy the house from himAssistant: Your goal is: Buy a house from a landlord that has not had follow through and therefore has ignored the maintenance and probably done shoddy repairs to the house You will move in to the house with your mother, eliminating your rent The landlord is dishonest and you are aiming to buy from a dishonest person By the way, he would take out a second mortgage to get back the equity on the house so that he could take care of what he wanted personally while marking the interest expense of the second mortgage as a business interest expense, thus lowering his income and maybe even carrying a loss on his taxes. Do not have the man do any house work for youWhy are you trying to buy THIS house and not ANY house for you, your brother, and your mother? I can tell you from experience as a landlord that he has ignored the property and you will have tens of thousands of improvements and repairs to make if you purchase it.Human: Ah, miscommunication. I am not going to move into the house, i already live here. Were all under the same roof. Ive seen a few of the other comments asking If the house is bad, why are you going to buy it? Well, if I had my way we would have dropped this dinky junk house years ago, but my mother is attached to the house. Weve been maintaining it best we can over the years, and were pretty handy people, so repairing it on our own isnt a big deal.On the matter of my landlords character, i basically plan on manipulating his current desperate need for money so that I can buy the house and be done with him. My brother and I will owe the bank a good loan, but to set my mom up with the house she raised us in, and get the landlord off her back, well thats worth it.I cant imagine this house being worth any more than 60,000, and I know my landlord. If we told him hed get anywhere near 60,000, hed be on that in a heartbeat. So we need to discuss it with him, sounds good. He should be coming to pick up more rent in a few days. I can talk to him then. Hypothetically, if he agrees to the idea, whats my next move?  <response>: If your mind is set in stone about this, and youre not willing to reconsider:Pay up to get the house professionally inspected so you know theres nothing you missed, and then ensure that your 60k is a good lowball. Id try to lowball him hard at first ie we either buy this house or we move out and GL finding another tenant who will deal with all these issues, could be months before you see the money coming in. Now Im ready to do 48k today.... If hes a lazy idiot in financial trouble, he is the ideal candidate. I figure if you pay a fair value for the house, he wins because theres probably going to be expensive, frustrating issues down the line with the house that were caused through his inattention or that hes dodging revealing now. Might as well take the pragmatic approach and make lemonade out of this. 