Board-up Specialists in Demand

What’s the latest trend in the home improvement industry? Well, it’s not something that “improves” the home per se, but rather something that protects it. I recently came across this interesting MSNBC article that examines a rising sector in the industry: ”board-up” specialists.

Board-up specialists are home improvement professionals who are hired by lenders and banks to look after their foreclosed properties. As the article explains, this can mean many things. Based on the needs of the lender and the specific property, board-up specialists handle everything from boarding up the windows and doors to changing the locks to hauling junk to the dump. If there’s graffiti on the home, they’ll cover up the graffiti. If windows are broken, they’ll replace the windows.

As the number of foreclosed properties skyrockets, many professionals who once did skilled labor are finding the board-up industry lucrative and a source of steady work. Lenders generally have very few people on staff — or nobody at all — who handle maintenance on foreclosed properties, and they’re finding themselves with an increasing number of properties to manage.

In some areas, lenders are being fined by local municipalities if their homes are neglected, since these unkempt homes can affect property values. In addition, lenders are looking to prevent the homes from being taken oven by squatters and theives. There have been many recent cases of foreclosed homes being stripped of their innards and stripped of everything else. As long as cases like these keep happening (and they likely will), there will be no shortage of work for board-up specialists.

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