Why Mansions Get Abandoned

Mansions get abandoned when nobody is both able and willing to take responsibility for them. The owner dies and the estate stalls, the bank forecloses and sits on the deed, the taxes go unpaid, the price is too high for the market, or two sides end up in court. A mansion costs a lot to keep up, so once nobody is paying, it starts failing fast.

This is general information, not legal advice. Every claim links to the source it came from, and none of it is a reason to go inside anything.

What happens to a mansion when the owner dies?

It goes into the estate, and that can take a long time. Illinois Legal Aid Online says real estate in an estate generally means probate is needed, and that settling an estate “can take months or longer, especially if there is real estate.” A will has to be filed in the county where the person last lived within 30 days of death, and a representative then has to protect the property, pay the debts and hand out what’s left.

The page lists the representative’s job as protecting property, paying funeral costs and debts, and distributing what’s left. A representative can also be a grieving family member living far away, and a large house is a big job. When heirs disagree about whether to sell, keep or split it, the house can just wait.

That is the setup behind the $1,000,000 mansion video. The description says a family built the house in 2001 and it became abandoned after the owner passed away in 2020. The bank then foreclosed, and it has been sitting ever since. I don’t say where it is.

What happens when the bank takes it?

Often, nothing, and that is the problem. The Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning describes foreclosed homes stuck mid process as vacant homes “that do not have a clear party responsible for maintenance and are in danger of deteriorating.” It adds that mortgage servicers can enter and maintain a property before taking title, but some hesitate because entering may be considered trespassing or make them liable for damages.

So a house can be in a gap where the old owner is gone and the new one hasn’t arrived. CMAP notes that vacant homes raise city costs for monitoring, cleanup and security while cutting property tax revenue. Its numbers are dated, with the Federal Housing Finance Agency reporting about 74,000 Illinois loans 90 or more days delinquent and about 12,500 bank owned homes at the end of 2011, but the mechanism hasn’t changed. A bank owns it, nobody lives there and the first things to go are the upkeep and the security.

Do unpaid taxes finish a mansion off?

They can, because a big house comes with a big tax bill. In Cook County, where Chicago is, the Treasurer runs an annual tax sale, and it is an auction of delinquent property taxes, not of the property itself. Investors bid on the right to pay the overdue taxes. The owner can keep the property by repaying the taxes with interest and fees, usually within about two and a half years. If that deadline passes, the tax buyer can go to court to obtain ownership. Other counties handle this differently.

Income taxes can do it too. The IRS treats lottery winnings as gambling income, and says you must report all gambling winnings on your return.

That matters for the lottery winner’s mansion video, and I want to be careful with it. The description tells the story as I got it. A doctor and his wife bought the house in 2016 after they won the lottery. After the money was spent, the family forgot about taxes and the mansion was taken from them. It was listed for sale in 2018 and never sold. I haven’t confirmed any of that, and I don’t say where it is.

Why does nobody buy it?

Because the market for very large houses is thin. A Daily Herald report on the Chicago suburbs found that homes priced at $5 million and up had been listed an average of 1,239 days, more than three years, compared with 174 days for homes priced from $1 million to $2 million. The reasons it listed included buyers wary of large mortgages and high yearly property taxes, fewer executive relocations, and buyers who increasingly prefer city living. It also said some owners won’t accept a lower price.

Pricing matters here. A seller who is waiting for last year’s number keeps the house vacant for another season, and the house loses value while it waits. A mansion that sat for three years is not the same house that went on the market.

Can a court fight freeze a mansion?

Yes, and Horizon Farm in Barrington Hills is a documented case. The 400 acre horse farm entered foreclosure in 2009, according to the Daily Herald. The Forest Preserves of Cook County acquired it in 2013 for $14.5 million, and the former owners sued, arguing the district lacked standing to complete the sale. A state appellate court upheld the ruling for the district in May 2015.

The fight didn’t end there. By February 2019, The Real Deal described a dispute that had run about ten years, with the former owners filing six lawsuits to try to regain ownership. A house that nobody is allowed to touch while lawyers argue is a house that nobody maintains. My Horizon Farm video was shot shortly before the mansion came down, and the description says it was demolished a couple of days before I uploaded.

What happens to the house while it waits?

Water gets in, and then people do. The EPA says to dry water damaged areas within 24 to 48 hours to prevent mold growth, and it lists roof leaks as a cause of hidden moisture. A mansion with a leak and no one checking it misses that window by years.

The U.S. Fire Administration’s guide to vacant buildings adds the human side. It cites NFPA estimates that more than 72 percent of fires in vacant or abandoned structures are of incendiary or suspicious origin. It says buildings that aren’t secured will degrade faster than ones that are, and that without power or water, fire detection and sprinklers may not work and heat loss can cause freezing. The $1,000,000 mansion’s description says it was severely vandalized and set on fire multiple times.

What does this look like in practice?

Different mansions fail in different ways, and I hide the locations of most of mine on purpose. People always ask, and I won’t give them out.

A pool that nobody drains turns into this fast. The mold is worse. The basement movie theater in the lottery winner video was covered in it, and a ceiling and wall spotted like this are what the EPA’s 24 to 48 hour rule is about.

A respirator like the 3M 6200 half face respirator on my list is built for air like that, and a cloth mask is not. No filter beats staying out of the worst rooms.

Some of what a mansion holds is quiet. In the lakefront mansion video there was a stair lift beside a solid hardwood staircase, and it wasn’t plugged in. I can’t tell you why the house was left, and the description only says it sat vacant for many years before a buyer came along.

The toy collector’s mansion in Barrington Hills is the case where nobody knows. The description says there’s nothing online about the old owner or the story behind it, and my best guess is that the owner loved collecting and passed away. It’s a guess. The post on that video has the details.

How I find places like these, and how I stay safe in them, is covered in a $9.99 PDF called How to Find Abandoned Places.

A mansion is rarely abandoned in one moment. It happens in the gaps between the person who left, the person who owns it now and the person who will pay to fix it.