A savvy inner-city housing investor with $11 million in her pocket emerged as the leading buyer Saturday for north Minneapolis homes that are part of a two-day auction of 300 bank-foreclosed Minnesota houses at the Minneapolis Convention Center.

This is good for North Side neighbors, who have been disproportionately affected by vacant houses, thanks to loan scams and adjustable-rate mortgages that proved too much for former homeowners when rates rose.

Carolyn Olson, who runs a venerable organization, Greater Metropolitan Housing Corp., works with neighborhood groups and developers to educate aspiring home buyers and stabilize communities.

Since 1970, Olson's organization has constructed or renovated about 1,500 homes for working-class folks. She planned to bid on about 15 of 80 north Minneapolis houses, which were among 150 auctioned Saturday. She got eight. The auction ends today.

"I was pleased to see that Carolyn was there and there were other people who were looking for good deals on homes to live in," said Hennepin County Commissioner Gail Dorfman, who attended the auction. "We've already had one cycle of overpriced housing and people ending up with mortgage products that they couldn't sustain, and now at least we have an opportunity to get these homes rehabbed and get families back in them."

Olson's opportunistic buying was staked by an $11 million loan from the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency. The money is to be used to buy and renovate foreclosed properties and sell them to families that have household incomes of less than $85,200, slightly more than the metropolitan area's median household income.

Two tuxedo-clad auctioneers, assisted by several deputies who each worked a section of the huge room to fire up the crowd and implore bidders to go higher, barked out opening prices and raced rapid-fire through each property, concluding with a passionate "Sold!"

Olson paid:

• $62,500 on a three-bedroom house at 3519 Emerson Av. N. that last sold for $114,900

• $35,000 for a house at 3906 Colfax Av. N. that last sold for $94,900

• $60,000 for a house at 3910 Dupont Av. N. that last sold for $157,000

Others got bargains, too.

There seemed to be about seven investors, who planned to rent or rehab and sell a property, for every person who showed up to bid on a house in which to live. Several hundred people showed up.

Dave Flatum, a general contractor from Osceola, Wis., paid $97,500 for a Ham Lake house that last sold for $147,500. He said he would put in up to $20,000 and his own sweat to make repairs.

Amy Anderkay, a chemical engineer, was the winning bidder at $67,500 on a three bedroom house at 3323 Girard Av. N. that had sold for $265,500 a few years ago.

"I don't know whether I'll live in it or not," said Anderkay, who lives in Brooklyn Park and works in Savage. "It would be closer to work. If I don't live in it, I'll fix it up and rent it or sell it."

The 150 houses auctioned on Saturday ranged in price from $40,000 for a two- bedroom, 1,200-square-foot house at 3431 Emerson Av. N. to $715,000 for a four-bedroom, 4.5-bath home on six acres in Cedar, Minn.

Buyers had to bring down payments and were allowed to arrange financing.