When I was in college the house I was living in was foreclosed on. We got a nastily-worded letter from the property owner (who apparently had been missing payments) telling us we had to be out within 2 weeks. It was weird, because her letter seemed all pissed at us, like she was doing us a favor by even giving us 2 weeks notice. We'd been model tenants and always paid on time.

Took her letter to the housing assistance program at our college and talked to a lawyer. Don't remember the exact conversation, but he said she had no right to boot us out prior to the property being sold/repossessed by the bank. Not exactly sure what would have happened if it had gone back to the bank, but the house ended up being bought on a short sale by a young contractor who was buying it as a rental property and ended up being an awesome-tastic landlord.