Safer Short Sales

Short sales are notoriously hard to settle…. Nothing is certain until we have third party approval (the bank)….  Real estate ethics sometimes fly out the window as offer after offer is presented to the banks by some agents…  Reasonable time lines are a joke…. It makes an agent nervous to show a owner occupant…. Especially a first timer or someone who needs to be in the home quickly…..

So when do I show a short sale to an owner occupied buyer?  First I do not send them short sale listings unless they request it.  I look at the available short sales for the clues in the public or agent remarks.  The clues are:

1) Bank approved price

2) Bank approval buyer walked

3) IFHA short short sale (they are quick in Idaho)

4) Small local bank

5) Only need to negotiate the 2nd

6) Process started buyer walked

Even with these words I call the listing agent to get a feel.  If I feel very comfortable with the situation I will send the listing to my client. I always ask the listing agent what is their policy on offers that come in later. If I don’t like the answer I try not to show the home.  Thes represent safer short sales.

Regular sales and REO (bank owned property) sales usually settle more quickly than short sales.  I do not find much difference in the asking price of a short sale and a REO.

Often my buyer will do their own research and I get to investigate all sorts of short sales and contingent short sales…. I do like a buyer who like to do research… In the end I usually find the home first that they actually settle on.  Call me if you want to find your home in the Treasure Valley!  Good hunting!

  Debbie Holmes

Gold Key Real Estate    

(208)761-2551 Email: d5holmes@msn.com

To search Boise Homes visit my website

I hate dealing with big banks!

I hate dealing with big banks.  It started a couple of months ago. I had new clients that came with their own loan officer.  They wanted to deal with their “own” bank.  The bank is Wells Fargo. The loan officer seemed competent and had been recommended by their previous real estate agent.  They asked what my opinion was….My opinion is that my loan officer can get a loan done in about 2 weeks and that big banks have lots of hiccups where one department does not deal well with the other departments…. Somehow this always makes the loan take 2 or 3 weeks longer with a lot of hand wringing at the end.   I told them this and gave them the name of my favorite loan officer….

They chose the big bank…..  OK I can deal with this….I never have had a loan close easily with a big bank and I still haven’t….  That includes US Bank, Wells Fargo and Bank of America….I have heard bad things about Chase but since I haven’t closed a deal with them I can’t include them on the list.  I was surprised when Sandy told me it would take 5 weeks to close the VA loan….  So I put December 29, 2011 in my contract (Sandy picked the date).  We bid the day before Thanksgiving….The inspection came back on November 30…. On December 2 I was told the appraisal was ordered….By December 15 the appraisal still wasn’t done.  The appraisal finally came back on December 19….  The latch on the slider needed to be fixed…  We knew about the latch from the inspection but we figured we would fix it after closing…  The loan officer told me that the deal was going to final underwriting… By 12/22 the file was still being worked on.  On 12/23/2012 at 10 AM  (the last working day until Christmas) the underwriter asked for the previous employers verification….These people had been through final underwriting with the same bank in late October on a different deal and had made it through….I have always coached my buyers to give the underwriter whatever they wanted no matter how silly it seemed…  I convince my buyers to try to make the phone call to corporate headquarters and by some miracle the HR person sends the docs 2 business days before they usually do.  Meanwhile I had my handyman fix the latch and a couple of other things….  I called the bank to tell them that all was ready… It took them until Tuesday to get the appraiser back out…  Final underwriting also completed Tuesday or Wed.  All the time the loan officer kept saying we would close by the contract date of 12/30 I was always reminding her that the date was 12/29 and we needed an extra day for FEDEX…..She told me that couldn’t happen but we could get it done by 12/30….  So now we get to 12/28 and that is where the fun really began….I hate dealing with big banks…. 

The hud comes out at 6 PM on 12/28… It looks sort of OK….Fast forward to 9:49 AM the next morning….Email says docs will be out in a few minutes….I talk to title….The lender left money on the table from the 3% closing costs….That is annoying….I submit the receipt for the inspection…  I talk to the processor, the loan officer, the escrow officer..  The processor and the loan officer keep telling me I will have docs out any minute … I get lunch…I make more phone calls and Emails… I meet a repairman at a rental…I am now spending full time trying to make the docs come out….I am fielding calls from the listing agent… He is furious….He blames the whole problem on me…. He also got the same email stating docs will be out in a few minutes…. The escrow officer calls and asks me to intervene…I hate dealing with big banks… I get a phone number for a person higher up the food chain….She talks to me and tells me docs will be out soon…..  Finally 5 PM comes and all goes quiet…. Defeat… I put out the addendum for closing on January 3…  Of course I need to talk to the listing agent and the buyer…. Not much to do….I try to relax with NETFLIX….The other agent starts emailing me…..They get harder and harder to deal with….He starts with blaming Wells Fargo and the loan officer…No problem with that I am pretty annoyed with them… Then he states that his 90 year old clients have a loss for the home (which was bought for a sick daughter that died) and that they would have to wait until the 2012 tax cycle to claim their tax loss….  I feel awful but I can’t make it happen short of going to California to get the signed papers… 

Finally I remind him about the serenity prayer….I have worked for days to make it happen on time….I can’t make it happen on time…  I am going to try to relax so I can tackle it in the morning…..He doesn’t respond after that….

Today its 10:49 AM  I have been yelled at and hung up on by the person further up on the food chain… I didn’t yell I just asked about the docs…(the one preparing the docs)… I have spoken to title, the loan officer (twice), the processor (three times)….I still don’t have docs….I have talked to my clients…. I have not talked to the listing agent yet.  I have nothing to say…I am out of contract…  I assume we will close… Right now I want to scream I HATE DEALING WITH BIG BANKS!…  We have penalties for not preforming perhaps banks should too….

What can I do about this situation?  Not much except:

1) Blog about it…

2) Discourage my clients from using big banks…

3) Push my loan officer on my buyers because I know she will get the job done….

4) I am planning to take my rental accounts out of Wells Fargo (after the mortgages are paid in January) and go to a smaller bank…. I will write  a letter to the management so they know why I am changing banks…

5) Do you think I could put it in my political blog?  Big banks are getting a lot of bad press lately…

Now I sit and wait for loan docs to come in…..I want to take my loan and go elsewhere but that will take another 2 weeks….  For the final time I hate dealing with big banks…

I know it’s a short sale but…….

I just took my buyers into a home….I called the listing agent and she informed me that the seller was taking the dishwasher…..I know they do sometimes but when you see it there you expect it to be there…..I suggested that she had better put that it excludes the dishwasher since most people would expect it stay since it was there….I talked about agents who had to supply appliances…  I suggested that she excludes the dishawasher…Oh well we want to see the home…..I should have been suspicious when the pictures were from the last sale 1.5 years ago….

 

We walked in and the house reeked of cat urine….There was also some cat poop right in the living room….The house was absoultely filthy….The cat itself was adorable but obviously not well behaved…They had a sex book out on a dresser or table… Basically the home was in not at all showable condition.  Now the seller is moving by Dec. 1….It makes me wonder why the listing agent didn’t wait until they left and did the rugs….The price was OK but not great….The house itself might be OK but my buyers were grossed out…

 

Remember first impression mean a lot in our business.  This house was as bad as any rental I have seen when the tenant is being obnoxious.  I don’t gross out easily but I was disturbed…Guess which house we didn’t write an offer on?

The Rose Bushes are missing….

This Sunday while I had 20 guests at my house my HUD buyer called me. Apparently all the shrubery was clearcut on 2 sides of the home (including the heritage rose bushes)

As soon as my guests left I went to the listing and sure enough there was no shubbery and there was no branches on the ground. I called the listing agent who sent an email to the assest manager on Sunday. On Monday I called the property manager. At first they said they would check into it. Then I called the asset manager who said they had nothing to do with it. I then became worried they would take the rest of the shubs out. I called property manager who said the asset manager requested that the bushes be trimmed…..

I pointed out the bushes were gone not trimmed and would they please not trim anymore bushes. We are closing the deal on July 21…..Now they could have gone for the debree field or the cheat grass meadow but those items are still there. It sure would be nice if the property manager was in Boise instead of Phonix….

Tomorrow we sign and Thursday we close…. Just needed to vent a little.