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A Sacramento Short Sale Lifespan
For the first time in my life, which is almost since the dawn of humankind, MLS has not immediately loaded on my computer when accessed. I have an internet connection. MetroList is just not responding. It won’t open in Safari nor Firefox. It partially loaded in Firefox and then quit. There is no joy in Mudville; it’s trouble with a capital T that rhymes with P and stands for poop, and the Grinch has stolen Christmas.
We count on things in our life to always be there for us and never change. To work when we expect them to work. But that’s not how life works. Stuff goes wrong. People let us down; they die.
But Sacramento short sales can go on practically forever. I have a few I’ve been working on now for more than a year. A short sale doesn’t die. It doesn’t blow up. It doesn’t just go away and, in some cases, the short sale bank won’t even file a foreclosure notice. It’s not having the Notice of Default filed that can keep a short sale alive and pumping out blood long after the arteries have been sliced.
This is the little known secret that agents don’t realize. Once a bank says NO to an agent, many will give up. Not this Sacramento real estate agent. I keep on pushing until either the seller collapses from exhaustion or the bank says: All right, you got it. Here is your short sale approval. Few sellers are outright rejected in this day and age. This is not 2005, Dorothy.
If you want to work with a Sacramento short sale agent who has closed hundreds of short sales, call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916 233 6759. I really doubt you will find an agent in the Sacramento Valley who knows more about short sales.
A Sacramento Lockbox Experience Shed Light on a Bad Agent
When I first moved to Sacramento in 2002, I did not yet belong to MLS. I had not yet reactivated my real estate license because it involved passing the California real estate exam again. The real estate laws in California changed over the past 12 years or so since I had left the state, so it took me a few months to choose an office, take the exam and become an official Sacramento real estate agent who has access to MLS as a member of MetroList.
As a member of MetroList, I also get to buy my own Sacramento lockboxes and secure them to homes that I list, so other agents can gain access if the sellers aren’t home. Lockboxes come in handy for appraisers and after the sellers move out, when the buyers conduct a final walkthrough. It’s very difficult to get into a Sacramento lockbox if you don’t have an display key. The good thing about the infrared communication device on the lockbox is it sends the agent’s information to a website. I check this website every night before I turn off my computer to join my husband for dinner.
The website tells me the name of the agent who used the lockbox, the time and the day, the agent’s telephone number, the agent’s email address and the name of the agent’s broker. It’s also a useful list in case somebody left the lights on by mistake, I can track down the last person to show and ask them to be more prudent in the future. I also email all buyer’s agents who showed my listings that day to ask for feedback and thank them for showing.
When I bought my home in Sacramento, the previous listing agent left the lockbox on the railing and I couldn’t get it off. He never came back to pick it up. I don’t know if it was because he did not want to run into me again or if he simply forgot. I would be mortified if I forgot to pick up a lockbox. Not only that, but lockboxes cost around $100, and I own about $8,000 worth of lockboxes. To get a lockbox off, I had to resort to a reciprocating saw. It took me a good 20 minutes of teeth rattling to saw through the shackle.
It’s much easier to use a display key to open the lockbox. I could have called my own agent to come over and use her display key, but she had done such a lousy job during my escrow. I did not want to ever speak to her again. I vowed I would never do what she did to my own clients. She felt that my husband was her client and forgot all about me. She did not return my phone calls or emails. She never answered her cellphone when I called. We almost did not close escrow because she messed up so badly. As I sawed through the shackle on that lockbox, I thought about her, and how grateful I am that I will never be like her.
In addition to my heros and heroines, whom I admire and aspire to mirror, the bad ones also teach me the paths to avoid, what not to do.
Short Contingent vs Pending Short Lender Approval
What’s the world coming to when you can’t make idle threats anymore? Like, you can’t tell a guy you’re gonna hit him in the head with a shovel and bury his body in the desert without some jury awarding him $20 million in punitive damages. Even if he is a porn guy, or soft porn or whatever. Criminy. And you can’t threaten to burn down somebody’s house at a City Council meeting, either. Whatever happened to freedom of expression? Huh? Why can’t you just talk off the top of your head? Vent a little? It’s like words have meaning or something, and people take you seriously.
We need to go back to the days of Joe and Curly and Moe. When you could just poke somebody in the eyes with two fingers and nobody cared. Maybe zing a pie of whipped cream in a face.
People get frustrated. That’s pretty much a given. It doesn’t take much sometimes. Take Sacramento short sales for example. Buyers are very frustrated when they read listings in MLS that are a short sale. MetroList has attempted to clear up the confusion by offering two status choices after an offer has been received. But the problem with MetroList is a buyer can’t see the change when it’s active short contingent. That status modifier is hidden in the bottom right corner of the listing the buyer receives.
Agents don’t much understand it either. I know because as a Sacramento short sale agent some of my listings are listed as “active short contingent” and some are listed as “pending short lender approval.” Short Contingent means we have an offer. It also means we are open to back-up offers, and we might already have a few. An inquiring mind should call and ask. Bear in mind that a true back-up offer incorporates a purchase agreement addendum. No PAA, no backup. And a seller is not required to sign a back-up offer. Pending Short Lender Approval means we don’t want any back-up offers, and there are no more showings.
If you’ve got a gripe with the way Active Short Contingent shows up in MLS for a buyer, take that gripe to MetroList. That’s who your beef is with. It’s not with this Sacramento short sale agent. And watch where you walk. There are banana peels on the ground.
