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Who is Your Short Sale Bank POC?
Sparked in part, no doubt, by the National Mortgage Settlement, short sale banks have appointed a Point of Contact (POC) for most short sale negotiations. These individuals are generally the go-between for both the Sacramento short sale agent and the short sale seller, but they can also be appointed solely for the benefit of the short sale seller. And I use the term “benefit” loosely.
The short sale bank POC is a person — God knows where the bank found them: sleeping on cardboard under a bridge, leaning up against the wall in a soup line — who acts as a liaison for the borrower, typically a person of whom the seller can ask questions. And, if the POC doesn’t know the answer, the POC will make it up. Hey, that’s what they are here for. I will gladly pay you on Tuesday for a hamburger today.
They are also responsible for reading the notes in the file. Notes are generally as good as the information supplied upfront by the real negotiator, the person which some of us are not allowed to speak to anymore because some short sale agents have not been that polite, I suspect. If there are no notes in the file, it becomes even more difficult for the POC to soothe worried souls. Or, the POC could also read another file and pull information from an unrelated situation because after all they are all the same, aren’t they?
None of these POCs ask for permission to contact the borrower. They pull the borrower’s personal information and phone number from bank records. If a seller has changed any of this information or put a “do not call” into the file, the POC either cannot figure out how to call or is prohibited from calling. One of such individuals called me as I was heading out the door to catch a matinee in Chicago of Million Dollar Quartet during my holiday vacation. Said he could not find the seller’s phone number and asked if I would be so kind as to pass along his contact info to the seller. Yeah, I’ll get right on that. I’m not about to ruin her holiday, too. She can hear about it during banking hours.
This is a guy who could have looked at the listing agreement to get that information. Note to self: stop putting that info on the listing agreement because these guys might actually catch on. The last thing a Sacramento short sale agent needs is for the POC to call the seller to call to ask why the bank doesn’t have the . . . you fill in the blank of the name of the document. In most cases, the docs are in the file and the short sale bank POC is mistaken. Maybe some short sale agents fall down on the job, but let me tell you, this Sacramento short sale agent ain’t one of ’em. Being a POC, I suspect, is a thankless job because it deserves to be a thankless job.
A Chase Bank Short Sale Loves Me, Chase Bank Loves Me Not
Usually I do not talk about Sacramento short sales until they close, just as a matter of policy. But this particular Chase short sale is so bizarre; whatever happens the seller is beyond giving much of a hoot, even though the bank is offering, let’s say $50,000 in cash for a home worth, let’s say $200,000.
The problem is there is a second loan held by a collection agency. The second has been sold over and over. It’s amazing that there is a market, a physical financial market for a second loan without any equity. There is a way that collection agencies can make big bucks buying up worthless instruments. You would think there is something illegal or against the law with this kind of practice, but everybody just looks the other way and shrugs their shoulders when I ask about it. It’s not a small financial practice, it’s a huge money-making venture. Hand-over-fist piles and piles of money is manufactured out of thin air! Nobody is talking about it.
The second problem is Chase has flagged this short sale as a file that needs a huge cash payment by Chase to the seller. To a person with an underwater home. Why does Chase need to give the seller $50,000? Nobody is saying. It’s unrelated to the National Mortgage Settlement because it’s been going on for more than a year. See, the thing with a Chase short sale is these short sales are not in Equator like almost every other short sale. These short sales are negotiated directly with Chase so they take forever to get approval. On average, my Chase short sales get approved in 3 to 4 months.
Because of California Civil Code 580e, the seller cannot make any contribution in a short sale. The second lender says if the seller is receiving a huge wad of cash from Chase, they want more of it. But the seller can’t give it to them. So, the answer is the seller gets nothing. We received short sale approval on this with Chase giving the seller nothing, and then the buyer split. Sorta par for the course.
Now we are back with a new buyer trying to get a second approval from Chase. This time Chase says it can’t issue approval unless the seller takes the $50,000. What? It’s a Chase Bank short sale like this that can make a Sacramento short sale agent pull out her hair.
