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The Eddie Izzard of Short Sales
This is like the Eddie Izzard of short sale stories, a Chase Bank short sale in Rancho Cordova. I mention Eddie Izzard because we went to Mondavi to see him last night. He is such a hilarious performer. We were all of 3 people, my husband says, who watched The Riches and felt so grossly disappointed when the show was canceled on FX. It wasn’t fair. Eddie Izzard and Minnie Driver sucked you in, captivated, entertained and then tossed you to the curb like a dead rat they grew tired of torturing. Some short sales are like that, too. Except short sales are not available at Netflix.
We had made a dinner reservation before the show through Open Table at Morton’s. Only because Morton’s had sent me a postcard showcasing filet mignon paired with Australian lobster tail — ah, the power of four-color marketing. Ah, the power of discount pricing at $49.95. I might be the best Sacramento short sale agent in Northern California, but I can’t pass up a deal. I did, however, manage a few bites of my steak before my husband asked if it was possible that our server had mixed them up. Sure enough, he had the medium rare while I was left thinking that perhaps Morton’s simply did not know how to prepare a medium-rare steak and maybe I should send it back. Mine was definitely medium.
The had switched our steaks by mistake. My husband prefers medium, while I like mine pretty much dripping in blood, just like my trustee auctions. Actually, we had postponed this particular trustee auction at least 8 times. It’s enough of a hassle to postpone an auction once. We started the Chase Bank short sale in February. My seller called to say she had just canceled her listing because her previous short sale agent could not manage to negotiate her short sale. This was a Chase short sale in which Chase had preapproved the seller and offered her $25,000 to do a short sale.
Yes, this Chase Bank short sale offered $25,000 in cash in hand at closing to sell a $95,000 home in Rancho Cordova. Sounds pretty incredible, doesn’t it? Almost as absurd as the fact that Morton’s, an establishment known for excellence, could manage to mixup our steaks. But life is often weirder than it seems.
The problem with cash in a short sale is always the second lender. If there is a second lender. Because no second lender wants to take it in the shorts and let a seller walk away with cash when they get jack crap. Chase Bank has its reasons for wanting to give $25,000 to the seller. Don’t ask me why or I’d have to kill you. Trying to talk Chase Bank out of wanting to give $25,000 to the seller is almost as difficult as trying to talk the second lender into letting the seller have the $25,000. It’s a damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
I sold this Rancho Cordova short sale twice, too. The first short sale buyer walked away after two months and just before approval. That’s not unusual. But the second buyer hung in there, and we closed escrow yesterday. The seller ended up with $3,000 in cash and no foreclosure. Yay. Nine months to close this Rancho Cordova short sale. You can get pregnant and deliver a baby in 9 months! But I never give up. Just like Eddie Izzard, I keep on doing my thing. We’re better off for it.
When the Short Sale Buyer Walks Away
I don’t know why they call it walking away in a short sale. When a short sale cancels, the buyer doesn’t always walk. Sometimes, the buyer is kicked out of the short sale, booted to the curb. Sometimes the buyer runs away because the buyer is frightened. Sometimes a buyer just can’t get financing together so the buyer can’t close. But buyers rarely walk. They don’t take a leisurely stroll. They don’t wait patiently with you for a green light like some little old lady who needs help hobbling across the street. They bolt. Like cotton.
A few days ago a buyer’s agent sent this Sacramento short sale agent an email to say her buyers were canceling. Those weren’t the words she used — because she did not understand that her buyers were canceling — but that’s exactly what was happening. She just didn’t seem to know it, for whatever reason.
You can tell a buyer she is purchasing a short sale in “as is” condition but that information often falls on deaf ears. People think they are special and their situations are special, but the truth is they are not. When a buyer signs an “as is” addendum, which all buyers do for a Bank of America short sale, this means regardless of what a buyer finds in a home inspection, there are no renegotiations. None. No price reductions. No discounts. Not only is that because of the “as is” addendum, but the market dictates it as well. That’s because another buyer will buy the home in its “as is” condition. In a heart beat. The bank knows it. I know it.
The only person who doesn’t seem to know it is the buyer. Oh, and the buyer’s agent.
But the really good thing about Equator and a Bank of America short sale is a new buyer can be slipped into the old buyer’s position. It’s called a soft decline. Providing that the negotiator at Bank of America doesn’t press the wrong button and close out the file by mistake, which has been known to happen, the new buyer approval doesn’t take very long. Within 30 days, the new buyer should receive short sale approval.
So, if your short sale buyer walks away, don’t despair. It’s not a huge deal in the overall scheme of things and your Sacramento short sale. In fact, walking away is a fairly common occurrence.
The Search for Intelligent Life in a Green Tree Short Sale
Talking to a Green Tree short sale bank negotiator can be like that cartoon about what dogs hear. You know what I’m referring to, right? The human is speaking to the dog, giving a lecture about not jumping on the furniture or perhaps not tracking dirt on its paws into the house, and the caption balloon over the dog’s head is an interpretation of what the dog hears, which is “blah, blah, blah.” This is what it feels like when I talk to a short sale bank negotiator. Words are coming out of the mouth of this Sacramento short sale agent, but they are ignored and must sound like incomprehensible gibberish to the negotiator.
This is so common place in short sales that my Sacramento short sales are ripe with illustrations. Let’s look at a Green Tree short sale, for example. Green Tree is famous for trying to extort extract payments from sellers during the short sale, and why not? Green Tree is a collection agency. If PNC or Bank of America transferred the servicing of your loan to Green Tree, you’re stuck with Green Tree and, by extension, so am I. But that’s OK, I don’t mind dealing with Green Tree as it’s typically good fodder for illustrations of ineptness.
The latest problem is a Green Tree short sale in which there are four individuals who have signed the mortgage. All four people have signed the promissory note and the deed of trust. Since Green Tree picked up this loan by assignment, it was not involved in the notarized signatures on the prom note and deed of trust. In fact, Green Tree might not even know how to recognize a promissory note and deed of trust nor understand the instruments even though these pieces of paper are the basis for its business. Because Green Tree has decided there are only 2 individuals noted on the note and deed of trust — because that’s what Green Tree’s incorrect records tell Green Tree.
Never mind that I sent Green Tree a copy of the deed of trust showing that all four individuals have signed it. The evidence is in front of their faces. Nope, Green Tree has demanded a new package, new hardship letter and all new documents signed by only 2 people. You might be asking what’s the harm in that? Well, the harm is Green Tree is not the lender. Green Tree is the servicer of this loan. The lender is Fannie Mae, making this a Fannie Mae short sale. And when Fannie Mae sees there are only 2 people who have signed everything, Fannie Mae will kick out this short sale package and reject it. Green Tree has refused to send the file to Fannie Mae unless we submit it with only 2 individuals. Do you see the problem?
We have talked to the negotiator and the negotiator’s supervisor. They both have demanded that we submit a package that will be rejected by Fannie Mae for being incomplete. Makes one want to grab Green Tree employees by their shoulders and shake these people.
I’m just a Sacramento short sale agent. Why am I having to explain to Green Tree who their borrowers are? Why doesn’t Green Tree employ people who can reason and think? The only way to remove a borrower from a mortgage, apart from death — which, believe it or not doesn’t do it either — is to refinance that mortgage or pay it off, neither of which has happened.
Today we will contact Fannie Mae and report this problem at Green Tree, in addition to contacting the supervisor’s supervisor at Green Tree. Somewhere, there is intelligent life in this universe.
Get Your Short Sale Package Upon Initiation
Did you miss the earthquake drill yesterday? We were sitting in the doctor’s office waiting room when 10:18 had come and gone. Darn it. But then, until my husband told me about the earthquake drill, I had not heard about it. That’s because I don’t hang out on social websites during the day. Nope, this little hamster on the hamster wheel is busy wheeling and dealing in short sales and Sacramento real estate. Nose to the grindstone and all of that.
Still, I managed to miss observing the drill. Because if I had known about it, I would have wanted to observe. Certainly, nobody in the doctor’s office was doing a duck-and-cover. You’ve got to ask yourself, though, did anybody really believe that diving under your desk with your hands over your head would protect you against a bomb? A nuclear bomb? No, in the 1950s, you just did what you were told and you didn’t question it. It’s life experiences like this, the duck-and-cover, that has prepared me for my career-turn to a Sacramento short sale agent. It takes a special kind of person, I’m convinced.
Take a short sale package, for example. Way back in the early years of short sales, like 2007, I used to hand out short sale packages in advance to my clients. Sometimes, I would email the packages. Mostly these were financial P&Ls like a 710. Today, we have a ton of options at our disposal, but I don’t routinely send out a short sale package before we open the short sale file. The reason I don’t is because I don’t want my sellers to do any more work than they have to do. I want to limit the pain.
Not only do the requirements change from day to day, but the forms change, too. There is a short sale in Lincoln that I’ve sold 4 times now. The first 3 packages did not include this particular financial, but the present sale does. You may wonder why did Wells Fargo not require this and now it does? Legal crap. Sometimes, it’s one word in a document that changes.
It’s not just a Wells Fargo short sale in which the required forms and documents can morph. Bank of America has changed its third party authorization more times than I can count. I’ve run out of fingers and toes. So, when I don’t give you a short sale package in advance to complete, it’s not because I’m failing to be proactive or shirking my duty. It’s because I don’t want you to have to fill out one package and then be told you need to complete a different package. Especially those arm’s length affidavits that require a notary. I’m trying to save you time and agony. Because heaven knows there is enough agony in a short sale as it is.
Get Cash for That Sacramento Cooperative Short Sale
Not every person is cut out to be a Sacramento real estate agent. That’s a fact, Jack. In fact, some are unqualified to be in sales in the first place, and let’s not overlook the fact that some people think salesperson is a dirty word. Like, there is something wrong with sales or that if you don’t have the natural ability to sell then you can’t acquire that ability or wouldn’t want to. But when it comes to selling your home in Sacramento, a seller will increase his or her chances of maximizing profit potential and obtaining a fast sale by hiring a professional real estate agent.
In our Sacramento real estate market, often that means hiring a Sacramento real estate agent who knows how to sell short sales. You might think that any real estate agent can sell a short sale but that’s faulty thinking. Without jumping into a million reasons why that’s wrong, let’s just look at one reason. Like this seller in the Pocket. She had a good job and made a good income, and did not really have a hardship.
After looking at her situation, we devised a strategy. Because this Sacramento short sale agent knows her stuff. We put her home on the market in early September as a Sacramento short sale. A pre-approved Bank of America Cooperative Short Sale. It closed escrow yesterday. From the day the For Sale sign went into the yard to the day the buyer was handed the keys, it took 43 days. Start to finish. That’s faster than some homes sell and close that are not short sales.
The seller did not fork over her tax returns. She did not give Bank of America her bank statements nor payroll stubs. There was no hardship letter required. She had to make one phone call to say NO to HAFA and YES to the Cooperative Short Sale.
Bank of America paid two cash incentives on this short sale. The cash payment to the seller at closing was more than $12,800. No strings. Just: Here, take this cash. In fact, escrow wired the money to my seller’s bank account because she was on a plane when her home closed escrow. The seller received a cooperative incentive on top of an HIN Incentive. Yeah, I know what you’re thinking — it’s taxable. Yup. But yowza! It almost seems criminal and hard to believe that a seller can get paid to do a short sale yet it’s happening all over Sacramento, especially to my clients.
The bank did not approach the seller in this situation. This is an important component. Her Sacramento short sale agent figured out that the seller qualified and talked to the bank on the seller’s behalf. Bank of America wanted the seller to do a HAFA. But HAFA would have given her only $3,000, involved financial disclosures and made her life a total nightmare. Instead, the Cooperative Short Sale was fast, easy, no hassle and the seller put almost $13,000 into the bank at closing.
So, you tell me which was better for this seller, OK? HAFA or Cooperative short sale? I believe the Cooperative short sale wins hands down every single time. If you have a mortgage with Bank of America and want out, call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916 233 6759. It doesn’t cost you a dime out of pocket. In fact, it can pay.
