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Fannie Mae and Other Things That Don’t Work Right
It seems like I have to fix a lot of things that don’t work right. It’s not necessarily that they are broken as much as it is they simply don’t work correctly. Stuff goes haywire. In fact, I am so used to things that don’t work right that I have become somewhat complacent. I don’t get upset over it. I just fix it.
Almost nary a day goes by when I don’t run into some short sale negotiator telling me the bank won’t authorize seller credits on the HUD. Since when did a bank negotiator become a HUD expert anyway? I realize they don’t know how to read a HUD. If they had to prepare a HUD from scratch, they’d be up a creek without a paddle. Yet, here they are telling me to remove fees that are not credits under the assumption they are correct. They’re not correct. This problem has become so commonplace that I keep a stock answer prepared and ready to email. They don’t work right.
Last Friday my company email went on the blink. Stopped downloading to my computer. None of my settings changed. My email client stopped receiving. The company’s exchange server was not updated or altered. The IT department signed on to my computer to check but they couldn’t find anything wrong, either. We ended up doing a redirect. Because it doesn’t work right.
Yesterday we had to call out an electrician to remove a bulb from a kitchen pendant. We’ve had the pendants fixed twice. Third time they stopped working, we bought new pendants. None of this Lumen’s back-basement discount crap. We ordered blown-glass Oggetti. Then, the darned burned-out bulb got stuck in the socket and a wire connection busted. That’s why it doesn’t work right.
In many Sacramento short sales, I routinely encounter the dreaded Fannie Mae problem with second loans. Now, I heard a guy at DTS admit the other day that they kick out Bank of America Cooperative short sales when the investor is Fannie Mae. He said DTS has had too many problems with Fannie Mae. Because Fannie Mae is a government-sponsored entity, it doesn’t work right.
Fannie Mae has guidelines that are often somewhat restrictive. Like telling borrowers to stop making mortgage payments. Yeah, that’s your government telling you to go into foreclosure. Or, choosing foreclosure over a short sale by refusing to postpone a trustee’s sale. Another involves the payment it will approve to a second lender. Second lenders want to negotiate and try to get more, but Fannie Mae won’t allow it.
Most second short sale lenders realize the problem with Fannie Mae. They tend to get on board. Especially since Fannie Mae rarely makes exceptions. I even had the gatekeeper at Green Tree back down on a second demand a few months ago when I explained that since Fannie Mae was the investor he needed to accept 6% of his unpaid balance. He said: Why didn’t you say so? As though telling him my name was Dorothy would get me into the Emerald City. The system for some second lenders, though, is broken. They don’t work right.
And you can’t fix Fannie Mae.
Photo: Shutterstock
This is the Reason to Be a Top Listing Agent in Sacramento
A fellow real estate agent in Sacramento once told me that she prefers to work with first-time home buyers because they are more grateful than sellers. She said they were totally thrilled to be handed the keys at closing, more so than those who are handing over the keys. They didn’t complain. They didn’t nag her about why isn’t their home selling. I guess she moved up a notch or two in their eyes. And that approach works for her.
I’m very much the opposite. I love working with home sellers. I am a top listing agent in Sacramento. It shows in my production and I’ve been a top listing agent in Sacramento for a long time. I love selling homes. Including homes for sellers of a short sale. I know that sellers who need to do a short sale have limited options in Sacramento. There are not very many of us short sale specialists or Certified HAFA Specialists in the area. There are hundreds, maybe thousands who have taken classes, but few agents who actually close a lot of short sales. The more short sales an agent closes, the more an agent learns about the fine nuances of a short sale. I’ve closed enough to be the #1 short sale agent over 7 counties since 2006. Today I am a top listing agent in Sacramento for all homes.
I enjoy preparing the home for sale. Setting the stage. Helping the homeowner select the correct price. Shooting photographs and tweaking in Photoshop. Receiving purchase offers, reading between the lines. Analyzing comparable sales. Negotiating with the banks. Managing the selling process. All that’s involved in home selling these days.
Making a difference in somebody’s life is the key, though. Home sellers who have equity are happy when we close, especially when I sell the home for thousands more than they would probably get otherwise. Money makes everybody happy. If somebody tells you that money can’t buy happiness, that’s a broke person speaking. There is nothing inherently evil in money. It’s the love of money that corrupts people. Not money itself.
I picked up my mail from the office on Tuesday. I don’t go into the office more than once a week. In my mail was a card from Elk Grove sellers whose home I sold as a short sale sometime last year. They said they had been meaning to write me a note for a long time. They thanked me for doing my job, for my “wisdom, advice, expertise and encouragement.” They ended the note by saying: “Thank you for helping us get a fresh start.”
On my team members’ desk was a bottle of French champagne, an orchid plant and a card from another short sale seller. She thanked us for the sale of her home. I felt it was only fair that my team member, Barbara Dow, receive the orchids, especially since she had been watering it, and our assistant, Shaundra Bradley, I knew would enjoy the champagne. They work as hard as I do. Maybe even harder. I kept the card.
And that’s the reason I am a top Sacramento listing agent. It’s more than the sale of a house.
Photo: Elizabeth Weintraub
