The Short Sale Law of Averages

I think the law of averages says that for every three good things that happen, something else awful will happen. So, no matter what, I’m always ahead, right? Like receiving 3 short sale approval letters on a Monday (of all days) for 3 Sacramento short sales leaves room for something else to explode. I didn’t know if I would be able to pull two of those short sales out the fire. We had a huge disagreement between the second lenders and the first lenders. It was the usual disagreement: The first lender wanted to pay less and the second lender wanted more.

But in the end, they met in the middle. There was a bit of compromise. Negotiating a short sale is not always about power plays. It’s about give and take and options. It’s about having a Plan B and a Plan C. It’s about about patience and not letting personal feelings about anything enter the equation. Mr. Spock would have made a good short sale negotiator. James T. Kirk, not so much.

In the second short sale, it had been a long battle between two lenders as well. The bank originally wanted to give the seller many, many thousands of dollars. But the second lender refused to approve that scenario, and that was understandable. I don’t know if it’s because we wore them out with our incredible staying power or because of our luck that HAFA regulations had changed in June so we could give the second more money, but we finally brought both parties to an agreement.

Just as we’re patting ourselves on the back for a job well done, a short sale set to close this week blew up. All of a sudden the buyer backed out. Oh, he gave some lame excuse like they all do when they cancel but bottom line is he bolted. After 11 months of waiting for HAFA short sale approval from Bank of America. That makes little sense. We were so close to closing. This is like crawling across the desert without water to find a mirage.

See, agents often ask why I ask so many questions, why I insist on commitment, and this is why. Because we want buyers to close the short sale after we obtain short sale approval.