bpo: When the Short Sale Bank Rejects the Buyer's Appraisal - 03/25/12 08:18 AM
This doesn't happen very often, knock on wood. But every once in a blue moon a short sale bank will reject the buyer's appraisal. This can happen when the bank wants an unreasonable price. Why would the bank want an unreasonable price? Because the BPO agent is a moron. It's the BPO that the bank relies on, and BPOs are only as good as the agent who prepares them. Garbage in and garbage out results in a garbage BPO.
You can say that about an appraisal too but at least professional and licensed appraisers try to act like an appraiser. Which … (10 comments)
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bpo: Chase Bank to Process Short Sales in Equator But Equator Won't Fix the BPO Problem - 03/04/12 07:49 AM
I can hear the high-five slaps now. That's how I felt when I heard Chase Bank was going to Equator, but I had nobody to high-five but my cat. So, I tossed back a shot glass of diet coke, let out a whoop and slapped my desk. As a Sacramento short sale agent who has closed way too many of her fair share of Chase Bank short sales, I can hardly wait for Equator.
Yeah, I know everybody bitches about Chase Bank and short sales. They say Chase Bank takes too long, it loses paperwork, nobody returns calls, and it's a … (6 comments)
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bpo: Bad Odors and Old Carpeting Do Not Sell a Home, Not Even a Short Sale - 02/24/12 07:45 AM
Some people think you don't have to do anything to sell a short sale, much less to sell a fixer upper. I believe that every home deserves a chance to shine and show off its best characteristics. It doesn't matter if it's a short sale or a regular home in which the seller has equity. Because a buyer doesn't really care. A buyer is not buying the previous mortgage. The buyer is purchasing a home. The condition of that home's existing financing is not really important.
As a Sacramento short sale agent, I try to make suggestions to my sellers of … (6 comments)
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bpo: Proof that Bank of America Listens to Short Sale Agents - 02/01/12 09:04 AM
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. There is very little in between. Especially when it comes to short sales. As a Sacramento short sale agent, I close a lot of short sales. Our market is inundated with short sales. I've been specializing in short sales for 6 or 7 years now. As a result, I close a lot of Bank of America short sales.
In fact, I am very familiar with how Bank of America processes its short sales. I do whatever it takes to help Bank of America. Not because I am a stockholder … (5 comments)
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bpo: What Do You Do When that BPO on Your Short Sale Comes in Too High? - 01/16/12 11:04 AM
Whenever I list a short sale in the Sacramento area, I run the comparable sales two different ways. And I often get two different answers. When that happens, I know I might have a problem with the BPO. That's because it's tough to say which way of running the comps a BPO agent might use. I can tell you there is not enough money in doing a BPO for a BPO agent to run the comps more than one way.
So, the question is which do they use? You can't second-guess that. But if I were to guess, I'd say they … (7 comments)
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bpo: Bank of America Makes Another Policy Change for Short Sales - 01/14/12 11:36 AM
Earlier this week I received an email from Bank of America about Bank of America short sale policy. I briefly looked at it and thought HA. Then I thought hahahahha. And I went on to do other things. That's because when I receive an announcement from Bank of America about a short sale program change or implementation, I know it will be a couple of weeks to a couple of months before it is instituted.
But this particular email was strange in the way it was worded. It said due to agent responses, Bank of America was making a change that … (21 comments)
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bpo: Why You Want to Buy a Short Sale That is Back on the Market - 11/02/11 09:49 AM
Back in the old days, like 5 years ago, I used to get really bummed out if an active contingent short sale flipped back into on-the-market status. It meant as a Sacramento short sale agent I had to start over. I had to find a new buyer and put up with the inevitable questions such as "What's wrong with this house?" because now it was back on the market.
What is wrong with this house is nothing. It's what is wrong with buyers who shouldn't be buying short sales: not much commitment, little patience, easily frustrated, confused and annoyed.
An agent … (14 comments)
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bpo: Is Everybody Drinking the Same Kool-Aid? - 10/06/11 11:01 AM
There are some days that seem to be filled with stupidity. There's just no other way to put it. I expect a little stupidity here and there because that's how life is. You take the good with the bad. The smart with the stupid. The honest with the liars. But it can get a little overbearing at times and make an agent wonder: Is everybody drinking the same Kool-Aid?
An agent in my office told me about her experiences after a recent closing. She represented the buyers. Buyers who thought she should give them $2,000 of her commission because that's what … (11 comments)
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bpo: How Bank of America is Losing Money on Preapproved HAFA Short Sales - 08/26/11 10:14 AM
Great news about a Bank of America short sale this morning. Bank of America has directed AMS to use an expired BPO and to move forward on a file. I am ecstatic. This is a Preapproved HAFA short sale. The sellers received the preapproval letter dated June 1. We submitted the offer to Equator on June 15th. The entire HAFA file was uploaded and acknowledged by June 20th. Yet, here we sit. Today is August 26th.
The federal guidelines for HAFA that state banks must provide 10-day turnaround are worthless. It's not just this Bank of America short sale that this … (9 comments)
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bpo: The Upside to Buying an Elk Grove Short Sale or Any Short Sale for That Matter - 08/20/11 10:31 AM
I wrote an article yesterday about the Upside to Buying a Short Sale. Yeah, there is a benefit, a secret benefit. In this article I disclosed part of the reason I am so successful at selling short sales Sacramento. If you have eagle eyes and will take a moment to think about what I have to say about a BPO, you will understand how to use my recipe for success. As a buyer, you may find that it works very well for you.
Part of this recipe involves figuring out how to do a BPO like a BPO agent will. I … (4 comments)
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bpo: Is Your Short Sale Bank Negotiator Relying on a Magic Ball or is He Out of Crack? - 02/22/11 10:56 AM
Some of you may wonder how banks figure out whether or not to accept a short sale offer. After listing and selling almost excusively short sales in Sacramento since what? -- 2005, 2006 -- I have it figured out. Any Sacramento short sale agent worth her salt knows how banks determine the sales price on a short sale.
There is the logical way -- like a BPO agent would do it -- pull the comps in a 1/2 mile radius and within 10% of the plus-or-minus square footage. Try to use homes in the same configuration (one story vs. two stories, … (12 comments)
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bpo: The Skinny on Bank of America Cooperative Short Sales - 01/21/11 10:01 AM
When I first heard that Bank of America was rolling out its "Cooperative Short Sale Program," I was under the impression that it was available to sellers without hardship. However, that is not really the case. The bank says sellers without a severe hardship will most likely be asked to make a seller contribution but it does want to see some change in the seller's situation between the time the loan was originated and today.
Bank of America is simply validating, in a way, what I've been saying all along, almost any bank will grant a short sale if a seller … (42 comments)
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bpo: Why Some Short Sale Banks Demand a Higher Sales Price Than the Market Supports - 01/01/11 11:45 AM
I go out of my way to be nice to BPO agents with whom I come in contact for my Sacramento short sales. I might wonder to myself how they can survive in a tough real estate market like we have in Sacramento by earning only $50 to $100 per BPO, but I also give them credit for hanging in there and toughing it out.
It's the BPO agents who establish value on my Sacramento short sales for the lenders. If the BPO comes in too high, the bank might not grant the short sale. Over the years of selling short … (7 comments)
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bpo: Why Did They Foreclose on the Short Sale I Was Buying? - 10/22/10 10:10 AM
Pricing a short sale is an art. Although I try to explain to sellers how I arrived at the suggested sales price, most of them don't really care. As one seller put it, she's just the Monopoly piece. Because it's the bank that decides on the short sale price. The bank makes the decision based on the BPO. So logic would have it that if a Sacramento short sale agent would examine the comparable sales the same way a BPO agent does it, the acceptable sales price should be near the list price.
Earlier in the year, a list price could … (33 comments)
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bpo: It's the Seller's Choice to Accept or Reject a Short Sale Offer - 09/21/10 10:41 AM
Is every transaction getting harder these days? That's the question another Sacramento short sale agent asked me yesterday. I have to say it certainly appears to be true. It's not unusual in a short sale to draw a series of counter offers before finding a suitable and agreeable buyer. There are a number of points to refine and define prior to offer acceptance. Some buyer's agents get upset because they don't understand why the seller cares about the sales price. They wrongly think we should simply take their lowball offer and submit.
It used to be a buyer could submit an … (17 comments)
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bpo: Here is How to Screw Up a Sacramento Short Sale Listing - 08/07/10 10:28 AM
I have learned the hard way that before I put a Sacramento short sale back on the market, always always always read the marketing comments. That's because I don't physically change the status on my Sacramento short sales. MLS input and changes are handled by staff, and their job function is not to preview a Lyon agent's listings nor think about them. They do clerical work. That's why agents make the big bucks. And we need to read our own listings.
I consistently study my inventory list of Sacramento short sales, checking days on market, setting up alerts to let me … (12 comments)
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bpo: In Some Sacramento Short Sales, Two Plus Two Equals Three - 08/06/10 10:30 AM
You can train yourself to wake up when you are in the middle of a bad dream at night. It's called lucid dreaming. You can also make yourself realize that you are dreaming and change the direction of that dream. It's sort of like dreaming within a dream. You can control your dream. For example, you know those dreams in which things happen that could not possibly occur in real life, and they happen over and over? These unreal and repetitive instances are a clue to you that you are dreaming.
For me, repetitive dreams are frustrating. Like, when I can't … (8 comments)
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bpo: Here is Why Sacramento Real Estate Prices Are Falling This Summer - 07/21/10 10:04 AM
A reporter called yesterday morning to ask me about the rising real estate prices and market recovery in Sacramento. After all, our Trendgraphix reports show a 42% increase in pending sales for June. That's the message delivered by Lyon Real Estate. However, inventory is up about 8% and sales are down by 2%. The average per-square-foot price also dropped by 2% to $125. The reporter asked me to comment on our market stabilization in Sacramento.
Much as I would like to paint a rosy picture of the real estate market in Sacramento, I have to call it the way I … (11 comments)
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bpo: Why Do Short Sale Banks Hire BPO Agents Without the Tools to Do the Job? - 05/06/10 10:04 AM
What kind of BPO agent doesn't have a display key to access a lockbox? Every so often I run across these guys. They call to say that Bank of America or some other institution hired them to do a BPO on one of my Sacramento short sale listings and ask how they can gain access to a vacant home. When I tell them the home has a lockbox so they can go directly to the home, that's when the truth comes out. They don't have a display key. They would like me to drop what I'm doing at a moment's notice, … (8 comments)
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bpo: Update on Bank of America Short Sales and California's Housing Market Trends - 11/28/09 09:47 AM
Two interesting bits of information this morning. First, take a look at this chart from the Federal Housing Finance Agency. It shows the appreciation scale for housing in California from 1991 to present. Although we are not out of the slump by any stretch, it indicates the bottom happened in late 2008, which mirrors the movement I see in Sacramento's real estate market.
Second, another of my Bank of America short sales is about to be approved. What makes this Sacramento short sale different is the fact we submitted the file in early October, just as Bank of America was … (17 comments)
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