I've been helping alot people who are upside down on their mortgage for the past few years who need to sell their house short and have dealt with some of the worst banks regarding negotiating short sales. Most of these deals take between 3-5 months with some on occassion taking much longer.  I have come up with a few tips to help you negotiate for your client and get an answer from the bank quicker than normal.

OK , here goes...

1. Gather all the documentation upfront from the seller including Hardship Letter, Last 2 months Bank Statements, Tax Returns, Financial Worksheet showing income vs expenses, Pay stubs or other proof of income, any delinquent HOA fees and most important of all is the Authorization to release information form. This is obviously in addition to your Listing agreement. The reason I say to get this upfront is because it is harder to get it from the seller later on.Get them while it's early in the process

2. Once you have collected the necessary documents from the seller do what you normally do to list the property in your MLS. Take plenty of pictures and make sure you take pictures of any damage that is present.

3. Call the seller's lender to get the FAX number to their Short Sale Department and fax over the authorization form. Without this form the bank will not speak to you.

4. Call back the next day to confirm they received the authorization form and also to find out where to send the complete short sale docs. Ask if they have their own short sale package with their special forms. Using their forms can speed up the process.

5. When you get an offer and are ready to send the package to the bank the most important thing is to send them a complete package. Partial packages will only delay the process. A complete package includes Listing Agreement, Executed Sales Contract, Preliminary HUD1, Proof of any income, Hardship Letter, Financial Worksheet, Bank Statements, Tax returns, plus any other addendums the bank may use.

6. Now in addition to everything listed above, I would advise you to submit a Broker Price Opinion ( a low low ball BPO). The bank will order their own BPO/appraisal as part of their procedure, but if you submit your own BPO they now have something to compare their BPO to. In some cases they might not even order a BPO if they have yours. This will save a couple of more weeks.

7. Send the complete package to them in one shot, you may also want to put the seller's loan account number on every piece of paper.

8. Call the next day to confirm they recieved your package because some banks play this game that they never received it. So when I call to confirm I also get the name of the representative I was talking to. It helps to mention names of who you spoke to when/if they deny having the package you sent over to them. Resending docs could waste a couple of weeks, try to avoid this as much as possible.

9. When you can't get a hold of the bank negotiator, try calling during off hours, later in the day when the phones probably aren't so hectic for the bank. I have been known to reach Bank Reps after 6pm after weeks of trying during normal hours. Try to get the email of the bank representative. Sometimes it is easier to communicate through email and can save alot of time.

10. Please, when speaking to the Bank Reps, don't get frustrated with them and be patient. This is a slow process normally and these banks unfortunately are loosing alot of money. As they say, "you get more with honey  than you do with vinagar". Being polite will get you farther than rudeness.

11. When preparing Preliminary HUDs, work with your title company to do this if you don't know how. Most title companies are already doing this as a free service if you close the deal with them. Ask the title company you use if the offer this service. Tell them also to pad some of the taxes and fees to anticipate last minute charges, fees or fines. Because it is my experience that when Banks do offer their approval letter for the short sale, they always want the net amount that is reflected on the preliminary HUD, and if there are additional charges, the only place to get them from is your commission. Protect your commission by inflating some of the charges in the HUD. When it's all said and done, if there is any extra money left over, they will get more than they expected as a surprise.

I hope this imnformation will help you speed things up with the banks.

JP Sansaricq

561 386 4992

http://www.buyboynton.com

 

 

 

 

Hi everybody,

Just wanted to let you know that Brenda and I have moved to a new office located in Lake Worth Florida to better serve our clients. Exit Realty Premier is located at the corner of Lantana Rd and Jog Rd inside the Walmart shopping Center at 6177 Jog Rd Ste. 5D Lake Worth, FL 33467. Their phone number is 561 967 3948.

Come and stop by anytime to see our beautiful new office and our new home base. The Plaza our office is in is conveniently located to serve our customers in Boynton Beach, Lake Worth, Delray Beach, Ocean Ridge, Wellington and West Palm Beach.

For more information please visit our website at http://www.buyboynton.com

 

JP Sansaricq

561 386 4992

This past week HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan decided to allow the $8000 first time home buyer tax credit to be used toward the buyer's downpayment and closing cost. What a fantastic opportunity this presents to those home buyers who haven't been able to scrape together the money for their downpayment.

So for all you home buyer's sitting on the fence because you don't have the downpayment, now is the time to take action and start looking for that dream home.

According to HUD, FHA approved lenders, government agencies and non-profit organizations can supply home buyers short term loans upto the amount of the $8,000 first time home buyer tax credit.
 
To help buyers that need down payment and closing cost assistance when purchasing a home with the tax credit, a number of Housing Finance Agencies are offering special short-term second loans to qualified buyers. These loans are available for little or no interest and may be repaid with the homebuyer tax credit refund.

There is no need now to wait to file next years tax returns or file amendments to this years tax returns. You can use that tax credit now to buy your next home.

You still need to qualify for the first time home buyer tax credit. To qualify,  you can not have owned the home you live in for the past three years and you need to buy a home between Jan. 1 and Dec. 1, 2009.  Of course if you don't need the money for your downpayment you can still take the credit on your 2008 or 2009 income tax return.

For more information about the $8000 first time home buyers tax credit visit The National Association of Home Builder's website.

If you're a first time home buyer and looking to buy a home in Palm Beach County Florida, give me a call and I will help you use the $8000 first time home buyers tax credit to prucahse your next home.

John Paul Sansaricq
Realtor, Exit Atlantic International Realty
Office 561 330 6065
Cell 561 386 4992

In an effort to help our clients save money, we have collaborated with Wiglesworth-Rindom Insurance, a local Delray Beach Insurance Company, to help our friends and family cut the high costs of homeowner insurance by offering a free re-quote on their current homeowner insurance policies. In recent months we came across this money saving idea because our very own insurance costs were going from $1900 per year to over $4300 per year. Feeling helpless and screwed at the same time we called upon Michael Rindom to see what he could do for us in this regard. Michael offered to do a re-quote to see if there were any other insurance companies that could give us a better rate. Well, he did find a company that offered us more coverage for $2600 per year. We knew that rates had gone up but he was able to save us $1700 in insurance costs. Shortly after our fortunate incident, we received some calls from some of our friends and family who were in the same situation as their insurance rates were going up as well. So we put them in touch with Wiglesworth-Rindom Insurance and they all saved hundreds of dollars on their Insurance. On average $1300.00 As with other things if you don't know, you don't get, so we are letting all our friends and family know that they can save money by getting a FREE Re-Quote on their homeowners insurance by visiting our website at : http://www.buyboynton.com and clicking on the link that says "Save on Homeowners Insurance". Fill out the quote form and don't forget to mention John and Brenda Sansaricq as the people who referred you for Priority service and pricing. And best of all you don't have to speak with anyone if you don't want to. John Sansaricq, Realtor Exit Realty the Destinations group jb@buyboynton.com 561 386 4992

Lately, I've have been approached by many people who ask me for help because they are now upside down in their mortgage. They owe more money than their house is worth and don't know what they can do. The obvious question is what did you do to get in this position?

For some, they just got caught up in the interest only loan rate increases, property tax increase and the recent price drop from the slow market. For others, they bought at the wrong time, took advantage of 100% financing on overvalued properties and others refinanced to pull out equity from their homes and are now stuck.

 Whatever your reason is that you are upside down, there are ways to help your situation such as:

1. Contact your lender to see if they can work out a new payment plan, reduced payments that will allow you to stay in your home until things can get better.

2. Tell them your situation and see if they can refinance your current mortgage (provided you have equity and can afford the new payments).

3. Ask to speak with their loss mitigation department and tell them your hardship situation (loss of job, medical problems, payments have doubled due to insurance/taxes etc. ) and ask them if they will work with you on a short sale. Sometimes they will work with you without being behind on payments, other times they will require you to be a few months behind before they will even speak with you. Ask them!

4. If you are nervous about speaking with the bank, contact a realtor who is familiar with the short sale process to have them negotiate on your behalf. It will cost you nothing to at least get the advice. A good realtor will be able to negotiate for you, list and sell your home and find you a new place to live.

5. The worst thing you can do is nothing. Foreclosure is the worst option. it's better to have a few late payments on your credit than a foreclosure that can stay on your credit for 7-10 years.

My advice is to contact someone who is experienced and can help. With millions of people facing foreclosure this year, you are not alone. Banks are overwhelmed with people in this same exact situation. They don't want your home, they want their money so that they can lend more of it to other consumers. The more BAD DEBT they have, the less MONEY they can borrow from the federal government and in turn the less money they can earn in interest.

Hope this helps you if you are in trouble.

 

JP