Th roller coaster of REO's has left with little time to do anything as of late, this even includes going to the bathroom. I just got to go to the lake and take 3 days off for the first time since February. Caught a nice 21 inch 2.5 pounder! Did not want to come back, but I did! Things have not slowed down one bit, as I awoke again to yet another new asset. The money has been great, and if anyone says this is easy work, come follow me around for a day. I have over 40 REO's now, and what I have found out the most is, you arent a real estate sales person anymore, you are a property mananger and transaction coordianator. Till the next time!
Quick thoughts for the day....I have been so freakin busy with these foreclosures.
Some of you may understand:
Please get me a receipt with the exact service dates please or I wont get paid.....still no receipt coming on day 30! Bank wont re-imburse after 30 days....contractors sometimes really suck!
Never got expense approved for snow removel....please re-submit
HOA now has $300 of late fees....you are supposed to get those invoices right away.....HOA takes a month to even get you the invoice.
To turn on the gas would you like to wait around the house from 8AM-12 or 12-4PM? Yes we understand it is winter and there is no heat or power at the house and you need to sit there for four hours so we can turn on the gas.
My clients and I are getting very worried as it has been two weeks now and still no signed contract from the bank! Can't you as their agent do something?
NEW LISTING ASSIGNMENT- first thought.....do I really have to an eviction or when the locksmith gets the door unlocked what treasures will I find?
Short Sales - Only been 3 weeks....call Countrywide......we never received your fax.....oh yes we did.....oh it is still under review.....oh you never have been assigned a closing coordinator yet.....we will call you in 24 hours....ithas been 72 hours and still no word from them. Thoughts of monkeys in front of a mountain of paper comes to mind!
BANK OWNED FORECLOSURE - PLEASE READ PRIVATE REMARKS- On normal associtation lockbox, property vacant, no need to call, just go and show...please read the foreclosure info sheet that is posted above.----What do the other agents do? Hi, I was calling to show your foreclosure listing.....can you tell me anything I need to know about the foreclosure process?
The house is supposed to close tomorrow and the bank still hasnt sent the signed deed.....does my client get a $350 per diem fee? As their agent can't you do anything? I dont think you are doing your job!
10 BPO requests due in 48 hours in the middle of every month.
Multiple Offers on a property that was listed for 2 years now becomes a bank owned foreclosure and drops $100,000 in price.
Please get your lockbox and sign off the property....it has foreclosed and I now have the listing......but we had a signed short sale on it with a verbal approval of the bank for $100,000 below the market value.
Phone rings....answer....is this Ken....yes....you handle foreclosures.....yes....I am looking for a good deal......on what specifically......well what is out there and I will need to know on every property what I could rent it for and what it would apprceiate at......click.......I think we got disconnected!!!!!
With my bank owned foreclosures that I have been listing lately, I have been forced into working a lot more with the "city" agents. I am amazed and absolutely FLOORED at how many offers come in that are terribly incomplete. I am also amazed at how most of the agents can't follow the directions we get from the bank. I mean these incomplete offers could jeopardize their buyer's best interests. Here in Nevada we have a simple 7 page offer contract. But yet, I see things like purchase price blank, financing terms blank, strike outs without initials, then they try to be attorneys and write ridiculous rookie legal jargon in additional terms. We are a state without attorneys handling our closings......
My real thoughts on these agents......
They obviously failed in the real world in filling out pre-printed forms and following directions, so now they are agents?
Brokers don't spend anytime looking over or training their agents, isn't it their ass on the line too?
They are just lazy and filling out complete contracts isnt necessary?
"Paperwork just isn't my thing!" Well then in this business what is?......using a key and driving a car?
Don't get me wrong, there are many wonderful agents out there who do spend their time making sure that all is correct and THANK YOU for being diligent.
What do you do when you get these in-complete contracts from these agents? Should I just submit them when I know they are incorrect and could get into legal trouble (probably 99% of the time it wouldn't end up in court...but what about that 1%?)?
When I tell them it needs to be done right, they always throw up a huge stink, and act like I am just being anal. But why should I have to train another broker's agents? I really feel like sometimes I am back teaching 3rd grade again and need to get out my red pen and giving time outs!
Signs That Have Been Missing Since Sept have been Sighted!
I had a sign with brochure tube and directional arrow at the corner of an intersection out in our rural area here. Well some people love using them for target practice so this one since it wasnt near any other homes I put a kryptonite cable and lock on it around a stop sign. Well in September, the sign was missing. Upon further investigation, I found that the perportrator had cut the bolt on the bottom of the stop sign, lifted the entire post up, took my cable out with sign, and then used a new bolt to bolt the sign in. For someone to do this seems really strange, who did I piss off now, maybe it was the locksmith?
So I talk to my neighbor and he was horseback riding out the BLM area to the north of the missing sign and spotted my sign along with grey carpet and landscape trimmings. You see people just love to dump in the desert here as the dump charges $35 a pick up truck load. Well, at the time of me knowing about this sighting, northern Nevada welcomed its largest snow storm in 3 yrs and so now my sign is buried under a foot of snow. Once I see the carpet, maybe I can figure out who it belongs to. My guess, it was a buyer that I did not represent, and usually their city agent has them waive their septic and well or even survey inspections and then I am the bad guy for selling them a house that there is something wrong with, not that there agent never suggested having an inspection done!
Usually about once a week I happen to get a new foreclosure listing via email. It is always an adventure as to what you will find when you show up at the property. The best way to tell if it is occupied is to call the utility company and see if the power is still on. If it isn't, hire a reliable locksmith and arm your self with a flashlight and a camera. The key pops, the door opens and you almost feel like CSI. Then you have the ones where they refuse to leave the house and six months after my email, they are still there! Here are some examples below of what you can find!
NFR? What is a NFR you ask? National Rodeo Finals for the PRCA (Professional Rodeo Cowboy Association) I know these are a lot of abbreviations, but unlike CRS and ABR and all the other agent designations, I at least explain what they are!
The Pro Rodeo Finals are held every December in Las Vegas, NV at the UNLV Tomas and Mack Arena. There are 10 days to the event and the last night is the big night. You are chosen to the NFR by the amount of money you made over the past year at other PRCA events. Those who have the most winnings are invited. So this is really like the World Series of Rodeo. I have never seen such amazing riders in one setting. Well yes I did when I went in 2004.
We love going because Vegas turns into a cowboy town with country music in the casinos, live country bands at night and a large convention like hall of cowboy shopping otherwise known as Cowboy Christmas (I dont go to that casue I hate shopping).
My wife's parents and brothers came down from Canada and one from LA for the event and we had our Christmas with them as well. We took a Southwest flight from Reno, $100 RT and 1 hour flight to Vegas. Stayed at Harrah's (that's were in-laws were) and to be honest I won't stay there again. The rooms were marginal for $150/night and the restaurants were absolutely terrible. Someone should implode this place! The best meal of the trip was at the New York, New York, where we had rubeuns at a deli there. Excellent bands at both Toby Keiths Bar and Grill and Hooter's (Hooter's btw is in bankruptcy and sounds like they are going to implode that one as well!).
I would go again, but the Tomas and Mack is really too small for this event now at capacity of 20,000. By 2010 there is supposed to be a new arena built behind the Flamingo. In comparison to the Reno Rodeo which is held every June, the NFR goes by so fast, one evert after another. Reason is for ESPN. Reno Rodeo is outside, has a carnival outside, has entertainment in between the events, and isnt as big. But dont get me wrong, Reno Rodeo doesnt have the talent of the NFR. As a gambling city, I like Reno better. Vegas feels like all glitz and Hollywood now, kind of a who can piss farther attitude. $6 for a beer, $8 for a drink, $5 min tables, and $14 for breakfast which consists of eggs ($1 for 12) and a couple of sausage links. Not to mention the throngs of people everywhere and lines for everything from taxis to reataurants. I think if I were to go a gambling trip, I would pick Reno over Vegas.
Why Reno? No lines, $2 min blackjack, $1 Craps, $1 bottled beers, 5 cent poker machines at the bar, $1.50 mixed drinks, $4 breakfasts and $8 dinners. We here in Reno don't have any sticks up our asses either, with good ol western hospitality!
I think I have about just seen everything doing these bank owned foreclosures, until this!
I received an email for another REO listing last Friday. My usual thing is to schedule the locksmith first. I had been using a this locksmith. That was a mistake. Since I have been doing so many re-keys, the locksmith would just go out to the property and do it without me and then hide the key and I would come by in an hour and get the key....that way I didn't have to do cable guy scheduling problems. So I schedule the locksmith to go out and re-key.
I go to the home an hour after they had been there to see what I had going and take pics. There was a lot of personal debris in this home including an exercise bike and wheel barrow. It basically looked like they left in the middle of the night. Meanwhile, the neighbor came out when I was there and she was really a nice gal. She had mentioned that they had been gone since March of '07 and no one had really been there again. So I go through the home and lock everything up that needs to be locked up and check all the windows to make sure they are all locked. Off I go!
The next morning after I was done showing property, I check my messages and low and behold, there is a message from the locksmith's owner asking me if she could have the exercise bike as she was there yesterday doing the re-key. I told her I needed to evaluate the personal property to see if it exceeds the $300 limit of abandoned property, but I knew someone else who was looking for one and they had first dibs. She said well call if you can give it to me.....I started thinking.....I then asked her what she was doing in the upstairs of the house (that is where the bike was). She said, "It is our job to make sure that all the windows are secure". I told her that I only hired her to change locks, not to be a security company. I thought to myself then....this is the last time I use these guys.
So I had asked my wife Shannon (who works part time with me) and her brother who were visiting from out of town to go check this house out and see what they think the value is, plus I thought it would be fun for her and her brother to check out this foreclosure thing. Well, I get a call from Shannon and she was in the house and asked where the exercise bike and wheel barrow were. I said upstairs in the bedroom. Well low and behold there was only an indentation of where the bike was. I started asking her for all of these other things that were there and none of it was there. I asked her to go to the neighbor and ask her if anyone had been there and to check to see if there was any forced entry. No forced entry and the neighbor said that a red truck with this license plate had been there....a guy with grey hair and another guy. Hmmmm?
I called the owner of the locksmith and asked her if they had gone to the house to get the bike and other things? Seemed suspicious to me that no one had been around that home for ages, then it is robbed the next day after they were there? I told her that there was no forced entry and the locks were changed so that there was no former owner coming over. She assured me that they had been in business for 23 yrs and would never do something like that. I said ok.....welll we have the license plate and will be calling the police over and run the plate.
About 15 mins goes by and I get a call from this guy one of locksmith's finest. He told me that there was a mis-communication and he would be returning everything....I am very sorry. You see the owner and(another locksmith) re-keyed the house and they cut an extra key so that the other guy could go and take what they wanted and to give the owner the bike she wanted. So I asked...."YOU HAVE AN EXTRA KEY TO THIS HOUSE!" "Well yea I destroyed it", he said. But I will be putting everything back tomorrow.
I called the Owner and asked her if she wanted to come clean. She kept saying she had nothing to do with it. I asked her what she was going to do with Roy...she said just reprimand him!!!!
I went back to the house on Monday and everything that I saw there was returned....but who know what was there prior to me being there that the locksmiths took. I had the Sparks Police come out to file a report and they asked if I wanted to press charges for burglary, but that it would be hard to get the DA to get a case together as it is unknown what property was taken and whose property is it anyway. So, I just had them file a report and would pursue the Washoe County route which is who gives out the locksmith permits.
Yesterday, I received a bill from the locksmith. I can't believe they think that I would pay this bill, especially after I had to get another locksmith out there since who knows how many other keys they have!
The moral of the story is you can't trust anyone anymore.
This is on the comments on a country property I am going to show today. In the past, I have been bit by dogs that fit in the above catagory. I love dogs, I have five of my own, but some people just don't like dogs, nor do I like strange dogs running around on a property. I have a fear of being bit, and many people don't like dogs and this will distract from them concentrating on the home. Well, today's client doesn't like dogs and on another home we looked at the owner was waiting at the end of driveway and said the dogs were at the house, but they are friendly. We both told her to go get the dogs or we were going to leave.
So I call the agent and he tells me that there are 3 dogs that wander the property and it will be ok as they are really friendly. Well I have heard that before and the result was 3 puncture wounds through a pair of carhardts. I asked him if the seller can take the dogs for a ride when I show the property and my client doesn't like dogs. He said are you kidding? I said no, I am not.....if the dogs are there we will keep on going. I also threw in there that he is opening himself up to a ton of liability and thought to myself I am glad he is not my agent. He said he never had a request like that....the dogs are very friendly.
Well he did agree to have the dogs leave with the sellers....we will see today....but I also told him I would throw this out there for other agents opinions and see from the comments who is right!
This guy needs to lay off his crack pipe. We are not going to recover in 2008 for the housing market. There is 4300 active homes on the market and only 173 that have sold in Nov as of today. This figure doesnt include new home builders who keep building and undercutting the rest of their communites. There are 375 foreclosures in Washoe and this is just the start of the 2005 re-adjusters and we have all of the 2006 re-adjusters coming, not to mention that all mortgage delinquencies are up 23%.
The median price in Reno/Sparks is still at $285,000, still too high for the avg service/warehouse industry that is here. CA are not moving here anymore because they can't sell their home in CA and what other state has as high of housing prices as we do where it would make economic sense to move here? Mark my words, when the median home price gets down to $210,000 or wages increase 25% (which aint gonna happen) then the market will get better. You should see stabilization mid 2009 - 2010 and one year of flat, then a normal appreciation of 6-8% a year.
Investors and fence sitters, now is the time to buy!
I n my last post I mentioned some problems of the new office. Well Danny addressed the issue. His mgmnt company just took over the property 4 months ago as the prior mgmnt was loosing tenants left and right. Hmmm, why were they loosing tenants you ask? The Temp Agency. This temp agency does the staffing for Amazaon.com which is in Fernley, NV and is doing their holiday staffing. By the end of December the riff raff should be gone and wont ever be back. Danny said he could hit them with a nuisence eviction, but that would take too long.
The heat now works too!
Due to all of our problems, Danny is giving December for free. I am a squeaky wheel.
Office Phone:
(775) 828-9696
Cell Phone:
(775) 240-3866
Email Me
An entertaining, sarcastic look into the dealings of a broker/owner of Reno Rancho Realty, a comany specializing in horse property, vacant land and foreclosures in Reno, NV
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Ken Wiseman (Reno Rancho Realty)
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