OVERVIEW

Buyers pursue short sales to get a good deal. But you might want to think twice about making an offer on a pre-foreclosure, short sale home. It's not as simple as you may believe, and very few can close in 30 (or even 60) days or less.

A short sale occurs when a bank agrees to accept less than what is owed on a Mortgage or Deed of Trust to release its lien. Negotiated right, a short sale can be an excellent alternative to foreclosure to both sellers and buyers. And banks will consider a short sale because it allows them to recoup some of their investment without the work and expense of selling the home themselves. However, just because a property is listed with short sale terms does not mean the lender will accept your offer, even if the seller accepts it.

It is important to do your research before making an offer to purchase. Your agent can find out who is in title, whether a foreclosure notice has been filed and how much is owed to the lender(s). This is important because it will help you to determine how much to offer and the likelihood that the lender(s) will accept your offer.

In addition, the lender will want to see that you have your own loan available and you are preapproved. Send a preapproval letter to the lender. It will help if your agent sends a list of comparable sales that support the price you are offering to pay for the home.

WRITING THE SHORT SALE OFFER AND SUBMITTING TO THE BANK

Short Sale Homes Sell at (Near) Market Value

Before a buyer writes a short sale offer, a buyer should ask his or her agent for a list of comparable sales.The bank will want to receive somewhat close to market value. Lenders will insist on a comparative market analysis, known as a CMA, or broker price opinion, known as a BPO. If a lender believes a better price can be obtained by taking the property back in foreclosure over a short-sale offer, the lender may hold out for a higher price. That price will be close to market value. Lenders accept short sales when the home is worth the short-sale price, which means market value.

Many banks will discount the price a little bit from market value, but to get an acceptance, offers should be reasonable and close to the comparable sales. Some short sales are priced ridiculously low. The short sale price may have little bearing on market value and may, in fact, be priced below the comparable sales to encourage multiple offers. Or for that matter, any offer on the eve of a scheduled Trustee Sale (in an attempt by the Real Estate Agent to salvage commissions). So to get your offer accepted, it will need to be priced near market value. If you're not prepared to pay above a superficial price on a lowball short-sale listing, then pass.

The Buyer Must Qualify

In a normal transaction, a buyer's lender will examine credit history, length of time on the job, debt ratios, and a host of other criteria to determine a borrower's qualifications. In a short sale transaction, buyers also need to submit their loan prequalification letter along with their offer to the seller’s lender.

Prequalification means a loan officer has determined a borrower is credit worthy and financially able to qualify for a certain loan.Prequalification differs from preapproval because prequalified is based on a lender's opinion, not on verification.

Contrast that with a Preapproval Letter from a lender which says the borrower’s credit, bank references and employment have been verified. The letter is not binding on the lender because it is subject to other conditions such as an appraisal of the property. A preapproval letter from a lender carries substantial weight because it shows the seller and seller’s lender the buyer is serious.

Tip: Send a preapproval letter and a copy of a sizeable earnest money deposit that adequately reflects the buyer's ability to obtain a mortgage and intent to close the transaction.

SHORT SALE BUYER: BEWARE!

Lenders Discount Commission

Generally, only lenders who have sold loans to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac are paying traditional real estate commissions to real estate agents. The rest often discount commissions. Moreover, agents end up doing two to three times the work of a conventional transaction and don't appreciate getting paid less to do more work. If you have agreed to pay your agent a certain percentage under a buyer broker agreement, you could be liable for the difference between what the lender will pay and what your contract stipulates, if your agent refuses to waive the difference.

Higher Buyer Closing Costs

Because lenders rarely will pay for any extras, as a seller would be willing to do, if you want any of those extras, you will pay for them yourself. Sometimes lenders will refuse to pay for standard seller closing costs such as transfer taxes, too. If you want specific inspections, you will probably pay for them out-of-pocket.

Lynn Arends, concentrates her Seattle practice at Lynn Arends Law Group PLLC and Lynn Arends Realty Group, on short sale and foreclosure issues. She is a frequent speaker for the Washington State Bar and the King County Bar and an instructor for the Washington Association of Realtors. Contact her at lynn@lynnarends.com or visit her blog and website at www.lynnarends.com.

Foreclosure Fairness Act: New Law to Help Washington Homeowners

Last Thursday Gov. Chris Gregoire signed into law a new bill giving homeowners the statutory right to sit down with their lenders and discuss modifying their loan. 

In an effort to protect WA homeowners from foreclosure, under the new WA Foreclosure Fairness Act, lenders must now send to homeowners in default a letter explaining their right to a sit-down to discuss alternatives to foreclosure.  If that letter goes unanswered, the bank must make three attempts by phone, and then send a certified letter before proceeding with the foreclosure process. 

Lenders must conduct "a good faith review" of the homeowner's financial situation and offer loan modifications, if possible.  The new law allows a mediator to handle a negotiated agreement between the lender and homeowner. 

The problem, as I see it, is that many homeowners will simply ignore these communications.  After all, homeowners behind on their payments are already overwhelmed with harassing collection calls and letters and may simply view these as just another collection attempt by their lender and not their statutory right to mediate.

Some parts of the law are effective immediately and the entire House Bill 1362, aka the Foreclosure Fairness Act can be found here.

Click here to find out more about the Second Substitute House Bill 1362

Is a Short Sale Really an Alternative to Foreclosure?

By: Lynn Arends 

Short Sale Basics

A short sale occurs when a bank agrees to accept less than what is owed on a mortgage or deed of trust to release its lien. Negotiated correctly, a short sale can be an excellent alternative to foreclosure to both sellers and buyers. And banks will consider a short sale because it allows them to recoup some of their investment without the work and expense of selling the home themselves.

New Obama administration initiatives, such as the Home Affordable Foreclosure Alternatives Program (HAFA) and recent changes to HUD's Pre-Foreclosure Sales Program (PFS) for FHA loans, have made short sales an ever more viable option in today's current economic state. But before signing up for a short sale, here are some issues to consider:

Who Qualifies?

Assuming the property is underwater (more is owed than what it's worth), here are the necessary criteria to be considered for a short sale.

• The mortgage is in default or default is foreseeable.

Yes, borrowers can be current on their payments and still be considered for a short sale.

 • The seller has experienced a true hardship

Basically, this is the "what has changed since you took out the loan that you could afford it then but can't now" test. Examples of a hardship are unemployment, job relocation, divorce, bankruptcy, illness, or disability.

 • The seller has no assets.

Before accepting a short sale, a lender will require the seller to submit a short sale package. This includes the seller's tax returns, financial statements, bank and credit card statements, hardship letter, and schedule of assets. If there are assets, the lender may not approve the short sale because the seller has the ability to bring cash to the closing or the seller may still be granted a short sale but be expected to pay back the deficiency.

Deficiency Judgments

A deficiency is the difference between the amount received and the amount owed. Although a promissory note makes the seller personally liable for the debt, whether the bank can pursue a deficiency judgment after a foreclosure or short sale depends in part on the security instrument used and that state's deficiency statute.

Most lenders foreclose through a trustee's sale. In some states, that extinguishes the debt and usually does not give the lender the right to pursue a deficiency judgment. However, when a senior lienholder nonjudicially forecloses and the second lienholder is wiped out during a foreclosure under a trustee's sale, the junior security interest is extinguished but the obligation on the note is not-possibly giving the junior lienholder the right to pursue a judgment on the debt.

And yes, a lender can issue a 1099 to a borrower and still attempt to collect the remaining debt. The mere issuance of the Form 1099 does not alter the creditor's legal right to attempt to collect the debt and it does not act as an admission that the debt is no longer due (although the creditor will need to amend the 1099 issued to the borrower upon collection).

Junior Lienholders

The property may be encumbered by more than one lien. If so, all junior lienholders (and any mortgage insurer) must agree to accept a short sale. This is where good negotiation skills and playing well with others kicks in. In today's typical short sale, it is often the only the first lienholder who is receiving any money. Generally, it is up to that first lender to give some of its proceeds to the junior lienholders. This encourages the junior lienholder to agree to the short sale and release its lien. That amount, whether it is $3,000 or $5,000, is negotiated between the senior and junior lienholders.

But lately some junior lienholders have been demanding outrageous sums of money to approve the short sale and requiring contributions from the buyer, seller, and/or real estate agents. Often, all of this occurs without any disclosure to the first lender. Monies not disclosed or paid outside of closing? That's called mortgage fraud.

To me this is a case of the junior lender cutting off its nose to spite its face. In the event that the short sale fails, the first lender will most likely get the property back in the foreclosure, thus eliminating the second lien entirely.

It's All About the Debt!

Even if a client is a perfect short sale candidate, I spend a lot of time walking people through what nonjudicial foreclosure looks like. To me, this is the "what if I wake up tomorrow and do nothing" option. That's the baseline. Everything else-short sale, deed-in-lieu, loan modification, or bankruptcy-requires some action and needs to yield a better result. What that means is that I need to negotiate a better settlement in a short sale than any of the other options, especially with respect to the remaining debt.

For example, when my office receives the standard short sale letter of consent from a certain lender on a first mortgage, it always says that the lender is not waiving its right to a deficiency. If the client is delinquent in its payments, and facing a nonjudicial foreclosure on the first, given that the Washington Non-Judicial Foreclosure Statute prohibits the lender from obtaining a deficiency (except against a guarantor, which does not apply in virtually all residential sales), the client is better off simply allowing the property to go to foreclosure rather than allowing it to go to short sale. So the question is: Why does the lender not recognize this reality and waive its deficiency in transactions involving a pending nonjudicial foreclosure? Or if the mortgage insurer is calling the shots, why is it not able to convince the mortgage insurer to pay the claim without proceeding to foreclosure?

So who is the perfect short sale candidate? Three scenarios immediately come to mind.

• There is only one loan and there is a program for dealing with the deficiency. HAFA, HUD's PFS, and the VA's Compromise Sale Program are all attempts to waive deficiencies in short sales and deeds-in-lieu.

• Two loans and the first is being fully paid off in the short sale. Foreclosure does not benefit the borrower in any way. It's all about the second lien and I can negotiate that debt as part of the short sale.

• Borrowers who are able and desire to remain current on their payments. Obviously, being current never triggers the foreclosure. And if credit is important, clearly the biggest hit to credit is every month a borrower doesn't make a payment. Again, this is debt I can negotiate.

 In the end, it's all about the debt.

Beware of Condominiums and Any Super-Priority Liens

Unless the former owner of the unit files bankruptcy, he or she remains liable for the preforeclosure assessments on the foreclosed unit. But in states such as Washington, the association may also have a six-month preference for association dues owed prior to a foreclosure sale. What that means is that HOAs are a force to be reckoned with in any short sale transaction because if an HOA can collect six months of dues from the lender or new buyer in a foreclosure, they will need to be offered more than that amount to accept a short sale and release its lien. So it's important to do the math when dealing with an HOA. But the good news is that when an HOA approves a short sale, it is usually for satisfaction of debt and the seller is not liable for any additional preforeclosure or short sale assessments.

Buying Again After a Foreclosure or a Short Sale

At the time of this writing, the dust has not yet settled on the requisite waiting period after a short sale or foreclosure. Not long ago, Fannie Mae came out with new guidelines. Unless the foreclosure was the result of documented extenuating circumstances, which only requires a three-year waiting period (with additional requirements), all borrowers will now be required to meet a seven-year waiting period after a prior foreclosure to be eligible for a new mortgage loan eligible for sale to Fannie Mae. Contrast that to the waiting period after a short sale which can be as little as two years depending on the loan-to-value ratio and other factors.

 Final Short Sale Thoughts: Seller Beware!

A short sale is nothing more than a voluntary agreement on the part of a lender to release its security interest. Unless an express written term of the short sale approval is the waiver of any right to a deficiency, that lender, or the lender's assignee, will have the right to seek recovery of the deficiency, and may pursue an action up to the expiration of the statute of limitations for collection of a note. In my opinion, any attorney advising a borrower otherwise is committing malpractice. Finally, always seek legal counsel before attempting to pursue a short sale. A real estate agent cannot give legal advice.

See this article in the King County Bar Spring Bulletin or Print the PDF

Attorney's Life on MARS

The FTC has issued a final rule that gives federal and state authorities a new tool to combat the increase in deceptive mortgage relief practices.

The final rule does not affect attorneys who provide mortgage assistance relief services (MARS) in connection with the practice of law if certain basic requirements are met, but the FTC warns of MARS providers that try to use attorneys as fronts to avoid state laws.

Over the past three years, the FTC noticed a spike in the number of consumers scammed by MARS providers that charge advanced fees in the hundreds or thousands of dollars then disappear or fail to provide the promised service. Often, the delay and the cost combine to leave homeowners in a much worse position.

Many states have responded by passing state laws, commonly known as mortgage rescue statutes, under which MARS providers cannot charge advanced fees. Lawyers often are exempt from these mortgage rescue statutes.

Mortgage assistance relief services

In general, MARS means "any service, plan, or program" that offers or provides assistance in preventing or postponing foreclosure sales, negotiating loan modifications, obtaining forbearance's or modifications in the timing of loan payments, or negotiating extensions.

Lawyers often provide these services in connection with representing clients in bankruptcy, foreclosure, or other administrative proceedings. Without an exemption, lawyers would become subject to all the requirements of the new federal rule.

Under the new rule, any for-profit entities providing mortgage assistance relief services are, among other things, prohibited from misrepresenting any material aspect of their services, advising a consumer to cease communication with a lender, or taking advanced fees. The prohibition on advanced fees is not effective until Jan. 31, 2011.

In addition, a person violates the rule by providing substantial assistance to a MARS provider if the person knows (or consciously avoids knowing) the provider is violating the rules.

The rule also is designed to prevent abuses by mandating that MARS providers disclose certain information to the consumer, including their "for-profit" status.

Attorney exemption/client trust accounts

Attorneys who are providing MARS "as part  of the practice of law" are partially exempt  from the new rule as long as the attorney is  licensed in the state in which services are provided (or where the consumer's "dwelling" is located) and the attorney complies with applicable state laws and regulations.

However, to get the full benefit of the exemption, attorneys must comply with certain provisions regarding client trust accounts.  In order to be fully exempt, lawyers must place advanced fees in a client trust account before performing legal services and comply with state laws and regulations, including licensing regulations, applicable to client trust accounts.

A lawyer who does not comply with the client trust account provisions cannot charge advanced fees, or "request or receive payment of any fee or other consideration," until the lawyer executes a written agreement between the consumer and the consumer's loan holder. In addition, the lawyer must make specific disclosures through the written agreement, but is otherwise exempt from other provisions of the final rule.

The proposed rule did not exempt lawyers at all, but several state bar associations, along with the American Association, sought an amendment to the proposed rule that would provide an exemption for lawyers.

Without an exemption, these bar associations feared the rule could undermine the confidential attorney-client relationship and "make it difficult or impossible for many consumer debtors to obtain the legal services that they desperately need to help negotiate changes to their residential mortgages with their lenders and keep their homes."

All in all, it is hoped that the new FTC MARS rule will curb the "mortgage rescue" charlatans who prey on the most vulnerable of our public.

To find out what the Federal Trade Commission is saying: http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2010/11/mars.shtm

Freddie Mac announced Wednesday it will suspend foreclosure evictions from December 20^th through January 3^rd. This is the third straight year Freddie Mac has suspended evictions during the holiday season. (This move only applies to those homes that have mortgages backed or guaranteed by Freddie Mac).  Sibling company, Fannie Mae, also won't evict people over the holidays, but that has not yet been announced via news release regarding their upcoming suspension of holiday foreclosures. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac purchase home loans from lenders and package them into bonds with a guarantee against default and sell them to investors. Today they own or guarantee about half of all U.S mortgages.

So Happy Holidays from Fannie and Freddie!

However, did you know...

According to RealtyTrac, foreclosure homes accounted for 25% of all U.S. residential sales in the third quarter of 2010 and the average sale price of properties that sold while in some stage of foreclosure was more than 32% below the average sales price of properties not in the foreclosure process-up from a 26% discount in the previous quarter and a 29% discount in the third quarter of 2009.

•  REO's sold for an average discount of nearly 41% and accounted for 15% of all sales in the third quarter.
• Pre-foreclosure sales, which are often short sales, sold for an average discount of 19% and accounted for nearly 10% of all sales.

Looking at those statistics, it makes you wonder why investors Fannie and Freddie seem so eager to foreclose.

But at least for the Holidays... Merry Christmas!

For more information and foreclosure statistics visit - www.RealtyTrac.com.

Q: In a short sale, do Listing Brokers have a duty to disclose how far underwater the Seller is?

A: If you're in California, the answer may be "yes".

In Holmes v. Summer, G041906 (Cal.App.4th, filed October 6, 2010), a recently decided California appellate case, the court ruled that the sellers' brokers can be held liable for damages and costs incurred by a buyer in a failed transaction when the existing debt on the property exceeded the sale price. The court found that the brokers owed a duty of disclosure to the buyers.

No doubt, Holmes was an extreme case--three deeds of trust created a total debt of $1,141,000 with a sale price of $749,000--but the seller's real estate brokers were still held to answer for not disclosing this information to the buyer, despite the fact that this information was available on the preliminary title report and was a matter of public record.

The court found that real estate agents have the same responsibility as sellers to disclose information they have that affects the "value and desirability of the property."

In Holmes, the seller and the listing associate withheld from potential buyers knowledge of three mortgages against the property totaling $1.141 million.  The sellers accepted a buyer's offer of $749,000, but the deal fell through when the sellers couldn't deliver clear title.  So the buyers sued the real estate firm and the court found that the real estate practitioner had a greater duty to disclose facts affecting the desirability and marketability of the property than he did to protect the privacy of the seller.

It is my customary practice to make immediate inquiry with Sellers and in the public records to try to ascertain the status of a seller's mortgage liens at the outset of every short sale transaction that I work on.  Buyers certainly want to know information like this as they determine how much (or whether) to make an offer in a short sale situation.  Why bother putting up earnest money or wasting time, if the short sale is not viable?

Analysts say this decision makes it incumbent on practitioners with short sale listings to provide specific information about circumstances surrounding the sales, including approvals required for the sales to close. Admittedly, Holmes is a California case and not Washington law, but it certainly seems like good advice to listing agents out there. 

In light of this recent ruling and the movement of the courts towards finding brokers liable for the damages of buyers who cannot complete a sale, real estate brokers should pay careful attention to their listings and be fully aware of potential liability for failure to disclose these types of issues.

So the question for Listing Brokers with short sales in Washington: is it really enough to just check the box "Yes" to short sale and "3rd Party Approval Required" on the NWMLS Form 1 Listing Input Sheet?

To read Holmes v. Summer in its entirety: http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/documents/G041906.PDF

Are you applying for a loan?  You'd better know your FICO 8!

Question: What happens when you add soaring foreclosures--288,345 homes seized by banks in 2010 Q3, up 22% from a year earlier, according to RealtyTrac--to an unprecedented number of homeowners just walking away ("Strategic Defaulting")?

Answer: Both Fair Isaac (the FICO people) and VantageScore Solutions--the two major producers of credit scores-have begun changing how they evaluate consumers' risks of default.  New scoring systems (the FICO 8 and VantageScore 2.0) are expected to be rolled out nationwide to lenders shortly to handle the vast credit-disruptions caused by the housing bust, the recession, high unemployment and behavioral changes by consumers.  These revisions focus on the subtle warning signs of credit stress that might have been missed earlier--and penalizes or rewards consumers with higher or lower risk scores than they would have received before.

Consumer creditworthiness has deteriorated in the United States since 2006--especially among the "super-prime" borrowers.  These strategic defaulters ("walk-aways") have been an unexpected and shocking development to the credit industry.  For example, many homeowners are defying long-standing industry assumptions by going delinquent on their first mortgage payments while continuing to pay their credit-card balances and second mortgages on time.

In response to this abnormality, Joanne Gaskin, director of mortgage-scoring solutions for Fair Isaac, says that the new FICO 8 Mortgage Score is likely to be anywhere from 15 to 25 percent more accurate in detecting signs of future default compared with the standard FICO model when used by a lender to rate the risk of new applicants or existing mortgage customers. 

Experts in the credit industry say the new scoring efforts by Fair Isaac and VantageScore should prove to be a net positive for housing and the mortgage industries if they can do what they claim: spot subtle risk patterns and nascent hints of improvement. 

But buyer beware: these new changes could affect you personally the next time you apply for a loan because as a mortgage applicant you need to know that your next score might not look anything like the score you thought you had--it could be better or it could be worse.

For now the Foreclosure Crisis means business as usual.

This week Wells Fargo, the second largest mortgage servicer, admitted making "mistakes" in 55,000 foreclosures but is not halting the foreclosure process.

Wasn't it only two weeks ago that Wells Fargo had stated that the Foreclosure Crisis is overblown and that it wasn't like other services because it ran a tight shop and hadn't engaged in bad practices such as improper affidavits, aka "robo-signers"?

The company described the mistakes as technical and the documents are being refiled in the 23 states where a judge's approval is needed to complete a foreclosure.

According to the Financial Times, a Wells Fargo employee said in a deposition that she signed as many as 500 foreclosure-related papers a day on behalf of the bank and that the only information she verified was whether her name and title appeared correctly.  Although she signed affidavits that said she had "personal knowledge of the facts regarding the sums of money which are due and owing to Wells Fargo", and those affidavits were used by the bank in foreclosure proceedings, when asked whether she checked the accuracy of the principal and interest that Wells claimed the borrower owed, a crucial step in banks' legal actions to repossess homes, she responded " I do not".

And what is Bank of America really doing here in Washington?  Auctions are being postponed but only until after the election and all foreclosure timelines are still running.  So what does that mean?  The clock is still ticking, the process is still taking place-only the actual auction is being postponed for several weeks. 

In other words, it's (almost) business as usual.

Just to keep it interesting, last Monday BOA announced that it would resume foreclosures in 23 states.  BOA said it plans to resubmit documents with new signatures in the 23 states that require judicial authorization to restart the foreclosure process. These 23 states are those that have judicial foreclosures only and require a court process to foreclose.

By contrast, WA has both Judicial and non-judicial foreclosure remedies. Almost all of the residential foreclosures here are non-judicial and require no court intervention. Thus, WA is not affected by this latest BOA announcement.

However, I have still counseled my clients that it is "business as usual" with respect to foreclosure in WA--and why not? Even with a supposed self-imposed BOA moratorium still in place in WA state, BOA can still take the foreclosure process right up to auction and then not proceed. It is important to understand that the foreclosure clock is still ticking. Homeowners must still prepare for foreclosure or plan for a legal defense against it.

Can we Stop the Foreclosure Crisis?

 According to CNN and RealtyTrac, foreclosures hit record numbers.  In the last quarter of 2010, there have been 930,437 foreclosure filings, a 4% increase from the previous quarter.  One in every 139 homeowners had received a foreclosure filing during those three months!    

 Two weeks ago, four major lenders halted foreclosures in 23 judicial foreclosure states.  Washington State was not affected by this directly.  However, last Friday, Bank of America announced that it was suspending the sale of its foreclosed home inventory in all 50 states.

  Wednesday, agent Rob McKenna announced in a press conference that his office has uncovered evidence that suggests foreclosure trustees are ignoring consumer protection laws in Washington.  He sent letters today to 52 trustees outlining his concerns and calling on them to suspend any questionable foreclosures in the state.  Washington is a "non-judicial foreclosure" state, which means that a lender can proceed directly to selling a home at public auction without first filing a lawsuit.  This lender-driven process was created by the state Legislature in better times.  Although lenders may foreclose in court in Washington, they almost always choose non-judicial foreclosure which is quicker and less costly. 

 From the McKenna Letter: "I ask you to suspend all foreclosures in which you have not yet confirmed that all foreclosure-related documents were lawfully signed, that the chain of ownership is clear and has been revealed to you in full, and that state consumer protection requirements have been followed."

 As a third party trustee, they are responsible for conducting non-judicial foreclosures, they have a statutory duty to perform all foreclosures in good faith and owe that duty to both the homeowner and the lender. 

 Some of the issues raised in the AG's letter are:

•·         "Robo-signers": who is actually signing the foreclosed documents and in what capacity?

•·         Is there really a clear chain of title or have the lenders "reverse-engineered" that chain of title (back dated)?

•·         Are default notices given out advising borrowers of their mediation rights (loans originated in 2003-2007) and with the actual loan owner and servicer identified (beginning July 26, 2009)?

 This was the topic of yesterday's radio show and I'll be back again next week for an in-depth review and update of this issue.

 Following the news this week, it seems like there have been announcements almost every day on this issue.  On October 13^th, GMAC announced that it too was expanding its review of foreclosures to all 50 states.

Attorneys general in all 50 states have pledged a coordinated investigation into chaotic foreclosure practices by some of the nation's largest banks.  The Department of Justice is also looking into what happened, while some lawmakers are now calling for a nationwide moratorium on all foreclosures until the legal questions are settled.  The Obama administration is insisting such a broad delay would hurt the economy.  And title companies are weighing in on what these all means to the buyers of REO's and purchasers at auctions.  What does this all really mean?  Stay tuned for next week's broadcast and any further developments.