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Your Short Sales Are Approved! Acceptance Letters or NOT?

Great news! Your short sale listing has been approved. Please find the attached acceptance letter!

These are the sweetest words a short sale listing agent can hear! Or are they really? palm beach county short sale agents

Because sometimes there is a catch! So don't start doing the Happy Dance too soon! Make sure you read the fine print first. Most of the time the acceptance letter contains language that can still blow your deal right out of the water.

Hold on to that phone, hold back your tongue, don't jump before you read those acceptance letters!

Last week we received 5 acceptance letters:

1. Your short sale has been approved. Investor (owner of the note) is requiring a cash contribution of $20,000 from the seller.

2. Your short sale has been approved. Investor (owner of the note) is requiring a cash contribution of $25,000 cash from whomever wants to give it for a lien release but if seller wants deficiency release the cash contribution goes up to $80,000.

3. Your short sale has been approved. Closing must take place within 9 business days with a buyer who is getting financing!

4. Your short sale has been approved. All is a go until the fine print discloses that the lender is reserving his right to a deficiency.

5. Your short sale has been approved with a counter offer to the buyer. The buyer declines the counter offer but we have another buyer ready to close in that time frame, but this servicer's policy is you can NOT sub buyers!

Problems: cash contributions from sellers who either will not pay or can not pay.

Solution: Go higher up the chain of command. Use lots of honey, niceties and flattery. Flattery does get you far in the short sale negotiating business. Don't give up, keep fighting for your sellers.

A word of caution: Once you have found your well, don't abuse it, don't go back to it too often, only when really needed.

Problems: Deficiency rights. To some homeowners this may not be a deciding factor yet to others for a variety of reasons it may just be the nail in the coffin so to speak. We had a seller ask, then why not just keep living here for 2 years, not pay my payments, then let them foreclose, then file bankruptcy and then they have no more right to their deficiency. He has a point.

Solution: Go higher up the chain of command until you find someone who can and will reverse this decision.

Problems: Buyers walk or say no to counter and you have have a ready willing and able buyer to take their place.

Solution: Ask for the managing supervisor. Tell her you understand the policy. Ask her to please close the file right now and tell her you are sending her directly the new offer with the new buyer and ask her to expedite the opening of the new file.

So that puts us into hyper telephone, email and fax mode!

There is no problem for which there is not a solution.

We would rather take all these problems, solve them and have closings than accept the alternative! Keep your chin up! Be in gratitude for having deals to work on!

T o view Wellington Florida Homes For Sale Click here . We know Palm Beach County and Port St Lucie Florida and will help you get your home Sold if you need to Sell your home and help you buy your home in Palm Beach County Florida : Call us today.

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Your Short Sales Are Approved! Acceptance Letters or NOT? was first published on South- Florida-Luxury-Living.com.

P.S. If you are listing your home as a short sale in Palm Beach County Florida and Port St Lucie Florida make sure you hire an agent who knows how to do short sales and has the experience to get the job done. We are doing successful short sale packages. Call us at 561-753-0135 to find out more about Palm Beach County Short Sales and Port St Lucie Short Sales.

Posted by Nestor & Katerina Gasset Realtors® Wellington Florida Luxury Homes on 07/06/2009 09:02 PM

Comments (28)

Short Sales / Foreclosures in the ActiveRain Channel

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Originally posted at: South Florida Real Estate and...: Your Short Sales Are Approved! Acceptance Letters or NOT?

This post has been included in Florida Information Palm Beach County, FL Information Wellington, FL Information

28 Comments on Your Short Sales Are Approved! Acceptance Letters or NOT?

JUL

I got a deficiency judgement dumped on us the day before closing. I had to up the food chain and finally a letter before closing. IF I had not got the letter my sellers were just going to let it stay in foreclosure.

Then the 2nd lien holder who was asking for the deficiency was going to get zip, zap, nada.

My sellers, the first lien holder were all contributing to get it done, and we were not going to have my sellers with a loan over their heads for months on end.

Missy- We must go to bat and stand up for our sellers the best we can. Knock on those doors, make those calls, get your congressman involved, whatever it takes. I am glad if finally worked out for you. You kept up the good fight.

Katerina,

Do you ask all of your seller' lenders to specifically say in their letter there will be no deficiency judgement, or do you talk with each homeowner before there is even an offer or after there is an offer on how they want to proceed?

Heather- We review each seller and do a qualification intake evaluation over the phone with ever potential short sale listing. I can just about hit it right on the nail as to what the chances or not of them getting approved with and without conditions.

Some of our sellers know full well that there is no way but to bring cash to closing. They understand that. I just had a seller renig on that deal.

So it is on a case by case basis. We ask for all of them in the cover letter to not have any deficiencies but we know in which cases this will be allowed or not. But there are always some surprises like two of the ones above are totally down and out on their luck with no money and still they come back with deficiencies. But one of them we just got removed about an hour ago.

Hi Katerina! Great advice--I did not realize that you could 'go over their heads' to get it done because when you ask, they say they're it! I need to figure out how to find out who the UP-ladder position is with all of these folks!

Great question, Heather.

Debe- That is what they are trained to say. Their job is to keep you away, a shield for management. ;) Where there is a will, there is a way:) Rules were made to be broken:)

Katerina -

You are one feisty Realtor! Good for you fighting the good fight on behalf of your sellers....they are blessed to have you!

And P.S.: Don't you wonder why this has to be so difficult??

Hello Katerina, we agree you can never give up with these problems that come up. It has been amazing to see the various 'problems' arise and how there are so many one-off solutions! Keep at it! John

Katarina - Thanks for the post. Short sales are definitely not for those who are faint hearted.

Coleen- Oh, some of that is me, but most of that is Nestor:) He is one of those guys that can convince you that the sky is green. :) He can also butter you up or have you rolling on the floor laughing. Plus he is so observant- he can remember names too! Not my strength:)

We must change that thought process that things are difficult. When we give into that, they become more difficult. When we embrace each problem as a blessing in disguise, the solution comes easier and then we get the blessing of some easy ones also.

John- Agents who got into this biz when the going was easy have a tough time sticking it out and looking for solutions, they really didn't have that enter their paradigm during the hot years. We just don't give up. Sometimes we may have to let go but that is different than giving up.

Ryan- Nope, got to have that tough skin, don't you! That is one reason we can not delegate the negotiations out. That is Nestor's most greatest strength, getting in whatever door we need to go through.

Lately I've been encountering some really stupid FHA guidelines on Short Sales. Like the one that says NET must be at least 88% of appraised value. In this particular case, NET of 88% value was $2000 more than the owner had remaining on his payoff...are you kidding!?

I've thought often about not taking short sales anymore...they are long, hard and stressful. However, when the homeowner gets out from under the foreclosure cloud, they are greatful and that makes for a very rewarding transaction. I seem to forget the stress and strain when I have a greatful former owner across from me.

I've been seeing a lot more fine print also and the worst part is the owners are getting the letter about a day before me and they get so excited until I point out to them the fine print.

Todd Clark - www.LivingBeaverton.com

Ron- We go through the same thoughts and processes. But there are many rewards to doing short sales. It also is a given you will get referrals, the gratitude is awesome when there really is a hardship. We do some for some very ungrateful people too. But such is life. The biggest reward for us has been that we have been able to carve out this niche working from home, getting the listings over the phone and email and saving time in that regard. It works out the same amount of time as a non short sale, really, all things considered. Katerina

JUL

Todd- We make sure we are the point of contact and all contact must go through us to the sellers. This way we can decipher, and also alleviate some of the miscommunication that can take place.

In other words:

Be thankful for all the problems in your work. They account for at least half of your income.

If it were not for the problems associated with your job, someone could be found who would do it for half what you get paid.

(As true now as when I first heard it -- forty years and twenty (long and short) jobs ago.)

Jim- AH, we are so grateful! We thank God every day for the blessings that we have business.

I did not get your links you were going to send me.

I have 2 in the pipeline now. Now sure what the outcome is. We'll just have to wait and see.

Excellent post, but I have to say that short sales certainly seem like a train wreck. I have seen far too many investors veto an offer, only to foreclouse and list it for less 6 months later.

Mark- We have not had that experience. We close all of our short sales; with an average of 50 listings- about 90% of those are short sale listings and an average of 18 to 20 of them under contract at any given time. Most of our success has to do with prequalifying the sellers for the short sale and then deciding if their case will likely be accepted.

Loreena- I wish you much success and determination:)

Katerina, you have the right attitude to get the job done for your sellers and for the buyers as well. You definitely get a lot more flies with honey than vinegar!

Sharon

I hate short sales. I hate 'em.

Katerina, I made the mistake of doing the premature happy dance once. It was embarrasing!! I had already given the seller the good news and then...... read the fine print. I was so bummed. I missed the little diddy about the $30,000 promisory note!! The lender wouldn't budge and the seller wouldn't close. I actually placed the property back on the market, found another Buyer at $20,000 less and the lender accepted it with no note. Go figure.

Bryant- Isn't that amazing how one time, same property, different deal, will get a totally different result? Yep, no rhyme or reason, go figure is right!

JUL

Katerina - Your sellers are so lucky to have you and Nestor to represent them through the short sale process. A less experienced agent would not know that they should not give up.

AUG

Nestor and Katerina,

I have read from your answer to another post about Indymac "retaining the right to deficiency" and that you had to take it to FDIC to get Indymac to remove this clause for one of your homeowners. This is exactly what is happening to my short sale listing which we just got with an approval letter...Can you please advise and expand on how you got Indymac to revise their approval without the defiency? We are in Cali and this is the first lien.

Thanks very much.

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