Another guest author comes on board with the St. Louis Real Estate Voice. Rick is currently working with Real Estate Investors.  

HELP! I CAN'T PAY MY MORTGAGE!
by: Rick Wiedenhoeft, Keller Williams Realty Southwest

The bank does NOT want your house.  I repeat; the bank does NOT want your house!  One common misconception I run into as an investor time and time again is that banks want to foreclose on people's houses.  Quite the opposite is true.

Imagine for a moment you're the bank:  The average home price in the US in April 2007 is $299,100.  You just loaned a happy buyer $290,000, at 6.5% interest, because they brought 3% to the table.  You're collecting roughly $1570/mo in interest, the Buyer's happy, you the bank, is happy.  Then they stop making payments.  You the bank send letters to let them know you care, and to please call to fix it.  They don't!  You call them and offer to help.  They won't talk to you.  After a few months of this, you have no choice but to get them out so you can sell and recoup some of your lost money, but you realize it'll cost you as much as 20% of the homes value (when factoring in labor, man-hours, eviction, repairs, etc) just to unload it.  Logically, you're the bank remember, which would you rather do; work with the home owner, or foreclose?

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