Short Sales: Past vs. Present - Are we headed towards fast, automated streamlining or are the banks causing us more grief?

Short Sales: Past vs. Present - Are we headed towards fast, automated streamlining or are the banks causing us more grief?

I can remember the first short sale my partner and I did about 3 and a half years ago.  It was a  Wells Fargo short sale and from beginning to end it took about 60 days.  Back then, short sales were so new to the banks that they didn't quite have anything too elaborate set up for them, so they seemed to have pushed them through fairly quickly.

The end result was a seller that was able to move on with her life.  The short amount in total was about $75,000 and she ended up having to hold back a promissory note for $10,000, payable in 15 years, interest-free.

Now, I know that I've seen some definite improvements.  With the Equator website, I have been able to streamline the document submission process quite a bit with Bank of America short sales and GMAC short sales.

Yet just a few months ago, I still ended up closing a short sale that took a year from the date of the fully executed purchase contract.

Half of me feels that we have made some improvements in the short sale process, yet the other half of me feels that the banks have learned how to manipulate the process and thus cause delays.

How do you feel about the history of short sales for the last few years and where we are now?