I recently completed an analysis of ARMLS (Arizona Regional MLS) data for 12 months of Short Sales. I focused on Closed, Cancelled and Expired.
The purpose was to determine Short Sale list to close ratio - the premise being that to avoid foreclosure in Phoenix and other parts of the Phoenix metro area, you have one shot at it and therefore it's in your best interest to select a Short Sale Listing Broker, a Short Sale Listing Agent, a Short Sale Listing Realtor that can prove based on their track record that they know how to get Short Sales closed.
The closer their list to close ratio is to 100%, the better the chances that yours will close too!
I was astounded by some of the statistics, and I'll share them over a series of posts so as not to throw a bunch of numbers at you all at once.
Of the 307 real estate brokerages in ARMLS that had a track record for short sales between 8/5/2009 and 8/5/2010 for a dozen or more transactions:
The average List to Close ratio for those 307 brokerages combined was less than 1 out of 2 - 48.32%.
The median List to Close ratio was 45.24%.
Only 128 out of those 307 brokerages handled 12 or more Short Sales and had a list to close ratio that exceeded the 48.32% average - which again is less than half of them.
More on the "above average" 128 in the next installment.
Lesson: If you choose a Short Sale Listing Broker at random, you have less than a 1 in 2 chance of your Short Sale closing!
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