Lyon Real Estate sponsored a luncheon yesterday for its top producers from our office in Midtown. This is an annual event that I've missed the last 4 or 5 years because of schedule conflicts, but yesterday, come hell or high water, I planned to attend. Turns out it was high water. The rain and flooding did not let up. Awful weather.
The wind turned my umbrella inside out, twice. That's how bad it was, and I only had to walk a block from my dentist's office on 22nd through the alley to 21st. We had lunch at Kupros Bistro, which is located on 21st Street between Capitol and L Streets on the alley. It's a 100-year fully restored and updated Craftsman -- a beautiful historic structure with stained glass accents, polished wood paneling and beams. It's a joy just to sit inside this building and soak up the vintage architecture.
I ordered a beet salad, made with fresh spring greens, red and yellow beets, and deep-fried goat cheese balls that melted on my tongue. Followed that delight with a beer-cheese macaroni dusted with crispy crumbs browned in the oven. I ordered it simply because I liked the name of the ale-cheese: Arrogant Bastard. But I could eat this for lunch every single day of my life and gain so much weight I couldn't fit through the door, it's that good. Decadent. The pan-fried mahi-mahi was just OK but cooked to perfection.
I sat across the table from an agent who works out of our office but is never there, sort of like me. Well, I do show up for office meetings on Wednesday but I rarely see this guy ever. He was telling me that he handles a lot of bank-owned homes and how the banks are not willing to promote their REO agents as short sale agents. No joke. And thank goodness for that. Being a Sacramento short sale agent is a lot more than knowing how to sell a property or rollover a mold-infested bank-owned piece of crap.
You don't just wake up one day and decide to become a Sacramento short sale agent because you've sold bank-owned homes in the past. Short sales are a specialty. They are complicated. And yes, in some situations, they are almost rocket science. The success of a short sale depends on so many different variables that all need to come together in one place. It's like blowing up a balloon -- if you squeeze one end, the other end gets big. You don't want to pop it. Short sales are delicate transactions.
I had a seller call me last week to say that Bank of America suggested she get in touch with me because I am a certified HAFA specialist. Luckily, this seller has received preapproval for a HAFA short sale. Another seller called and said Wells Fargo recommended that she call me. Wells Fargo? And I've said so many awful things about Wells Fargo short sales, too. But I don't take any of it back. Wells Fargo needs some help in its short sale department. But all the banks do.
At least Bank of America is smart enough to figure out that it can sell those short sales at higher prices if it streamlines the short sale process to entice a buyer to make an offer. Buyers offer lower prices when they have to wait forever for that short sale approval. They'll pay more if the turnaround time is faster. Plus, B of A wants control over pricing, which is one of the reasons it rolled out its cooperative short sale program and evaluates every seller for HAFA. I love Bank of America short sales. And I recommend Kupros for lunch or dinner, too. Fabulous restaurant.
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