The One That Got Away – With No Fault of Mine
It started as a short sale as some others. We helped a client, from New York, and she referred her friend Jennifer to us.
It was all pretty usual stuff. The Sellers forwarded us all the documents, after we secured the contract.
It was the Bank of America, so we were working via Equator. And one day the task required information from the Buyer, like Equator asks every time, and one of the pieces was the first 5 digits of Social Security number.
Forwarded to the Buyer, and, unexpectedly, the Buyer refused to provide this pice of information.
Why on earth does the buyer to give any information to the Short Sale Lender? It is a cash deal, so what is their freakin’ business?
I tried to explain that this is not a matter of choice. If we do not provide it, there would be no deal. And that he did not have to put the whole number, but only first 5 digits.
Instead of calming him, it added fuel to the situation. The Buyer said that the bank was playing him, as everyone is using last 4 digits, and only the lazy one does not have the last 4 digits. Here the Lender wanted 5 first number, so this effectively gives them the full number.
I did not tell him that he needed to trust the bank. Why? I myself do not get why Bank of America need to know all that (or anything at all for that matter) about the Buyer.
And also, I could not tell him to trust the Bank. Why? Because I don’t trust them myself…
Yes, there is no fault of mine here, but there is still a lesson to learn. I now tell every Buyer or ask the Buyer’s agent to tell their client upfront that the Lender can make stupid or possibly unreasonable requests, and if they will feel offended and will go on the defensive, they should not enter the short sale.
Can anybody give a reasonable explanation why the Lender needs that information about the Buyer?
Does reasonable explanation even exist?
Photo via Flickr.com Creative Commons by
Comments(32)