Customer Service by Banks

Here in the Tampa Bay area it seems as though the worst of the real estate wreck is over.  At least we appear to have hit bottom and houses are selling quickly.  Even short sales are selling quicker.  We have noticed a recent phenomenon.  For the last few years, getting a short sale through the bank process has been very time consuming, frustrating, and downright torture.  And that's for the "good" ones.  We have had to deal over time with processors who say they did not get a file, or worse, just lost it and need the Realtors to re-submit the entire short sale package.  Then, when that is done, after months of delays or no action, suddenly the file is opened and sellers and Realtors have to jump up and respond in almost impossible time frames.  The phenomenon is that while the short sale side is doing what they do, the lending side is now asking for new business.

In our market Tampa Bay short sale market, according to our board, for the past year more, than 60% of residential real estate transactions have been cash!  This is amazing.  That means that banks have a shot at making a loan in only 4 out of ten transactions.  So for such a limited market, which is killing our local mortgage brokers, the banks have been killing the Realtors with what some may call less than adequate customer service in the short sale arena.

Recently, we have been getting calls from banks soliciting our business, asking us (Realtors) to please remember them when our buyers need financing.  The banks' customer service people are very nice when they call, telling us how easy they are to deal with, that they have money to lend, and they are wonderful, yada yada yada.  We do note which bank made the call.  And we do remember them, especially if they were involved in one of our eternally long short sales.

This little rant is one frustrated Realtor's way of saying "What goes around, comes around."  So please excuse me when Mega Bank calls telling me how wonderful they are, after they took 18 months to close a short sale that could have been done in 90 days.