Short Sale Declined Over Missing Initial

Here’s a short sale saga for the books courtesy of the Realtor® forum on The Short Sale Specialist Network: 

After needing an escalation to move a stuck file, the negotiator [name intentionally omitted] out of the Delaware location came back with a number of corrections. After the corrections were made, he asked for a second set of corrections--some of them new, some of them redundant.

I sent him a quick note telling him it would've been more efficient if we did ONE round of corrections.

I guess this angered him and he found something to knit pick at so he can reject the file. He sent in a message: "The file has been declined because the seller's middle initial is missing on the Agent Certification header."

No request to have it fixed. Just declined. Now, I have to start over from scratch after waiting more than 2 months.

If you are an avid fan of my blog, then you know that I provide so many tips and tools for successfully getting short sales closed that it is hard to keep track of all of them.

However, here is the first rule of short sales (and also the first rule of business, in general):

Don’t bite the hand that feeds.

While I cannot claim to know the particulars of this short sale transaction, it would appear to me that the agent who was working the short sale made one minor error, and took a little nibble out of the hand that was feeding him when he suggested that there were more efficient ways to get his short sale approved.

However, that certainly does not excuse the individual’s behavior. And, if I found myself in this position, I would certainly escalate the file, contact one of my buddies in the executive offices, or take it to the streets by using social media to obtain some top-notch customer service.

But, even when I got my short sale drama in front of the right person, I would not bite the hand. I would simply say that I am concerned because the file was declined due to a missing initial, and I wanted to see what could be done to get the short sale back through the system as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Believe it or not, for every short sale saga, there is one awesome short sale success story. Just a few days ago, we received short sale approval on a short sale that was submitted to the lender (Carrington Mortgage) only 3.5 weeks ago. From listing to close--under two months. So, you see, it’s not all that bad. The key is to continue to take listing after listing—since you never know which ones are going to have a missing middle initial.

special thanks to Broker Regina Brown for sending me the link to this story

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