Lancaster PA Luxury Real Estate - Short Sales

Naturally, when purchasing a home, all buyers want to believe they are getting the best Real Estate deal possible. Briefly, we will discuss short sales and their relationship to the home purchase and its consumption. Let us first establish that when a buyer purchases a HOME, it is considered to be something that the buyer will live in or consume. Therefore, buying a home is naturally an emotional process as well as logical. If a buyer can streamline the emotional side and expand on the logical side of the equation, the best Real Estate purchase opportunities can better be achieved. So lets look at Short Sales and how they can be exploited to the buyer's advantage.

What is a short sale? A short sale is when a mortgage holder agrees to the sale of a property and the net proceeds will be less than ("short" of) what is owed to them by the seller (owner) of the property. Sounds simple enough, but it is very, very difficult to actually get to the closing table on these types of transactions. Very briefly, when a lender is considering a short sale, they have to be sure that it will result in the best possible deal for them. Keep in mind that at the short sale level, the property has not been foreclosed and therefore is controlled by the home owner.

Now then, short sale prices almost always appear very attractive. Here are 3 things you should seriously consider when deciding to look for and make offers on short sale listed properties.

1. State up front that you will protect your agent and see to it that he or she gets their full 3% commission. Real Estate agents do not like Short Sales because of the risk of not getting paid their commission. When a homeowner asks their mortgage holder to consider taking less than what is owed to them, the mortgage holder looks at all of the numbers and often will come back to the seller with a counter offer which will reduce the commission as a way to diminish their loss.

2. Be prepared to wait and be prepared to tell your Real Estate Agent you will be loyal. The turn around time or the time it takes to get an answer from the mortgage holder is on average 90 days. A lot can happen in that time period. The Real Estate Agent needs to know, that if you decide to look at other properties during the waiting period you will allow him or her to be involved.

3. Make the strongest and cleanest offer you possibly can: When a mortgage holder considers a short sale one motivating factor is recognition of quality of the buyer and their ability to close the deal. While a mortgage hold may take a long time to make up their minds, once they have decided to green light the deal, they want it closed quickly and efficiently.

In summary, in order to get the best Real Esate deal, keep an open mind, protect your agent, be patient and have your financial and personal ducks all in a row.