May is just about over. It went so fast when I look back on it but at times it felt like it would never end. If you do much in the short sale world, you know that this was the big integration month for Countrywide and Bank of America.
Fortunately, the two companies are not fully integrating their processes until 2010. However, all of our countrywide reps now have B of A email addresses and all the loan statements show Bank of America.
One of the reasons that May seemed to drag on from time to time is one of the newer policies that B of A unveiled this month. B of A has often had its challenges over the years when working short sales but if you have not been blessed with this new information you are going to love it.
In the world of shortsale negotiation the key is efficiency right? Well Bank of America sure thinks so. They have decided to become so efficient that they are having the team that receives faxes in the short sale department open the fax, immediately review for a complete package and either pend, decline or counter the offer. Wow, that is definately efficient. It makes sense to me to empower your team to do it all at the same time.
When we called in on May 12th to check on the receipt of a package we found out about this new policy. (you know where I am about to go with this don't you?) "Great, so we faxed the package in last week, when will they be able to look at it and give us an answer?"
"June First." ................
In the world of short sales that is a pretty good time frame for having a fully reviewed short sale offer.
"So can you just let me know that you got the fax and I will follow up after they have had time to get to the file?"
The answer was no. They are not imaging the faxes into the system until they review them which is three weeks later. So we send in a fax and have to wait for three weeks before we can find out if they even got it. Even better, on the new "Short Sale Application" that B of A provides it says that "your fax confirmation sheet will be proof that we have received your fax. Do not call us for 15 business days to allow time for review."
I am sorry buy how many times have you sent a fax and it got lost in cyberworld or fell on the floor or was missing a page or whatever? Way to many times in my book to trust that a fax confirmation on my side of the machine is good enough.
So obviously Bank of America still has some short sale problems. But check out what happened yesterday.
Here are the specs: Countrywide (B of A) First mortgage; Bank of America Second Mortgage. The property had a poor BPO (another story) and has lost several buyers and is now under contract for $92,000. Just three doors down (nice name for a band) there is a property that we were negotiating a short sale on and the bank dug in their heals said no. It is now listed as an REO for $87,500. (Our short sale offer they declined was $95K Hugh!?!)
Bank of America is convinced that the subject property is worth $138K. Not from any kind of walk through appraisal or BPO but simply through their highly proficient, fail safe automated valuation machine. If you can hear my sarcasm I am not trying to hide it. I used to work at B of A doing loans for them from '01 to '04 and if I am not mistaken their automated valuation system is part of the reason they have to have a short sale on some of these properties to begin with. All we cared about at the time was hitting our numbers but there was many a time I had a client at my desk laughing about the value the system just gave their property.
Oh and in addition that $138k price is about $20,000 more than the subject property just appraised for a few months ago. (on the same system) Sorry, I did not know we were in such a highly appreciating market. I must be in the wrong business.
Here is the point. B of A has another policy that they will not accept any offers on properties that are less than a specified percentage below what they believe to be the value of the property. At a value of $138k there are no dice.
So we got on the horn and hoping against hope itself, set off to negotiate the un-negotiable. There are some moments in life that the stars align and even at B of A you find someone who truly understands the words you are speaking.
The rep we had on the phone saw our cause. She looked into every angle of our plight and went to bat for us. Before our conversation was over she had convinced the system that the old BPO value was correct and that our offer was within guidelines and get this...
She actually sent us out our short sale approval letter. All in the same conversation.
At the begining of this post I think most of us would agree that B of A is on a downward spiral at least in some regards. However, after that conversation and the results from yesterday. I truly believe there is still hope. It will really depend on how many reps like that are still at B of A compared to how many of the opposite nature are filling the seats.
When I was a VP at Bank of America they preached their five core values. My favorite and one that I felt summed up all the rest was "Doing the Right Thing" Sometimes the right thing meant taking a little more time, using your common sense and figuring out a way to make sure the policies did not harm the bank or the client. If more reps at B of A will live this core value, there truly is hope for Bank of America.
Have a great weekend.
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