We all love clients who give us repeat business, but I recently listed a home that made me wish that this particular client hadn't, or at least hadn't needed to.
Last January I closed on a home for a wonderful young client who was a first time homebuyer. She was a very careful buyer, and had done everything right in order to buy her first home. She had good credit, had been in the same job for several years, saved her money to pay closing costs and insurance, and took her time choosing the home, making certain that the payments were low enough that she could handle them without over-extending herself, and generally was just a joy to work with. The day we closed, she was so happy that I thought she would explode.
But as careful as my client was, there was one thing that she couldn't have predicted. You see my client worked for a prominent mortgage lender who was closed down last August. My client was among the several hundred employees who went to work one morning and found themselves unemployed by lunchtime. My client has been unable to find a new job in our area, so last week she called me to talk about listing her home as a short sale, since she can't keep up the payments any longer, and is leaving the area to find new employment.
So in less than a single year, my client has taken a roller coaster ride from the height of excitement over being a new homeowner down to the the absolute low of losing her cherished home. What a terrible experience.
Now, hopefully we'll get an offer, have a sympathetic lender, and get everything worked out in short order. Then she can get on with her life, and start over somewhere else. That's what I'm hoping for, anyway. But I still wish that she had never had to give me the repeat business, or at least not under these circumstances.....................
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