Short Sales Affect Comps!!

Too many times the appraiser has not seen the condition of the Short sale and don't give enough value to the traditional sale for the condition of the property.

So when you inform them of this bad news, do you still do the listing? I find that I am doing more consulting than ever before because the equity in homes is alot less than 2 yrs ago.  I would think if they didn't want to be realistic, I would be throwing away lots of advertising monies.

I know in your area in Washington the homes are very expensive. I have ran into the same problem here in Illinois. But there's nothing like what's happenning in Indiana! NW Indiana is only 30 minutes away from downtown Chicago, and the property values are plummetting into levels less than some non-luxury cars. The areas that take the greatest hit from the Indiana decline is the South Suburbs of Chicago which happens to be the most heavily populated area in Chicagoland. I can truly understand how your area can be affected because it is on a much larger scale. But in a 30 mile radius in the Chicagoland area, you can have a 2 bedroom condo downtown that's worth 900k and with a little less than a half an hour drive, you can run into a 5 bedroom, 3 level, 2 bath, full basement, 2.5 car garage on a full 1/4 acre lot- for 29,995.00-Less than a Maxima SL!!!!!!!!! Ouch! I totally understand your problem, and on a smaller scale, I feel it all the way down here in the midwest too!