I received two short sale approval letters yesterday. These were both preapproved HAFA short sales that Bank of America had farmed out to AMS Loan Servicing. They were approved for HAFA in June, sold in June and sat at AMS since then. The way they were handled seemed as though the negotiators would open the file and try to figure out what they could do to stop from having to work on it.
If they could ask for a tiny revision, they could close the file. That would free up their time so they go back to Facebook to chat with their friends or maybe upload photos of their husbands posing with showgirls in Las Vegas. So, they might ask for us to change the verbiage for the seller's incentive to seller's relocation. Then, the following month, they could ask us to change it back to seller's incentive. Yeah, that's the ticket. After all, they graduated from high school. They know what they're doing.
Thank goodness for the HAFA escalation team at AMS. If only the AMS HAFA escalation team could handle all of Bank of America's short sales. But this Sacramento short sale agent knows that's gonna happen when pigs fly.
Here is a new short sale in Rancho Cordova that is not a HAFA short sale. This is a home in Anatolia in Rancho Cordova. It has 4 bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths. It was built by U.S. Homes in 2006, so it's somewhat newer construction.
The kitchen is open to the family room and is quite large. There is space for a kitchen table in a breakfast nook area, but the sellers have opted for extra storage. The cabinets are moveable and therefore not fixtures. But you could buy extra cabinets just like those from Ikea. After all, you do have dining space in a formal area off the kitchen, so you don't really need a breakfast nook.
The entry to this home is dramatic. You can't quite tell from my photo of the front yard, but there are two columns, one on each side of the door. None of the other homes on this block has columns flanking the front door. Makes it rather unique.
In the back yard, you'll find a concrete patio and a built-in bench and arbor, designed and custom made. There is enough room for a patio table and chairs, too. Best of all, though, is the price. It's very affordable and priced well, subject to bank approval.
11828 Stoney Ridge Way, Rancho Cordova, CA 95742, is offered exclusively by Lyon Real Estate as a short sale at $166,320. For more information, call your Sacramento short sale agent, Elizabeth Weintraub, at 916 233 6759. For a private showing, call Barbara Dow, at 916 761 7398.
Photos: Elizabeth Weintraub
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Certified HAFA Specialist
My Sacramento Real Estate Listings
Elizabeth Weintraub is an author, home buying columnist for The New York Times-owned About.com, a Land Park resident, and a Land Park real estate agent who specializes in older, classic homes in Land Park, Curtis Park, Midtown and East Sacramento. Weintraub is also a Sacramento Short Sale agent who lists and successfully sells short sales throughout the four-county Sacramento area. Call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759. Put 35 years of real estate experience to work for you. Broker-Associate at Lyon Real Estate. DRE License # 00697006.
The Short Sale Savior, by Elizabeth Weintraub, available at Amazon.com.
Lyon Real Estate is not associated with the government, and our service is not approved by the government or your lender. Even if you accept this offer and use our service, your lender may not agree to change your loan.
Photo: Unless otherwise noted in this blog, the photo is copyrighted by Big Stock Photo and used with permission.
The views expressed herein are Weintraub's personal views and do not reflect the views of Lyon Real Estate.
Disclaimer: If this post contains a listing, information is deemed reliable as of the date it was written. After that date, the listing may be sold, listed by another brokerage, canceled, pending or taken temporarily off the market, and the price could change without notice. It could blow up, explode or vanish. To find out the present status of any listing, please go to elizabethweintraub.com.
Elizabeth, I think you captured the esence of the problem with this line from your post:
"negotiators would open the file and try to figure out what they could do
to stop from having to work on it"
I'm responding to underwriter requests on one transaction that have exactly that flavor behind them. We are being asked to respond to meaningless questions that don't advance the lending process or an understanding of the transaction, but that can chew a day or two off the clock.
I see that "flavor" over and over with AMS. Most of my transactions have 6 to 8 HUDs, all with different requests, silly requests such as:
I'm betting that most of the negotiators at AMS don't even know what prorations are! They certainly have difficulty understanding tax prorations / delinquent tax bills. One of them told me the other day that the delinquent tax penalty would not change, even though she was planning to approve the HUD with a closing date of 9/20 and knowing full well that we won't close until sometime in October. Doofuses.
There's always my favorite: Oops, the HUD expired because AMS forgot to look at the file.
I have yet to get my approved list price for my latest Bank of America Cooperative Short Sale. Seems BOA finds the cheapest companies to hire out their Short Sales too. This one, whose initials I can't remember...and really....they are completely forgettable, can't seem to find their *** with both hands.
I wish Bank of America would hold its third-party vendors accountable, which in my mind means they would terminate those contracts. But the thing about incompetence is you can't really fix it on a corporate scale. It's inherent in that structure. You can only somewhat manage it.
I think back to my early introduction to corporate structure in America as a young 20-something. I was astonished that companies could continue to operate under such dysfunctional conditions. I mean, how could they stay in business? I created a tracking system for Ralston Purina in Denver when I was 21. I had discovered the ingredients inside the bags of cat food did not match the ingredients on its labels. I was shocked.
The older I got, the more I realized that all corporations are dsyfunctional and inept. It's not a unique feature to Bank of America's culture.