Real Estate

My husband and I put an offer on a short sale home. We fell in love with house and made an offer over the asking price. The seller accepted our offer within a day, and submitted it to the bank for approval.They said the bank did the appraisal this week and that we should expect an answer by Monday.

After extensive research on the short sale process, I found that it would be a miracle if we received an answer from the bank that quickly. I’m wondering if they recently had an offer and the buyer backed out, or was denied. They claimed to of had another offer when we submitted ours. They claim our offer was higher and that we were not asking for as many repairs as the other offer, which they also claim to have not even submitted to the bank.

It’s just not clear whether or not they have been approved to do a short sale. The printout off the MLS mentions something like (short sale, must be bank approved – seller in default). I don’t know if that means our offer needs to be approved by the bank, or if they need to be approved to do a short sale, or both. What stage in the short sale process would they be in if their bank did an appraisal. I thought they just used an estimate from the Realtor and not an actual appraiser.

Any advice would be appreciated. I know the odds are against us in getting approved due to the nature of short sales. I just can’t help but get anxious because we really want this house. Is it possible the bank give an answer so quickly, and under what circumstances?

Additional details: This house has been on the market since December 2010 and the family is still occupying the home.

The odds of success should be very good. The only problem is the long time that you will be required to wait. You think that your "offer" is the most important part of the process but it isn’t. The most important thing is how much money the bank is going to require from the seller to complete the process.

If the house is asking $150,000 but the existing loan is $250,000, the "short" amount is $100,000. usually the bank will ask the seller to pay $15,000 in order for the bank to lose the remaining $85,000. The bank and the seller share the loss. The seller might refuse. The bank then makes another proposal. The bank will lose $80,000 if the seller signs an IOU for $20,000 (but the seller does not have to pay any cash).

Sometimes this negotiating takes 6 months as the seller refuses the proposals. You are never told about any of this. All you know is that the bank "has not accepted your offer" but that is not true. The acceptance of your offer is completely dependent on how much the seller will contribute.

On one short sale, the final proposal to the seller was that the seller had to pay $13,000. When the seller refused, the buyer (you) agreed to increase her offer by $13,000 just to buy the house and be done with it.

You need to talk personally to the seller ( you can do this if you make an effort) and find out how much the bank is asking from them.

Looking at homes for sale and ramblers and ranchers are the two home styles we like the most in MLS pictures. We sold our property and want to re-invest before Obama destroys any hope of re-investing by devaluing our money to nothing.

Both are Ranch style houses in that they are low, and wide either front to back or side to side. The Rambler would be the Ranch style that has a footprint that wanders from being just a single rectangle.

I want to sell my house myself, and I’ve heard of flat fee mls listing services that will get your house on the mls, and therefore it would also appear on realtor.com. But I’ve read little disclaimers that say in Tennessee I can’t put a ‘for sale by owner’ sign on my lawn if I’ve gotten an mls listing, because there was a broker that had to do the listing for me. This confuses me, as what is the purpose of a flat fee mls service if not for people trying to do for sale by owner?

I do not know the laws in TN, but you cannot have it both ways. If you want your house in the MLS, you have to have some sort of relationship with a broker, period. The flat fee broker should (IMHO) provide signs for your listing, and you will be a ‘limited representation seller’ – as it is called in my area, you get some canned forms and get to try to complete the transaction.

I always tell people that want to try this to go for it, but keep my number, you’ll need it.

You buy the lot & design the house etc (ex: thru Centex) – then up until official closing, does it get listed "available" on a sign, or "for sale" in MLS?

No. If you own the lot, no one else has the right to put it on the market.

One of the bedrooms is in a finished basement, but does not have an egress window and therefore cannot legally be considered a bedroom. Can I still list it for sale as an additional bedroom in MLS? I could always clarify the bedroom situation in the detailed listing.

List it as a basement bonus room…

I want to sell it by owner off mls can anyone help? Does anyone have a for sale by owner story?

YOU would have do all your own advertising
it WON’T be on MLS – you need a realtor for that
YOU have to dea individually with everyone wanting to see the house and all their real estate agents
YOU need to know how to handle all the related paperwork
you will still have to pay the buyer’s real estate agent his commission-probably 3%

all in all, it’s hardly worth it, you probably won’t get the best price possible and it may take twice as long to sell (avg time is 9+ months now as it is), if you sell it at all

I’m househunting and am finding quite a few homes for sale on line have already been sold. Is there a Web site I can plug the mls number of the house into to see if it’s been sold already?

try www.realtor.com, they have the most up to date listings – updated as frequently as every 15 minutes.
From there, you can see is something’s still available or not.

We’re in the process of selling our home (a sweet little antique cape in coastal Maine), Our agreement with our realtor is about to expire and we’re going to try selling the home on our own for a bit since that would allow us to lower the price.

We’d like to keep it on the MLS though as so many people surf the MLS from their computer to find homes they’d like to see.

I’ve seen online that there are sites that will allow you to list your house on the MLS service for a flat fee so you don’t have to use a realtor to get it in the listing service which will save you at least 3% commission.

Anyone have any experience with these services???

Thanks
G.
The one service I found said they’d also list on Realtor.com

Our house is unique and while I understand what you’re saying about double the work for double the pay – I don’t understand why – we’d hire the title company/or attorney they’d take care of the details, we’d show the house – what the heck else does a realtor do? Mine never do all that much as far as I can see. This is the 4th house we’ve had on the market and maybe I get bad realtors, but they don’t seem to do all that much – I even end up showing the house half the time.
It just doesn’t seem doable to sell yourself without the exposure the MLS gets you.

What could be hidden with a flat rate service like that that says they don’t take a commission?
It would be helpful to have examples of tricks someone might play…cause I just don’t know enough about these services to trust them….anyone can have a website right!
Ed, would we have to sign on for an additional 2 months – or is that the tricky wording that can sometimes be used?

There was a lawsuit by property owners to be allowed to "list" their houses on MLS without an agent. They sued under the "anti-trust" laws. The realty agents had to make some concessions, but they mostly got to keep their hold on the MLS.

So you have to hire one of the flat-fee brokers to get on MLS. It can work but you have to ask your agent to send you copies of your listing every 30 days.So you can review the wording and compare it to the other houses for sale in realtor.com And have him send you an updated list of houses for sale nearby (even tho you can drive around yourself) so you stay informed. Then get ready for your house to get shown. Usually you have to negotiate the offers yourself.

The main flat-rate "trick" was to offer you their service for $500. After 2 months with no offers, they ask you to switch to a full-commission listing with them. The only reason you hired them was to get the low fee. You would have hired someone else if you were going to pay much more. So you feel tricked.

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