his series on Short sales woodland Hills California continues we are going to explain what happens once we write an offer on a short sale listing. This post is important to buyers who are interested in buying homes that are short sales. You should be aware of all the steps involved and your Real Estate agent should understand and be able to follow the process of making a short sale offer.
To fully understand the scope of short sales in Woodland Hills California you should consider reading the other 3 parts of this series:
Woodland Hills California Real Estate - Short Sale Part 2
We are going to assume for this post that the seller understands what a short sale is, his Realtor(R) has experience working in Short sales, the seller in this case has met all qualification t to do a short sale, the seller and his agent have all the documents his specific lender requires to do a short sale except for the offer from a buyer.
We are set to receive offers from buyers. The buyer's agent aught to
know how to help a buyer be aware of all that is involved from the two sides, buyer and seller prerequisites in order to have a purchase deal that runs as smooth as possible in this particular situation.
The first and most important thing to understand about the short sale is that the owner of the property ( seller) still owns the property,he still holds title to the property and also has the say so as to what offers he will accepted or not. The seller has mortgaged his property to the lender to whom he pays his monthly mortgage payments the mortgage company is the note holder or in many cases, the note servicer. The mortgage company does NOT own the property. A notice of default may have been filed and foreclosure proceedings may have started but until that property is actually sold on those courthouse steps the owner of records is still the person that is on the county records.
All of that being said the owner/seller can accept an offer from a buyer but because the offer amount is shorter than the amount the seller owes to his lender, that makes the case for a third party approval to the offer. This third party is the mortgage company to whom the seller owes his loan to.
The mortgage company will require the property to be sold in its as is condition and will probably need to approve all the closing costs fees on the sellers side.
Part of the purchase packet the buyer will need to prepare a good presentation to this third party lender.as with any other offer You will need to have your lender's pre-approval letter for this purchase. Make sure you have been approved for your loan. This means that you have already submitted a loan application, and had all the documentation to the lender to be able to proceed with the loan for this purchase. Please be advised that should your offer be accepted it is very likely that the short sale lender will want you to close within 3 weeks of them accepting the terms and short pay off amount.
You should choose a mortgage company who is aware of the working of short sales and knows how to get your loan through underwriting in a short amount of time.
Have your earnest money deposit ready when you write the offer send it to escrow the moment that the third party lender approves your offer. Get a signed and dated receipt for your earnest money deposit. A fact to keep in mind is, if you are paying by a personal check most title companies will require 10 to 14 days for that check to clear. You may consider getting a cashier's check to the title company so that there is no hold up at closing for funds that have not cleared yet.
Along with your offer you should submit a nice hand written letter explaining to the third party lender why you want to move into the home and that you are an end user. Telling them how long you have been waiting to be able to purchase your dream home.
Your Realtor should enclose with your offer the comparative sales in the area and other market information documents to prove the case of your offer.
The next post in this series will be about how to decide what to offer on a short sale, myths and truths about offer prices on short sales.
Disclaimer: This post is not intended to be or to provide legal advice. We recommend that you speak to your attorney and your tax accountant regarding specifics and to find out if this is the best option for you in your situation.
The information provided herein is supplied by several sources and is subject to change.
Disclaimer: This post is not intended to be or to provide legal advice. We recommend that you speak to your tax accountant regarding specifics and to find out if this is the best option for you in your situation.
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P.S. If you are listing your home as a short sale in Woodland Hills California make sure you hire an agent who knows how to do short sales and has the experience to get the job done. We are doing successful short sale packages. Call us at 818 – 288-7255 to find out more.