Finding the Right Short Sale Real Estate Agent in Des Moines Iowa Area
Finding the Right Short Sale Real Estate Agent in Des Moines Iowa Area or any area.There are many things that need to be taken into consideration when looking to find the Right Short sale agent in the Des Moines area or any area. It doesn't matter if the home owners are looking for help to re-modify your loan to keep the home or if you are looking for an alternative to avoid foreclosure. Picking the right agent is very important and will make or break what you are trying to get done.
Most Real Estate agents have no idea what an short sale is, so you can bet they don't know how to do them. Yet they will still take a listing just to have a sign in the yard to try and get sign calls with no intention of every selling that home. I recently called a local agent in our market to show one of his listings I asked him specific questions as one should about a short sale Who is lender, is paper work collected, how far behind are they, has BPO been done and a few more the answer I got on all of them was " Um I don't know" then he proceeds to say if I where you I wouldn't even show it is not going to sell the only reason I took the listing was to try and get sign calls. My first thought to this was are you serious who are you helping this home is going to go into foreclosure because you are have no clue what you are doing.
So this got me thinking who else is out there that is going through this same situation and not even knowing that is it happening. So here are some tips and questions to know if you have found the Right Short Sale Real Estate Agent that can successfully sale your home short or help in some other alternative to avoiding foreclosures.
1) Please Remember just because an Agent has a designation does not mean they know what they are doing. I know of multiple cases where agents have a designation for some field of expertise and the fact is they know nothing.
2). Ask the agent for some literature on Short Sales and modifications, if they are truly skilled in dealing in distressed mortgage situations they will have these for you readily available.
3) Ask the agent how many short sales the have currently working, how many they have closed.
4) Ask the agent how they advertise/
5) Ask the Agent to explain to you how their systems are set up for doing short sale or foreclosure alternative.
6) Ask the agent if they handle the short sale negotiationson their own or if they have some one help them with this. If the say they have someone help them be careful of this there are some people who do this by the books and some who walk a fine line between right and wrong. So ask alot of questions if some thing doesn't seem right then chances are it it is not.
7) Ask the agent if they submit more than one offer to the lender at the same time, if they say yes your going to be looking at a much longer time frame and chances of the short sale ever getting approved are slim. Short sale negotiators have 200-400 files per person. So if you submit multiple offers on the same property it will lengthen the time frame. Only one offer should be submitted to the lender for review all others should be presented to sellers and held as back up.
8) Ask the agent who he works with as far as attorneys, cpa's that they may use at times in the short sale or foreclosure alternative process.
9) This may be the most important of all if the agent asks you to sign anything has the property deeded to someone else or transfer power of attorney. Some advise seek a legal council before you ever do this. Once you sign over your property you know longer have rights to it, BUT you still have to pay the mortgage.
There are more questions that you could ask these are some of the most important that should be asked.
Asking these questions and doing your home work will help you in Finding the Right Short Sale Real Estate Agent in Des Moines Iowa Area or any area.
I cant stress enough how important chooseing the right agent is in any transaction especially in a distressed situation.
Your able to find all that you need to know about foreclosure alternatives. at www.shanestopsforeclosures.com or www.shanetorres.com
Thanks
Shane Torres, REALTOR® CDPE / SFR Certified RE/MAX Real Estate Concepts
1830 Princeton Dr. Ste C
Grimes, IA 50111
Licensed Real Estate Agent in Iowa
Phone 515-202-5894
Fax 866-838-0904
shane@realestateconcepts.net
shanetorres@remax.net
reoshane@realestateconcepts.net http://shanestopsforeclosures.blogspot.com/
For Information on short sale visit www.shanestopsforeclosures.com
visit my web site at www.shanetorres.com for more information on current listings
In foreclosure controversy, problems run deeper than flawed paperwork
Millions of U.S. mortgages have been shuttled around the global financial system - sold and resold by firms - without the documents that traditionally prove who legally owns the loans.
Now, as many of these loans have fallen into default and banks have sought to seize homes, judges around the country have increasingly ruled that lenders had no right to foreclose, because they lacked clear title.
These fundamental concerns over ownership extend beyond those that surfaced over the past two weeks amid reports of fraudulent loan documents and corporate "robo-signers."
The court decisions, should they continue to spread, could call into doubt the ownership of mortgages throughout the country, raising urgent challenges for both the real estate market and the wider financial system.
For struggling homeowners trying to avoid foreclosure, it could mean an opportunity to challenge the banks they argue have been unhelpful at best and deceptive at worst. But it also threatens to leave them in prolonged limbo, stuck in homes they still can't afford and waiting for the foreclosure process to begin anew.
For big banks, "there's a possible nightmare scenario here that no foreclosure is valid," said Nancy Bush, a banking analyst from NAB Research. If millions of foreclosures past and present were invalidated because of the way the hurried securitization process muddied the chain of ownership, banks could face lawsuits from homeowners and from investors who bought stakes in the mortgage securities - an expensive and potentially crippling proposition.
At the core of the fights over the legal standing of banks in foreclosure cases is Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, based in Reston.
The idea behind it was to build a centralized registry to track loans electronically as they were traded by big financial firms. Without this system, the business of creating massive securities made of thousands of mortgages would likely have never taken off. The company's role caused few objections until millions of homes began to fall into foreclosure.
In recent years, the company has faced numerous court challenges, including separate class-action lawsuits in California and Nevada - the epicenter of the foreclosure crisis. Lawyers in other states have also challenged the company's legal standing in court.
Kentucky lawyer Heather Boone McKeever has filed a state class-action suit and a federal civil racketeering class-action suit on behalf of homeowners facing foreclosure, alleging that MERS and financial firms that did business with it have tried to foreclose on homes without holding proper titles.
These fundamental concerns over ownership extend beyond those that surfaced over the past two weeks amid reports of fraudulent loan documents and corporate "robo-signers."
The court decisions, should they continue to spread, could call into doubt the ownership of mortgages throughout the country, raising urgent challenges for both the real estate market and the wider financial system.
For struggling homeowners trying to avoid foreclosure, it could mean an opportunity to challenge the banks they argue have been unhelpful at best and deceptive at worst. But it also threatens to leave them in prolonged limbo, stuck in homes they still can't afford and waiting for the foreclosure process to begin anew.
For big banks, "there's a possible nightmare scenario here that no foreclosure is valid," said Nancy Bush, a banking analyst from NAB Research. If millions of foreclosures past and present were invalidated because of the way the hurried securitization process muddied the chain of ownership, banks could face lawsuits from homeowners and from investors who bought stakes in the mortgage securities - an expensive and potentially crippling proposition.
For the fragile housing market, already clogged with foreclosure cases, it could mean gridlock and confusion for years. And there is concern in Washington that if the real estate market and financial institutions suffer harm, it could force the government to step in again. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said Wednesday he is looking into the allegations of improper foreclosures, and Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), chairman of the Senate banking committee, said he plans to hold hearings on the issue.
The company, known as MERS, was created more than a decade ago by the mortgage industry, including mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, GMAC, and the Mortgage Bankers Association.
MERS allowed big financial firms to trade mortgages at lightning speed while largely bypassing local property laws throughout the country that required new forms and filing fees each time a loan changed hands, lawyers say.The idea behind it was to build a centralized registry to track loans electronically as they were traded by big financial firms. Without this system, the business of creating massive securities made of thousands of mortgages would likely have never taken off. The company's role caused few objections until millions of homes began to fall into foreclosure.
In recent years, the company has faced numerous court challenges, including separate class-action lawsuits in California and Nevada - the epicenter of the foreclosure crisis. Lawyers in other states have also challenged the company's legal standing in court.
Kentucky lawyer Heather Boone McKeever has filed a state class-action suit and a federal civil racketeering class-action suit on behalf of homeowners facing foreclosure, alleging that MERS and financial firms that did business with it have tried to foreclose on homes without holding proper titles.
"They have no legal standing and no right to foreclose," McKeever said. "If you or I did this one time, we'd be in jail."
Judges in various states have also weighed in.
In August, the Maine Supreme Court threw out a foreclosure case because "MERS did not have a stake in the proceedings and therefore had no standing to initiate the foreclosure action."
On the other hand, Minnesota legislators passed a law stating that MERS explicitly has the right to bring foreclosure cases. And on its Web site and in e-mails, MERS cites numerous court decisions around the country that it says demonstrate the company's right to act on behalf of lenders and to undertake foreclosures.
"Assertions that somehow MERS creates a defect in the mortgage or deed of trust are not supported by the facts," a company spokeswoman said.
But that's precisely what lawyers are arguing with more frequency throughout the country. If such an argument gains traction in the wake of recent foreclosure moratoriums, the consequences for banks could be enormous.
"It's an issue of the whole process of foreclosure having been so muddied by the [securitization] process," said Bush, the banking analyst. "It is no longer a straightforward legalistic process, which is what foreclosures are supposed to be."
Janet Tavakoli, founder and president of Tavakoli Structured Finance, a Chicago-based consulting firm, said that for much of the past decade, when banks were creating mortgage-backed securities as fast as possible, there was little time to check all the documents and make sure the paperwork was in order.
But now, when judges, lawyers and elected officials are demanding proper paperwork before foreclosures can proceed, the banks' paperwork problems have been laid bare, she said.
The result: "Banks are vulnerable to lawsuits from investors in the [securitization] trusts," Tavakoli said.
Referring to the federal government's $700 billion Troubled Assets Relief Program for banks, she added, "This problem could cost the banks significantly more money, which could mean TARP II
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 7, 2010; 12:01 AM
Judges in various states have also weighed in.
In August, the Maine Supreme Court threw out a foreclosure case because "MERS did not have a stake in the proceedings and therefore had no standing to initiate the foreclosure action."
In May, a New York judge dismissed another case because the assignment of the loan by MERS to the bank HSBC was "defective," he said. The plaintiff's counsel seemed to be "operating in a parallel mortgage universe," the judge wrote.
Also in May, a California judge said MERS could not foreclose on a home, because it was merely a representative for Citibank and did not own the loan.On the other hand, Minnesota legislators passed a law stating that MERS explicitly has the right to bring foreclosure cases. And on its Web site and in e-mails, MERS cites numerous court decisions around the country that it says demonstrate the company's right to act on behalf of lenders and to undertake foreclosures.
"Assertions that somehow MERS creates a defect in the mortgage or deed of trust are not supported by the facts," a company spokeswoman said.
But that's precisely what lawyers are arguing with more frequency throughout the country. If such an argument gains traction in the wake of recent foreclosure moratoriums, the consequences for banks could be enormous.
"It's an issue of the whole process of foreclosure having been so muddied by the [securitization] process," said Bush, the banking analyst. "It is no longer a straightforward legalistic process, which is what foreclosures are supposed to be."
But now, when judges, lawyers and elected officials are demanding proper paperwork before foreclosures can proceed, the banks' paperwork problems have been laid bare, she said.
The result: "Banks are vulnerable to lawsuits from investors in the [securitization] trusts," Tavakoli said.
Referring to the federal government's $700 billion Troubled Assets Relief Program for banks, she added, "This problem could cost the banks significantly more money, which could mean TARP II
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 7, 2010; 12:01 AM