Has any one bought or attempted to buy a short sale?

[rvchat]

ANY ADVICE? how bad, or good, was it?

thnx

 

[AZMermaid]

We put offers in on, I believe, 4 short sales when we were looking for a house. Our realtor said they take a long time so there is no harm in putting in the offers and if we found something else, we were free to cancel the other deals. 3 were pretty easy but one wanted all this really specific paperwork and we had to get our mortgage through Wells Fargo and stuff and I honestly don't remember if we made an offer on that house.

Every one of them had multiple offers, so we bid at least $10K over asking price, as instructed by our realtor. He said many banks won't accept asking price. We never heard back on a single one. One it was about 3 months and the other ones was more like 1-2 months. We ended up finding and buying a foreclosure. Our house sold in like 3 weeks, so we ended up with less time than we were anticipating. Even the foreclosure took almost 4 weeks to hear anything back from the bank.

They were all in okay shape. None had appliances, most had the ceiling fans and intercoms ripped out. We saw houses with all the fire alarms and door knobs missing, but I don't think those were the ones we offered on. My FIL saw some houses in the outskirts with the cabinets gone!

Now, this is AZ where they say like 2/3 of the houses are signifigantly (more than 50K) under water. On House Hunters, people seem to hear back on short sales in a few weeks, but my advice would be don't fall in love with it, because it may never happen!

 

[disneyfan007]

My step-son had put an offer in on a house that was a short sale. That was four months ago and he still hadn't heard anything. Ended up withdrawing the offer because he found a house that was not a short sale and will be moving in shortly.

 

[Pakey]

We bought one as investment property and it wasn't too bad but perhaps it helped that I knew someone at the bank who held the house. We offered $10,000 more than asking and did not ask for any closing costs. However, our realtor told us that she had another one for the exact same floor plan in the same subdivision that hadn't moved forward after offer for 6 months (different bank).

I don't think there's any way to know before you put in an offer how it's going to go.

 

[LoveBWVVBR]

No, but we bought a foreclosure last year. It was on and off the market in 4 days. We paid $26K over asking, as the asking price was artificially low (to generate a bidding war...and it did). We owned the house 2 weeks after having our offer accepted. Our offer was accepted 4 days after it was submitted.

After hearing so many horror stories about how long it was taking to hear back on short sales, we told our realtor that we wanted either a bank-owned foreclosure or an owner-sold home (non short-sale). We didn't even bother with short sales.

 

[stargazer2892]

Ours was a short sale and never again. The poor owners just wanted to get rid of the house and we just wanted the house, but the bank apparently had other ideas . they actually at one point counter offered their OWN counter offer. Our agent had never seen that move before. It was such a PITA. If that's "the house" then go for it but be prepared for a long, bumpy, ride.

 

[Claire&TheBoys]

We did and lived to tell the tale!

We first looked at the house in Oct 2009 and really liked it, but we had some logistical issues arise (my husband was getting mobilized) and weren't sure if it was the right time to buy. It was not a short sale at that time and was listed for $269k.

In Jan 2010, the house changed realtors and was offered as a short sale. The price with the short sale was $288k. Why they thought they could mark up the price $20k when it didn't sell at $269k is beyond me. Anyway, we kept talking about it and looked at it again in February. We made the offer in March, I believe, for $245,500. We were hopeful at the time that we'd hear back quickly and get the contract before April 30 so we could get that "incentive" money from the government, but no such luck.

The last week of June 2010, my realtor called and said, "are you sitting down? Your offer was accepted!" I was very pro-active with getting issues handled as they arose and I have some contacts through my current job and former job, so I was able to get some things done quickly. We closed on the Friday before Labor Day. We didn't know until a few days before closing that the house had TWO mortgages on it (the selling realtor did not disclose to my realtor), but the closing agent was the catalyst who took the bull by the horns and got the approvals and got it closed. (The selling realtors were worthless.) It all came down to the people I had on our side -- our realtor, our mortgage agent, and the closing agent. And my own perseverence and desire to get it done.

It can be done. We were fortunate that we were able to carry 2 mortgages until we could move into the new house and sell the first house. We didn't have the pressure of having to get out of our old house by a certain date. We feel like it was all God's timing for us and we're thankful it worked to our benefit. We love our new house!

 

[Abdieso]

No experience.

 

[LSK]

We bought our home through a Short Sale and it was super easy. We're rare, I know. It was easy for us because the 4 or so buyers before us each pushed the process along with the bank a bit further. By the time we came along the bank had set their lowest acceptance rate and the realtor had a direct connection to someone in charge at the bank.

We put in an offer, got word back that the offer was too low ($50K under asking, can't blame a girl for trying) so we put in another offer. Five days later we had word back, the bank would accept but they had procedure they had to follow and she was legally required to counter with the original asking price so she did. I said, "no" and she said, "OK, then we accept your offer." Within 3 weeks we closed on the house.

We did get a thorough inspection done and the house was in very good shape but not only were fixtures missing but every light bulb had been taken out of the house and some wires had been cut or reworked so they turned on the lights instead of off or turned on a different light than you would expect. I'm sure the former homeowners were upset with the situation they were in and I'm just glad they left the appliances untouched.

I know my story is rarely heard but it does happen. We absolutely love our home and are so grateful our experience was so positive.

 

[ekatiel]

We made an offer on a short sale last Spring. After several months of waiting on the bank, another property came up that was not a short sale. We ditched the short sale and bought the other house. The short sale became a foreclosure a few months later. Not sure what's happened to it since then. It was a total PITA. We would wait to hear from the bank for weeks at a time, and then they would leave nasty voice mails for my realtor saying that we needed such and such paper work in within 24 hours or the deal was off. I think my realtor was extremely relieved when we decided to ditch the short sale. If you make an offer, be prepared for a LONG process. --Katie

 

[mrsheppo]

When we were house hunting we found a house that we really liked and we put in an offer for 5k over asking. After getting back from putting in the offer, we found out the owner dropped the price 9k while he knew we were making our offer, so our offer was 14k over asking. While this ticked us off, we really wanted the house. After waiting 3 months the bank still never responded to us. We were very frustrated and contacted our realtor to start looking again. We ended up finding a foreclosure that we loved. We made our offer and the bank accepted the next day. This was in 2009 and to this day, the short sale house has not sold.

 

[AZMermaid]

My experience was in 2009 too and of the 4 short sales we bid on, one went to auction, two are still on the market as short sales and the other one was taken off the market. None of them ever sold. Now, there was a house around the corner that was being sold as a short sale. It was on the market about a year, but it did finally sell.