Central Florida Short Sales: December 2011

Tutas Towne Realty and Bryant Tutas just had another successful Kissimmee/Poinciana Florida Short Sale closing with Fifth Third Bank.

The property:

Investment property. 4 bedroom 2 bath townhouse located in Kissimmee Poinciana Florida. This home has 2,234 sq ft of living area. It was purchased new in May of 2005 for $234,000. It Sold 12/28/2011 for $72,200. That's a decline in value of 70% in 6.5 years! 

Liens:

• 1st Mortgage with Fifth Third Bank for $230,000

Hardship:

• Loss of rental income. Reduction in value.

Summary:

I placed the property on the market 29 April for $75,000. Negotiated a cash deal at $72,200 on 19 May. It took until 18 December to get the approval from Fifth Third. Most of this time was negotiating promissory notes that were required form Fifth Third and the Mortgage Insurance Company. After almost 3 months of trying to make these go away the seller agreed to pay Fifth Third $15,000 over 15 years and the MI Company $23,000 over 15 years. After finally receiving the written approval on the 18th of December the buyer decided to walk!!!

Even though the Buyer and his agent had been updated weekly for 7 months he still walked. Anyway I placed it back on the market as an "approved" short sale and we found a Buyer the same day for $72,200. We scheduled the closing for 2 days later and this Buyer made it to the closing table before getting cold feet and walking.

So...I placed it back on the market and found another cash buyer on 22 December. We closed and funded on 28 December.

Tutas Towne Realty placed the property on the market 20 April 2011.  The transaction closed on 28 December 2011. 243 days from listing to closing!!

Fifth Third Bank accepted $65,500 or .28 cents on the dollar for the 1st mortgage. 

***The Seller received FULL WAIVER OF DEFICIENCY on an investment property. He did have to participate in the loss by signing two promissory notes.

Do you need help with your Florida Short Sale?

 Tutas Towne Realty has already successfully negotiated Short Sales with the following Lenders and Investors.

• Chase Short Sale
• Sun Trust Short Sale
• GMAC Short Sale
• Wells Fargo Short Sale
• Bank of America Short Sale
• USA Bank Short Sale
• PNC Bank Short Sale
• Citi Short Sale
• HomeEq Short Sale
• Fifth Third Bank Short Sale
• ING Direct Short Sale
• GreenTree Short Sale
• Capital One Short Sale
• ASC Short Sale
• First Horizon Short Sale
• E-Trade Short Sale
• Transland Financial Short Sale
• US Bank Short Sale
• IBM LBPS Short Sale
• Nationstar Short Sale
• BAC Florida Short Sale
• Real Time Solutions Short Sale
• Fannie Mae Short Sale
• FHA Short Sale
• Selene Finance Short Sale
• Indy Mac
• One West Bank
• DTA Solutions LLC Short sale

Can we add you to our list of successful Short Sales?

Are you facing foreclosure in Florida?

(CLICK THE IMAGE IF YOU NEED LENDER CONTACT INFO AND SHORT SALE PACKAGES)

Hi folks. Here we are at the end of 2011. I spent some time this morning reflecting on short sales and these are some of my thoughts, observations and predictions.

• In 2012 Banks are going to have even more control over our real estate businesses when it comes to Short Sales.

• “Pre-approved Short Sale” really means the Bank will now dictate how you market, how you are paid and who you can sell to.

• Examples are:

• Last week I received an email from BofA, for a Co-op Short Sale listing, stating that they require the listing agent to hold 3 open houses and have at least 1 broker caravan.

• I saw an email from a different lender requiring the listing Broker to split the commission 50/50.

• I have had lenders refuse to sell to a corporate entity even though they are NOT the Seller.
  

• Banks are outsourcing more of their Short Sales to 3rd party vendors and are requiring the listing broker to pay for these services out of their commission.

• Loan mods are rarely given. One reason for this is that Mortgage Insurance doesn’t pay out on a loan mod but will on a foreclosure or Short Sale.

• I need to up my game as I did not help enough people avoid foreclosure in 2011.

• I want to help 100 people avoid foreclosure in 2012.

• If you think you are a Short Sale expert...you are wrong. You may be experienced but you are not an expert.

• Short Sales will increase for 2012 in the hardest hit areas.

• You may not need a hardship to sell your property as a Short Sale.

• You may not need to miss payments to do a Short Sale.

• Needing to sell but not being able to due to your mortgage balance being too high IS a hardship.

• Since more lenders may start to dictate how we split the commission on a Short Sale I need to think of alternative ways to get paid and generate income.

• Collect advance commission at time of listing.

• Have the buyer pay part of my compensation.

• Charge the seller and/or lender for clean outs and maintenance.

• Increase our buyer side commissions and fees.

• Hire more agents.

• Cut costs.

•  My partner Wendy Rulnick and I have grown http://ShortSaleSuperstars.com to over 8,000 members and have made it the number one place on the web for folks to get reliable short sale information. We now have almost 50,000 unique visitors per month.

• Lenders “google” the agents involved in a Short Sale. Remember this the next time you go to write a negative article about a lender or a Short Sale.

• Lenders will be hand selecting more Short Sale agents for their distressed borrowers in 2012. (see my last bullet point)

Well folks, that’s it for now. I hope I have given you some food for thought. Please go out and help folks avoid foreclosure. If you don’t want to handle Short Sales send them my way. If they are in Florida I will take care of them personally, if not, I will refer them to one of our Short Sale Superstar. We cover all 50 States.

And if you are in Florida we can co-list and work the Short Sale together. You have options. Just don’t walk away from the Short Sale listing. You owe it to your community to help folks avoid foreclosure.

I will help you in any way I can. Fair enough?

NEED TRAINING? SHORT SALE WEBINAR STORE

Are you facing foreclosure in Florida?

To:  Potential Clients of Bryant Tutas

From: David Bernier

I have bought and sold many properties over the past 30 years both primary residences and Commercial Properties.

I want to take this time to highly recommend Bryant Tutas as the Real Estate Broker to represent you.

Bryant is by far the most professional person that I have ever dealt with in my entire life.  

Whether it is Real Estate, Insurance, Medical, etc Bryant far surpassed the others.  You too will be completely

satisfied with his Real Estate expertise.  Whether it was another step of the process that had been

completed or just informing me that everything was going smooth he regularly kept me updated

via email or by phone.

If you have any further question please feel for to call my cell phone number below.

Thank you

David Bernier

850-830-4207 

Are you facing foreclosure in Florida?

Tutas Towne Realty and Bryant Tutas just had another successful Oviedo Florida Short Sale closing with SunTrust Mortgage.

The property:

4 bedroom 2 bath townhouse located in Hawthorne Glen Oviedo Florida. This home has 1,828 sq ft of living area. It was purchased new in March of 2006 for $277,200. It Sold today for $125,000. 

Liens:

• 1st Mortgage with SunTrust Mortgage for $234,500

Hardship:

• Curtailment of income. Current on payments. Purchased for their son when he was going to college. He graduated and they no longer needed the unit.

Summary:

This was a referral from my partner Wendy Rulnick. I placed the property on the market 2 September and had multiple offers within the first 3 days. Negotiated a cash deal at $125,000.Within 45 days we had an approval from SunTrust. However they wanted the seller to contribute $10,000 to the transaction.The sellers were not in a position to do so, so we asked the buyer to pay it. They said no.

We canceled the contract and placed it back on the market. Within 1 day we had a new buyer willing to pay $125,000 AND make the $10,000 cash contribution for the seller. This was agreed and fully disclosed on the contract, on the HUD and to SunTrust. The buyer paid the $10,000 at time of closing and the seller received FULL WAIVER OF DEFICIENCY on an investment property with out missing any payments!

I never saw the property, never met the seller or the buyer. The entire transaction was handled via email and text messages.

Tutas Towne Realty placed the property on the market 2 September 2011.  The transaction closed on 27 December 2011. 113 days from listing to closing!!

SunTrust Mortgage accepted $125,600 or .54 cents on the dollar for the 1st mortgage. 

***The Seller received FULL WAIVER OF DEFICIENCY on an investment property with out missing any payments!

From Mrs Seller:

• Thanks Bryant!!!  Best news you could have given us.  We will certainly keep you in mind if we should hear of anyone needing your services.  You have been terrific to work with and we can't thank you enough for staying on top of the whole process.

From Mr Seller:

• Thanks Bryant.  You are by far the most professional person I have ever worked with!  Kind of bummed though.  I enjoyed having you in my life. 

Do you need help with your Florida Short Sale?

Tutas Towne Realty has already successfully negotiated Short Sales with the following Lenders and Investors.

• Chase Short Sale
• Sun Trust Short Sale
• GMAC Short Sale
• Wells Fargo Short Sale
• Bank of America Short Sale
• USA Bank Short Sale
• PNC Bank Short Sale
• Citi Short Sale
• HomeEq Short Sale
• Fifth Third Bank Short Sale
• ING Direct Short Sale
• GreenTree Short Sale
• Capital One Short Sale
• ASC Short Sale
• First Horizon Short Sale
• E-Trade Short Sale
• Transland Financial Short Sale
• US Bank Short Sale
• IBM LBPS Short Sale
• Nationstar Short Sale
• BAC Florida Short Sale
• Real Time Solutions Short Sale
• Fannie Mae Short Sale
• FHA Short Sale
• Selene Finance Short Sale
• Indy Mac
• One West Bank
• DTA Solutions LLC Short sale

Can we add you to our list of successful Short Sales?

Are you facing foreclosure in Florida?

Tutas Towne Realty and Bryant Tutas just had another successful Dunedin Florida Short Sale closing with IndyMac-One West Bank.

The property:

2 bedroom 2 bath single family home located in Dunedin Florida. This home has 1,476 sq ft of living area. It was purchased in October of 2005 for $205,000. Sold yesterday for $101,000.

Liens:

• 1st Mortgage with IndyMac-One West Bank for $190,000
• 2nd Mortgage with IndyMac-One West Bank for $38,000
  

Hardship:

• Curtailment of income. Relocation.
  

Summary:

This was a pretty straight forward Dunedin Florida Short Sale. I was contacted by the Buyer in August about wanting to purchase this property. She had contact info for the sellers so I contacted them and put the deal together. The initial offer was for $72,000. After negotiating back and forth with the lender the buyer agreed to a price of $101,000.

The Buyer is a first time home buyer and ended up using a FHA 203k Rehab Loan to purchase the property and added about $25,000 worth of repairs into the loan.

The Sellers had abandoned the property after an unsuccessful short sale with another agent and were thrilled to be contacted about doing the deal. We were able to negotiate a full waiver of deficiency with no cash contribution or promissory note being required.

I never saw the property, never me the seller or the buyer. The entire transaction was handled via email and text messages.

Tutas Towne Realty placed the property on the market August 12 at $75,000.  The transaction closed on December 20. 130 days from listing to closing!!

This property sold for $101,000. IndyMac accepted $88,000 or .46 cents on the dollar for the 1st mortgage and they accepted $3,000 or .08 cents on the dollar for the 2nd mortgage.

The Seller received full Waiver of Deficiency.

Do you need help with your Florida Short Sale?

Tutas Towne Realty has already successfully negotiated Short Sales with the following Lenders and Investors.

• Chase Short Sale
• Sun Trust Short Sale
• GMAC Short Sale
• Wells Fargo Short Sale
• Bank of America Short Sale
• USA Bank Short Sale
• PNC Bank Short Sale
• Citi Short Sale
• HomeEq Short Sale
• Fifth Third Bank Short Sale
• ING Direct Short Sale
• GreenTree Short Sale
• Capital One Short Sale
• ASC Short Sale
• First Horizon Short Sale
• E-Trade Short Sale
• Transland Financial Short Sale
• US Bank Short Sale
• IBM LBPS Short Sale
• Nationstar Short Sale
• BAC Florida Short Sale
• Real Time Solutions Short Sale
• Fannie Mae Short Sale
• FHA Short Sale
• Selene Finance Short Sale
• Indy Mac
• One West Bank
• DTA Solutions LLC Short sale

Can we add you to our list of successful Short Sales?

Are you facing foreclosure in Florida?

Hi folks. Many of you may know that the Short Sale lenders are starting to get very proactive with getting short sales approved and closed.

Some of the lenders are even paying the borrowers to do a short sale.

All of this is good except for the part where they are also starting to completely control the real estate transaction.

I really like streamlined short sales but I’m not sure I like this little diddy I received form Bank of America:

• “Borrower is in a streamline Cooperative Short Sale program.  We require 3 open houses and a broker tour.  List price is determined by the bank’s pricing tool.”

Open houses? Broker caravan? Really?

How can Bank of America have any clue of what works in MY market? The answer is....they don’t.

Fortunately for me I sold this property in less than a week at full “approved” listing price. Now lets just wait and see how long it really takes to receive the written approval on my approved streamlined short sale. Want to start a pool?

Are you under water on your Florida mortgage?

Hi folks. One of the biggest myths with Short sales is that it takes a lot of time to work them. I have been asked numerous times why I don't outsource my files and use a 3rd party negotiator instead of handling the process myself.

Well it's simple........I enjoy working short sales!! I like doing paperwork and I love negotiating with the lenders. Short sales fit my skill set perfectly.

Time wise I spend about 30 minutes per week per file unless I have something out of the ordinary going on. I can handle about 35 files without too much of an issue and I handle ALL of it. The most time is spent at time of listing during document collection. After the property is under contract I follow up with the lenders once a week and preferably by email if able.

My sellers are updated simply by copying them on all correspondence. The buyer's side get's a weekly update via email.

If I ever reach the point where I can't do it myself the first thing I would do is hire a virtual assistance to do the paperwork. I would still want ot be in charge of the entire process because I truly feel that no body is going to look after my sellers as well as I do.

The majority of my short sales are listed over the internet. Because of that, I rarely meet with sellers.  I hire runners to do photos and set up lock boxes (or the seller does it for me). In fact, I have a closing tomorrow where I have never seen the property, never met the seller and never met the buyer. And I'm on both sides of the transaction! How sweet is that?

Currently I have 30 Florida short sale listings either active or pending. I work from home and go to my office by 6am. I never work past 5, go to the gym 3 days a week (during work hours), cook lunch and eat with my wife everyday. I don't work on Saturdays and Sundays except for a couple of hours early in the morning to tidy up emails.

My title company handles my searches, the preliminary HUDs and all closings. I've worked with the same closer for 16 years and have complete confidence in her abilities to deal with my sellers and buyers. I don't attend closings but I am available if there are closing issues. There rarely are since everything has been reviewed and approved prior to going to the closing table

My sellers and I rarely speak on the phone after the initial consultation. This is a huge time saver plus it eliminates confusion by having all communications in writing. However, I do communicate with them several times a week.

BPOs are scheduled through my showing service and prior to the BPO agent going in the property I email them all of the comps, pictures, repair estimates and justification for the purchase price.

Short sales are nothing more than a process. Short sales do not need to be complicated or time consuming. Know what you are doing and have systems in place and you may surprise yourself with how many Short sales you can handle.

Are you under water on your Florida mortgage?

Hi folks. Recently I have had several Florida Short Sale sellers ask me the same question.....”We need to replace our car. Should we do that before we go through the short sale process?” The concern is that once they go through the short sale their credit will be dinged and financing an automobile will not be easy. One is even paying cash and is concerned how it will look that he went out and spent $15,000 cash on a car and then turned around and asked the lender to accept a short sale.

Interesting question. And one that certainly shows that we are in a different stage of the short sale wave. The Short Sale Sellers mentioned above do not have cut and dry hardships. They are current on payments and have great credit scores.

The first wave of short sellers that started mostly in 2008 were distressed sellers. Property owners that could no longer afford to make their mortgage payments. The next wave were folks that had adjustable rate mortgages that were resetting and they couldn’t refinance as promised when they took out their mortgages.

The current wave is made up of folks that just need to sell but can’t because their properties are too far underwater. They are current on their payments and are not in foreclosure. They could continue to make payments. BUT....they have to move.

Their family has out grown the property. They have a job transfer. Or they are strategic short sellers.

Their situations are different than the first two waves of short sales...

So......should they go out and replace their car prior to doing the short sale? It depends. My response to them is........

• “If replacing your car is something you would be doing even if you weren’t getting ready to do a short sale then, yes, go ahead and do it. If dependable transportation is needed for job purposes then, yes, go ahead and replace it now. Do what you need to do to make sure your family is taken care of. BUT...be able to defend your position if the lender ask you about it. Be able to show that buying a car was needed and not just wanted. And.....be prepared to make a cash contribution towards the short sale lender’s loss.”

This is my opinion. What’s yours?

Are you under water on your Florida mortgage?

Hi folks. Just when I think I have this Short Sale stuff figured out I run across another issue that has the potential to really place my sellers, the buyers and the agents in a difficult quandary.

Recently I received a phone message from Chase in relation to a Short Sale we closed on almost two weeks ago. It went something like this "Hi this is Sarah from Chase calling on LN# 11324567. I am preparing the post closing package to send off to the Investor and noticed that I need the last 2 months bank statements from the Borrower. Please fax these over to me by the end of business today or I will return the check and close the file. Thank You."

YIKES!!! This call came in at 1:00 in the afternoon while I was out of the office. So needless to say I had to scramble to reach the Seller and luckily she was able to get the statements to me in time. I was lucky because my Seller was in the hospital but just happened to have her relative in town who was able to run around and get this taken care of.

The Buyer has already spent about $10,000 rehabbing since he closed on the property two weeks ago.

The frustrating part is that Chase had issued the approval and approved the final HUD for closing.

This has happened to me 3 times over the last few months. You know....I can understand the Lender requesting additional information after closing to complete a closing file but this threatening to return the check and close the file is really starting to piss me off. AND....they only give you a few hours to solve the problem after it took them 7 months to approve the deal.

So....I wonder what would happen if they did return the check and closed the file? The deal has already been closed so I'm pretty sure they can't undo that. Could they? Could they refuse to remove the lien even though all closing conditions were met? What do you think?

Are you under water on your Florida mortgage?