This site has been live for almost 4 years and we failed to tell you of our success.  Not to boast but rather to share the short sale success stories we’ve had (and failures) so that you can see what will work for you or not.

One of the most memorable stories was a home for sale in Buford.  It was a Chase short sale and our client had lost his job.  Just months prior he was working hand in hand with a prominent author in leadership.  Unfortunately for him, his boss sold the company which left him as an odd man out.  After several months of trying to make ends meet he could no longer afford the home.  This continued for over a year when Chase told him about a short sale.

Short Sale Twitter Accounts

You might think this is an odd thing to think about, but a few of the big banks have short sale twitter accounts.   Ok, so they don’t have “SHORT SALE” twitter accounts, but they do have accounts on twitter for help.  In particular, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Suntrust have very active “help” accounts.  If you are running into roadblocks on your short sale then they should be able to help.  It’s worth noting that you really need to be the seller (home owner) or an authorized party.  Otherwise, the best they can do is refer you to their customer service line.

The key to utilizing these social networks with the banks is to wait until there has been enough time passed and there is a real reason to complain, so to speak.  Then you may have to “blast” them a few times in order to get an answer.  Don’t get discouraged, they’ll ask you to “follow them” and then DM  (Direct Message).  If you aren’t a twitter user, that’s OK, but you’ll need an account to use this technique.

The Bank of America Short Sale twitter Account is: @BofA_Help

The Wells Fargo Short Sale twitter Account is: @Ask_WellsFargo

The Suntrust Short Sale twitter Account is: @AskSuntrust

Update to HARP Refinance Loans!

Good news if you are in the group of folks that would like to keep their Atlanta home but really can’t afford it at the moment.  HARP Loans are better now and for several reasons.

First off, an Atlanta HARP loan (Home Affordability Refinance Plan) is simply put: Just refinancing your home.  The fun part comes in is that the same criteria being used for a loan except the most obvious one, the appraisal.  Since the market is understandably down your value is likely less than what your mortgage is, making a traditional refinance impossible and thus forcing you to contact an Atlanta Short Sale Specialist. A HARP loan is still just a refinance and it can keep you in your home only if you can afford the home.  There are certain income requirements.  It’s also only for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac folks.

What are the changes to HARP?

• The new HARP replaces the obligatory appraisal with a computerized model of your home value, called an Automated Valuation Model (AVM). So, whether you owe 110% or 300% of the current value of your home, you will be able to refinance to a lower rate. Source: (Atlanta Harp Refinance)
• Elimination of fees that some lenders were charging.
• Elimination of risk based penalties for those wanting refinance to shorter terms.

You must be current to qualify, so if you are behind, please contact us to stop foreclosure!

Certified Short Sale Agent

If you have been thinking about a short sale in Atlanta for any length of time you might have seen or heard about real estate agents who are supposedly certified short sale agents.  The truth is that you can get your certification to do short sales by simply putting your butt in a seat and sitting through the class.  It’s bad enough that there are real estate agents out there claiming they are certified short sale agents but what this video is about is that one agent in particular is advertising a completely bogus certification that only they have.

This particular agent is CDRS certified – to see the kind of crappy stuff that passes for certification see for yourself.  Not only this, but this agent claims to be the only agent in Georgia, while I found several with this certification.  She’s the only one that paid extra for their marketing package.  At the end of the day, all this BS is to get more listings!  Short sales are not about listings, this makes me sick to think that home owners are losing their homes because they hired an agent that cared more about the listing than actually completing the short sale.

This kind of deceptive practices could cost someone their home and I am hoping that it’s not you.  Foreclosure is a big deal, it puts the responsibility about what to do with the deficiency squarely in the bank’s hands.  Please interview your real estate agents, yes you need a short sale specialist, but you should care less if they are a certified short sale agent.

Short Sale Process – Pricing Your Home

Hopefully you watched our other video about pricing or possibly read our post at Gahomedigest about How to Price Your Home, but those post and this one go hand and hand if you are a short sale seller.  This is all part of the short sale process – pricing your home!

Pricing your home to sell as a short sale seller is crucial.  It could mean the difference of going into foreclosure or not.  If you are not using the Jarvis Team, then you must be instruct your agent to be as aggressive as possible, without being ridiculous.  This post isn’t about finding comparables or understanding market value, it’s about the short sale process and pricing your home correctly (low) to get it to sell for the highest possible amount.