All Forum Posts by: Nick Reuter

I have to be honest, I think this "Fraud" talk is crap. Did anyone actually read the article? In a nutshell, all it says is that it considers it fraudulent when an investor withholds information from the lender that would have affected the lender's decision to accept a short payoff. That's it. It then uses a case study of an A-B B-C transaction where the B-C sale is NOT disclosed as an example of possible fraud.

I don't see how this is any different from what lenders expect today. Hiding information about your B-C deal when it would impact the lender's decision has always been frowned upon,and not just by Freddie Mac.

Even more humerous is the suggestions for mitigation Freddie Mac makes. The article literally says that they should "be sure to read all documentation surrounding a short payoff offer". What a novel idea!

I think this whole thing is way out of proportion. Not to mention, it's not federal law, it's just a guideline that one GSE is bringing to the forefront.

Deep breaths, people! Deep breaths!

My blog post on HAFA:
http://www.shortsaleartisan.com/blog/2010/03/23/the-hafa-program-is-a-bunch-of-crap/

A snippet is these 6 reasons:

1. The underwhelming results of the overarching HAMP program. As a matter of fact, through January 2010, HAMP had only created a little over 100,000 modifications, despite having promises of reaching 4 million plus struggling homeowners. Remember, the HAMP program was also “mandatory“, but the results still were meager at best.
2. Promises of speeding up the process seems a little bit “pie in the skyâ€. Even though the 10 day window does not describe the entire process, the loss mitigation departments at the banks are still struggling with being understaffed and overworked.
3. There is no enforcement for not following the guidelines. There are no repercussions (other than consumer complaints) if things take 20, or 30 days, or if the terms aren’t followed as outlined.
4. Financial incentives are low – $1000 incentive payouts aren’t really that much in the scheme of the amount of work involved to process one of these deals. 2nd lienholders in particular can get $3,000, but that’s only marginally more than they are getting today. Since lenders aren’t able to utilize deficiency judgments under HAFA, they also lose the ability to try and collect some of those outstanding amounts. This is important, because lenders often sell these for reduced values to other debt collection firms. Those are tangible assets for a bank that are essentially wiped out.
5. Paperwork standardization – Banks are all using their own short sale packages today. Mix in some of these government HAFA files into the same loop and it’s going to get them even more confuse than they already are.
6. Removing the case-by-case analysis that short sales need: Every short sale transaction is different, and lender should approach them as such. HAFA requires lenders to identify their minimum net proceeds ahead of time, and the guideline requires 120 day period to change that value. This means that if a property falls outside of the minimum net proceeds, it isn’t eligible under HAFA. That’s a shame; because the house is worth what the house is worth, and even in the span of 120 days the criteria used can change. It removes flexibility from the process, which is critical when handling these transactions.

My impression is most short sales don't close for the same reasons James said. Laziness, apathy, half-heartedness. There are plenty of professional short sale negotiators who have closing rates twice that average that do it faster and at a lower price.

Short sales aren't easy, so anyone looking for the easy road who doesn't want to put in the effort should go to a different niche.

Keep us updated, Alex, glad to hear your deal is moving forward. A great interesting thread has generated here!

I've got some realtor marketing material I can hand out if interested. A powerpoint presentation and some other things.

I called Jim from Homestead Data and he seems like a stand up guy with a stand up company. His data looks good.

I got an email about a week ago from a competitor of his with supposedly even better rates - it was .13 a lead.

Maybe someone wants to try calling him? This is his name.

Minimum quantity = 500, so around $65 bucks

Aaron Salomon
President, UMG
[PHONE NUMBER REMOVED]

This is a fantastic site :)

I've got them on my site which is subscription based, but I don't mind giving some out if asked for them.

This is what I have right now:
* American Federal Credit Union
* American General Financing
* ASC Contract Addendum
* ASC Listing Addendum
* ASC Short Sale Package
* Aurora Loan Servicing
* Aurora Loan Short Sale Package
* Avelo Worksheet
* Avelo Short Sale Requirements
* Bank of America Short Sale Package
* Bank of America Authorization
* Bank United Short Sale Package
* Bank North Group
* Blue View
* Carrington Mortgage
* CCO Mortgage Short Sale Package
* Central Mortgage
* Chase FHA
* Chase Home Finance
* Chase Short Sale Package
* Citi Verbal Short Sale Requirements
* Citi Short Sale Package
* Citi Arms Length transaction
* Citi Workable Solutions
* Coastal Capital Corporation
* EMC Mortgage Corp.
* Equity One
* Everhome Mortgage Company
* Fannie Mae
* Fifth Third Bank
* First Franklin Short Sale Package
* First Horizon Short Sale Package
* Franklin Credit

* Fremont Investments
* GMAC Short Sale Package
* Green Tree Servicing Short Sale Package
* GRP Financial
* HFC Beneficial Short Sale Package
* Homecomings Short Sale Package
* HOMEQ Short Sale Package
* Indymac Short Sale Package
* Interbank Short Sale Package
* Litton Loan Servicing
* M T Bank 1st Mortgage
* M T Bank 2nd Mortgage
* McCue Mortgage Services Short Sale Package
* Midland Mortgage
* MorEquity Short Sale Package
* National City Short Sale Package
* Nationwide Advantage Mortgage
* NovaStar Short Sale Package
* Ocwen Short Sale Package
* Ohio Savings Bank Short Sale Package
* Option One Mortgage
* PHH Mortgage Short Sale Package
* Popular Mortgage Short Sale Package
* Real Time Resolutions Short Sale Package
* Regions Short Sale Package
* Saxon Mortgage
* SPS (Select Portfolio Servicing)
* Sparta Servicing Short Sale Package
* Specialized Loan Servicing (SLS)
* SunTrust Short Sale Package
* Taylor Bean and Whitaker
* UBS Servicing
* US Bank Short Sale Package
* Wachovia Short Sale Package
* WAMU (Washington Mutual) Short Sale Package
* Wilshire Short Sale Package

I've got over 65 different packages available. Just PM me if you are interested and I'll send copies for free, until something gets setup here!

That's what I've been hearing as well (limited impact). HAMP was supposed to help, IIRC correctly, "millions" of homeowners, but has only helped in the hundreds of thousands. That's still an appreciable number, but the way I gather it you can still process short sales outside of the HAFA process, so push it that way during your deals.

I wrote a blog post on my blog and here about it, based on what I've read / understand to be the case.