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The Short Sale Puzzle

10/19/2015

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Short sales, which were very common a few years ago, seemed to have dwindled to a small percentage of the market in Orange County, signs of a strengthening economy and robust real estate market (although a field rep for a major bank indicated to me a few weeks ago that they still have thousands of pre-foreclosure and foreclosure properties on the books).

The interesting thing is that we seemed to have come full circle in processing short sales -- it's become a puzzle, once again!  The first short sales were a process of trial and error as the banks were overwhelmed and did not have a process, or trained personnel, in place.  All documents pertaining to the short sale had to be faxed to them -- and the whole file, including tax returns, offer docs, financial docs, etc. could easily exceed 100+ pages.  Fax numbers changed frequently, and the negotiator with whom one was dealing often changed, and without any notice. And to add to the frivolity, the banks often "lost" one or more of the documents, or several critical pages of the documents, so they would need to be re-faxed, and it took a couple of weeks for their document imaging system to catch up.  And of course each lender had their own process, and their own phone/fax numbers, all of which created the need to be extremely organized when listing and selling short sale properties.  To keep things interesting, there was the constant threat of foreclosure on the property as well.

After a couple of years of chaos, a few of the major lenders began using an online portal called "Equator". At last there was some organization and process to short sales.  Documents could be uploaded directly into the system, and negotiators would email all requests, all of which was documented in the Equator system.  Tasks were assigned to parties, and all was very efficiently tracked.  In most cases, over a period of several months, one would never speak with the negotiator -- the entire process was conducted via email and uploaded documents -- it actually worked well.

So awhile back I listed another short sale property -- something that I hadn't done for a year or so. My first surprise: No more Equator! I missed the deadline by about a week -- apparently the lender had discontinued use of their service.  But at least they had a central place to which to email documents -- while a step down from Equator, it was a step up from having to fax documents (I use an electronic fax service so it's essentially the same process, but seems to be less reliable at the receiving end).  So all was proceeding reasonably smoothly when I ran into another glitch:  Now they no longer accept emails -- all of the documents have to be faxed in again!  Seriously?  We just rolled back about 7 or 8 years (and to a technology from 30+ years ago!).

I'm grateful that at least that they're not going back to quill pens, carrier pigeons, and stone tablets -- although it wouldn't surprise me!

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My Stand Up Desk Alternative

10/18/2015

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Awhile back, I had my good friend Ty Fitzsimmons (www.TysWoodWorking.com) build me a temporary stand-up desk as I have a bad back and wanted to see if standing while working was a better option for me (and as we've all read, "sitting is the new smoking", so didn't want that hanging over my head!).  For whatever reason, it didn't work out for me and I quickly abandoned that solution.

Over time, I began alternating between sitting at my desk where my laptop is located, to standing up next to an old chest of drawers upon which my iPad sat (the chest of drawers was apparently in the house when the folks from whom we bought the house purchased the house in 1936 - so it's old!).  It was a good compromise except that the chest of drawers was a little too low and so my neck/back would become strained. Eventually, I found an oversized shoe box that elevated my iPad to just the right level, but it seemed like a temporary solution at best.  So I contacted Mr. Fitzsimmons again, and he built me a snazzy mini-desk that fits just perfectly! I'm thinking of drilling a hole in the back of the drawer as well such that I can put a small power strip inside and utilize it to charge my phone and my iPad -- and all of the cords will be out of sight.

Now my back feels better and I have a great place to hide not only my phone, but keys, business cards, glasses, and other odds/ends, too.

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    Tony Trabucco is a real estate Broker who lives in Old Towne Orange, CA

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Tony Trabucco
Orange Realty, Inc.
1537 East Chapman Ave
Orange, CA 92866
714.288.9369
Tony@OrangeRealty.com
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CA DRE Lic #: 0982321
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