Trapped in a Short Sale Nightmare

I read Corey Samson's posting this morning about short sales - Hoax or Opportunity, where he said the following:

Experienced agents qualify a property and a seller with the bank before setting a price. They request and receive a "Broker Price Opinion" on the value of what a Realtor thinks it would sell for. The price is not based on retail or on foreclosure value but somewhere in the middle.

The experienced listing agent also has a "negotiator" assigned to the transaction to move swiftly once a contract has been secured.

To find the opportunities, look for words like "approved" "BPO" "professionally negotiated" and my favorite "back on market". There are no guarantees that opportunities will flow smooth, but there are great deals in this category.

I want to echo what he said, based on the nightmare experience I am going through now with an inexperienced agent. We have a ratified contract, subject to approval by the bank. So good so far. Only after the contract was ratified by the seller did I learn that the bank had never given the listing agent any guidance on the price that it deemed acceptable. The property had essentially been in a free fall of pricing in response to the market, until it got to a price that prompted offers by several buyers. We were the winning offer. Only problem of course was that the price that had prompted the offers was never approved by the bank, which thinks, based on a drive by appraisal, that the property is worth $200,000 more.

Now we are waiting for the bank to send a "real" appraiser out to look at the property before it will respond in writing to our offer. In the mean time, the clock is ticking; my buyers need to find a house because they don't have one and they actually need one. The listing agent keeps telling me that I should be happy because the bank is actually responding with glacial speed as opposed to not responding at all. In the meantime, the listing agent is collecting back up offers with all the joy of a child at an Easter egg hunt.

In our conversation today the listing agent reminded me that she works for the seller (DUH!) and doesn't really interact with the bank, since that is the seller's responsibility and bailiwick. That brought me to a better understanding of Corey's second point. The listing agent is absolutely right. She doesn't have a relationship with the bank, but the seller probably is not in a good position to represent herself to the bank either. A negotiator costs money, but saves incredible time and aggravation for all concerned.

I confess that I am so irritated with the listing agent that I will probably avoid her the next time she has a listing, unless she is selling Buckingham Palace for a dollar. She is not helping her seller or herself by not getting a negotiator who can protect the seller and make sure that the transaction moves forward swiftly.

Thanks Corey - I will certainly be looking for those magic words,"approved" "BPO" "professionally negotiated" and make sure that any sellers I work with in a short sale understand how important they are too!