Nelya Calev

Before you chew my head off, please read this blog. As many of you know, I sell a number of bank owned properties. This is not as easy of a business as others on ActiveRain imply because there are a lot of things that go on behind the scenes that selling agents and buyers do not see.

When I first started selling foreclosure homes, I felt a bit of remorse at first. After all, people were losing their homes and I was benefiting from their loss. However, after dealing with a number of these people and what they left behind, I no longer feel any pity.

The media would like you to think that innocent people are getting booted from the homes they worked so hard to maintain. They would like you to think that it wasn't their fault at all. They are victims of the recession and home crisis, losing their jobs and then not being able to make payments on their home, which winds up in foreclosure because it is already underwater.

Of course, in the field the answer is much different. I'm sure if you look hard enough, there are a few sob stories that can be told. However, the vast majority of homeowners who I see losing their homes deserved it.

In one home, the owner decided to stop paying the garbage bill and just threw it in his backyard. Neighbors tried to complain to the authorities, but the town did nothing. After he left the house, I arranged for a cleaning company to come and get rid of the garbage. On two occasions when we were photographing and previewing the property, neighbors stopped by and thanked us for getting rid of this horrible person.

On another occasion, I stopped by a property to check vacancy and noticed that it was not. It took me several attempts to get a hold of the individual and I finally was able to offer him cash for key to leave the house. On my way out, I snickered at seeing a sign on his car that he ran a "get out of debt" business. He called back later and demanded more money to leave the house, to which we agreed. I setup an appointment to sign the papers in my office and he never showed up. I attempted to bring the papers to the house and he just played the music louder in an attempt to not hear me. I gave up and let the bank forcefully evict him. Weeks later, when I pulled his name up on tax ID I noticed that he had purchased a condo at an auction for $120,000 cash.

In another house, curse words were written on the walls. For another house, the previous owner parked his car outside during one of my open houses and harassed each buyer going in - telling them he had a better house down the street (which was also eventually foreclosed).

The fact is, these people did not deserve to have a house in the first place. You can fault the banks for giving them the money to start, but the reality is we wound up with a huge number of people owning homes that could not afford them and did not deserve them. Now the market is correcting itself and in the end I suspect things will be closer to the way they belong.

Recently while my family and I were on vacation, one of my listings went active. As the property was not ready before we left for vacation, the only pictures used in the listing were a few snapshots I took during the premarketing.

The home stayed active for six days with a grand total of one showing and no offers.

When we came back, I had the home professionally photographed and replaced the snapshots with much better pictures. Within 48 hours of publishing the pictures, the hits on the property jumped and I had three offers.

The home is already at a very low price, but that wasn't enough to get buyers into the door. This just goes to show that pricing isn't everything. If you want buyers to look at your home you need professional pictures - not snapshots that too many agents these days take.

Update for those of you that are interested here are the better pictures

Judging from listening to other people when shopping in markets abroad, I am surprised that many of them bargain very poorly. Many of them, particularly cruise ship crowds, do not seem to even know that bargaining is an option.

Haggling is an art form. I am used to it because it is the norm in the country where I am from, but I have had to alter my approach slightly for each country we go to. Whether you are haggling in Malaysia, Turkey, or Jordan, the approach is similar but there are differences.

The chief difference between the different markets around the world is how much shop owners will generally come down. In some countries, 20% is acceptable while in others 90% is common. It is often tricky to determine exactly how much is acceptable where. This is complicated by the fact that not all shop keepers price the same. Some start their prices lower and do not go down very much, while others start very high.

The following are bargaining methods I have seen.

1) Put down the item itself. The idea is to state that the item should be cheaper because it is not as good. I do not agree with this approach as it often insults the shopkeeper.

2) State a lower price and bargain to there. The problem is you have no idea what is acceptable to the shopkeeper. If your price is way too low, the shopkeeper may be offended and won't want to deal with you. If you state a price too high, the shopkeeper will immediately accept and you will have paid too much.

3) Get the shopkeeper to keep lowering the price. This is the approach I prefer, though it does not work uniformly in all places. In this approach, you state that you are very interested in the item, and would like to buy it. However, the price stated is too expensive. In many countries, the shopkeeper will start lowering the price. Play the game for a bit and pay attention to the price and what you think you might pay.

The shopkeeper of course wants to know your price and will keep pressing you for it, but your goal is to not give in. At some point, the shopkeeper will stop lowering the price and at that point I often offer a price slightly below their lowest price. Sometimes they disagree at which point I begin to walk away, at which point I most often get my price. Often this price is lower than I was initially prepared to pay.

In some countries, shopkeepers will not lower their prices like this. In this case, I try to find one who does and I use this purchase as a gauge for what prices should be in general. For instance, in Turkey I discovered that shopkeepers in the Grand Bazaar will take about half of the asking price. I then used that knowledge to bargain with the shopkeepers who did not automatically reduce their prices.

Standard courtesy is to only bargain on items you actually intend to buy and do not insult the shopkeeper.

Haggling for a trinket in a foreign country is a lot different than bargaining in real estate, but I hope these tips have helped.

Sorry for the long delay, as my husband, kids, and I were traveling through Turkey. We visited Istanbul, Antalya, and Cappadocia and it was a great trip. My favorite part was Cappadocia.

There we stayed in a cave house called Kismet Cave House and the experience was amazing. It is a very small hotel - only eight rooms - and is more like a bed and breakfast. The owner runs the place himself and my kids had fun playing with his kids and their new puppy.

Istanbul had a lot of very interesting things, though I thought the Grand Bazaar and shopping in general there was a let down. Prices were too high even after bargaining and most of the rugs there are not made in Turkey but are instead imported from China and sold as Turkish.

My favorite parts of Istanbul were seeing the world's third largest diamond at Topkapı Palace, the Basilica Cistern, and the huge Haghia Sofia and Blue Mosque.

Antalya was the warmest of our destinations and we stayed in a very nice hotel in the old city. We took boat rides and saw many of the ruins a short distance from the city.

It was a fun trip, but I'm glad to be back now!

Every transaction that I was involved in except for two has had multiple offers. I am not a pro, but have been very successful at getting my buyers the home. All of my sold listings have had multiple offers, despite today's market conditions. Therefore, I thought I would share some tips with you on how to win them for your buyers:

Call the listing agent and ask them what sellers are looking for? What you need to do to get that home for your buyers?

Is it about the money? If it is about money well in that case highest and best wins. Try to not put too many contingencies in there, like neighborhood review. To me that just says your buyers are looking for an easy way out and they are not serious.

If they just want to sell to someone who really wants the house then write a nice letter. There are probably emotions attached. Go through the house and pin point things... it could be the tree house that was not complete in the back yard. Put that in your letter, for instance that the buyers are looking forward to finish it for their four year old. Find out what those hot buttons are. Submit it in person to the sellers and have your buyers wait in the driveway. Remember there are emotions involved, so make it emotional!

Very often when I am on the listing side, agents call me and ask questions such as how much are the offers for? I am not going to tell you that. Ask me what you need to do to win this for your buyer and I might throw a few hints your way.

Whatever you do, do not step on listing agent's toes. Being agressive will not help you get this home for your buyers.

One of our top agents taught me a good lesson. Every time I had a problem I would go to her and ask what to do? She would look at me and say... What is it that you want from this transaction? Well, I want a sale! Well, then go make it work. Remember you want a sale... make it work! You are not there to prove someone wrong. You are there to get this home for your clients.

I happen to sell bank owned properties and as you might know there are no emotions attached. So, if you are writing an offer for an REO here is what banks are looking for:

The fewer contingencies you have the better it is. Pre inspect the property or waive the inspection contingency. Cash is ALWAYS what they want, but of course there aren't that many people running around with cash in their pockets and banks realize that. So, get a solid pre-approval - not a pre-qualification. Some banks might require buyers to be preapproved with their lender, but buyers could fund with lender of thier choice. Other thing they are looking for, is a quick closing - preferably two weeks. My last one closed in one week. Don't put on your contract that buyers will have remedy on disclosures, bank has never seen the home they don't know what to disclose therefor there is no remedy. Title and escrow almost always directed by the bank. And last but not least have a copy of earnest money recipt attached with your offer.

Feel free to add any other sugestions you might have.