Welcome to this week’s edition of the Pre-foreclosure Daily Grind! In this edition we discuss a couple of changes in the industry and how best to prepare for them. We’ll cover a nice new change within Bank of America that many of you will love to hear, and will make our short sales proceed much more smoothly. We’ll also discuss an initial hurdle with M&T Bank and how to overcome it.
This morning we, and all other real estate professionals out there, were greeted with a nice email discussing a very welcome change to how Bank of America processes short sales in Equator. It was titled “Now You Can Substitute a New Buyer for One Who Walked Without Restart.” As can be extrapolated from that title, we now no longer have to start from scratch whenever we lose a buyer! This surely comes as great news for all of us who have, and frequently do, find ourselves in this exact predicament. With this new change, we will no longer have to wait and go through all the same tasks again, and upload all the same documents again.
The way that this works is pretty simple. Most importantly, do not notify the negotiator you have lost your buyer until you have a new one in place! The reason for this is because the addition of the new buyer to the process works more like a substitution. In other words, when one buyer walks, it will then be necessary to immediately swap the new one in. Therefore, once you have your new buyer’s contract in your hands, the next thing to do is notify your negotiator via email through Equator. They’ll respond in 2 days asking if a backup offer is in place. Then they will ask you to complete 4 tasks which involve providing listing date, a marketing description, and then a marketing plan. They will also ask you to change over the status of the file to “Marketing.” Finally, the last task will be to upload the new offer. And then you’ll be back in business!
In other news, we had a bit of an encounter with M&T Bank this week. Upon calling their customer service department, we were told that this particular department will not speak to a 3rd party unless the homeowner is there present with you, or on the same call via a conference call. So when I asked about where to send written authorization, they said they wouldn’t accept it…period. Way to ensure the short sale DOESN’T get done! I called back a few more times and asked to speak to the short sale department instead. At which time they transferred me to their Homeowner’s Assistance Department, which handles their short sales. Thus, when you have a mortgage with M&T, just seek to bypass their customer service department, and ask to speak to the Homeowner’s Assistance Department instead!
Enjoy this week’s Pre-Foreclosure Daily Grind tip of the week, and have a great and profitable week!
