A few years ago many of us, including a lot of Realtors, didn’t know what a Short Sale was.  To be clear, a Short Sale is when the value of the property is lower than the encumberances (loans against the property) and the necessary costs of sale.  In short (no pun intended), the loans against the house are more than the house is worth.

Today, both sellers, buyers, and definitely Realtors are very clear about Short Sales.  It impacts everyone, at every level of the process.  And in truth, the poor, reactive approach the banks are taking to this epidemic problem is really only hurting them, and consumers, here in Orange County and across the country.

To truly understand all the implications here, it’s important to understand the process.  Please note, this varies from bank-to-bank and there are currently no industry standards to the process.

• Seller determines they are in a Short Sale position and must sell.
• Sellers apply for a Hardship Package from the bank.  A consumer can complete the package verifying they have suffered a hardship (loss of job, divorce, illness) and can no longer make the payment.  They also must show they do not have other assests to cover the shortage.
• The package is submitted to the bank.  Here is where the problem lies.  Banks likely will not even consider the Hardship Request until a seller supplies them with an offer.  And this is where I think the banks are really hurting themselves and consumers.  Lets talk about that…..

If you are a seller and have been told that your hardship package won’t be looked at until you bring an offer with it to present it to the bank, what do you do?  It’s often at this point that agents are brought into the matter. 

As an agent, you have a seller in distress, possibly in foreclosure, and in need of a quick sale.  What will the bank take?  No one knows.  Will they approve the hardship?  Maybe, maybe not.  Precarious and odd position to be in as an agent.  Where do you price the home to get a quick sale?

 Let me give a hypothetical, but not unrealistic circumstance.  For this example let’s assume the following:

Home’s Value Based on Recent Sales:  $500,000

Amount Owed:  $575,000

Closing Costs:  $35,000 (may include unpaid taxes and HOA dues)

# of competing homes on the market: 25

Now – an agent knows that getting Agents to show their Short Sale Listing will be difficult.  Why? 

1. Some of these agents have been working with these buyers for months or more.  They know the short sale process sets up their clients for heartbreak and delays a successful transaction.  In addition, Agents commissions are often severely cut.  While the brokerage fee may say 3%, it may actually be only 2% or less. 
2.  The bank may take weeks to respond.
3. There are likely multiple offers due to the low price (we’ll get to this)
4. A hardship may never be approved in the first place.
5. Their impatient buyer will still be looking in the meantime and possibly want to move on to something ‘better’ making this sale an exercise in futility.

So how does an agent attract showings to their Short Sale Listing?  A low price!  It looks like the best deal in town.  In our example a $425,000 list price wouldn’t be unrealistic.  The seller doesn’t care where it’s priced anymore.  The bank has given no guideline.  The agent has to generate offers to submit to the bank for consideration of that Hardship Request.

Time is of the essence in these situations.  Pricing it agressively, they will get many offers of anxious buyers looking for a deal and NOW they have the offers to submit to the bank so that they will consider the seller’s hardship.

In the meantime, traditional sellers and other bankowned homes are forced to compete with the short sale.  In all likelihood, the bank will never approve the sale at that price but at least you get the hardship approved and you can reenter the market at a bank approved price of, in our example, $475,000.  In the meantime, traditional sellers have been competing with $425,000.

The implications:

1. Listings remain in ‘Active’ status while waiting for the bank approval.  They aren’t really ‘Active’ but meanwhile it misrepresents the inventory to be higher than it is.
2. Traditional sellers are competeing with lower and lower prices that may not every even sell at that price.
3. Banks create their own comps for future Short Sales, Foreclosures and Bank Owned inventory.
4. Buyer demand is pent up while they wait for the word from the bank.

Why don’t banks take a proactive approach?  Review hardship requests first.  Reach out to delinquent sellers and disuss Short Sale options.  Establish an approved Short Sale Price before the home ever enters the marketplace! 

This type of strategy would serve their own interest, the sellers they are servicing, the buyers they are hoping to sell to, and the agents working in the industry.  Reactive is not working!  It’s driving prices down, misrepresenting inventory, and impacting consumer expectionations and results.  It’s a no win for anyone.

Isn’t this the million dollar question!  People talk about it, speculate over it, study it, and try to make buying and selling decisions based on all of it.  So when will the Orange County real estate market improve?

I thought we’d be in this condition at least until Spring of ‘09, because historically election years are not strong real estate years.  Even summer of ‘04 was a tough patch in our market.  With the financial crisis, energy crisis, inflation pressure, and overall economic state, combined with the bizarre election year, I have begun to wonder if Spring ‘09 was even too optimistic.

When a client and friend asked me the question recently, I discussed some of this with him and thought ‘this is a great blog topic!’ 

The one thing I am sure of is that until our short sale, foreclosure, and bank owned inventory is absorbed, the market will not begin to recover.   The traditional sellers are forced to compete with these listings and this continues to drag prices down.

I wondered how much of this inventory made up our existing market.  One of my listings is a condo in Rancho Santa Margarita for $285,000 with 2 bedrooms.  There are currently 36 listings with 2 bedrooms under $300,000 in Rancho Santa Margarita but of those only 9 are NOT short sales! 

So how much of the current market is in ‘distress’?  I should have paid more attention in my Excel class because I would love to chart this (add Excel to my list of technology skills to work on).  The following breaks it down a bit for just some of our local cities as of 5/21/08 (please note that distress sales are all things bank owned, short pays, probate, foreclosure, etc. and all information was gathered from stats on SoCalMLS and deemed reliable but not guaranteed):

Rancho Santa Margarita                                      Canyon Areas

Active Listings           383                                           Active Listings           177

Distress Sales           152  or  40%                            Distress Sales           66 or 37%

Laguna Niguel                                                        Laguna Hills

Active Listings           446                                         Active Listings           205

Distress Sales           152 or 34%                              Distress Sales           80 or 39% 

Mission Viejo                                                           Coto de Caza

Active Listings           450                                           Active Listings           166

Distress Sales           185 or 41%                               Distress Sales           33 or 20% 

Aliso Viejo                                                                Ladera Ranch

Active Listings           301                                          Active Listings           310

Distress                      133 or 44%                              Distress Sales           103 or 33%

If you were to look at some of the coastal communities the numbers are significantly lower:

Newport Coast and Newport Beach     6%

Laguna Beach  7%

Dana Point  12 %

Currently, higher price posts are less impacted than properties like my $285,000 condo in RSM but according to the May 20th artcile in the LA Times, luxury homes prices are beginning to feel the impact.

I’ll continue to watch and post these numbers.  As the # of distress sales begin to decline, that is a likely indicator that the market is beginning a true recovery.

I’ve spent weeks researching blogs – how to start one, which ones do I find compelling, etc.  I’m finally, enthusiastically, launching my own. I know these first few (or more) entries fall on deaf ears, yet I really think that there is an opportunity to share something that is unique about the real estate market in Orange County – even with the abundance of information that is out there.

My belief is that the real estate industry is changing, and I don’t just mean the values. In the age of information, I have noticed that my clients have changed over the years. Buyers don’t just crave a key into available listings and Sellers want more than their home in the MLS.

With all the information accessible to my clients, there is still something more that they look for when they come to me. I hope to provide some of those insights on this blog. I also hope to share my journey in real estate to my readers that are as passionate and curious about this wonderful and fascinating industry as I am.