Sounds like a win-win for most all involved and good luck with your new home. Most importantly, thank you so very much for coming here to post your story…it clearly helps me and many others, when people do that. I am most grateful.

Here’s an update on our short-sale case. After 5 months of broken promises from the seller, the seller’s bank, & negotiator, we have decided to bail out. We decided that we couldn’t go through the stress of another possible foreclosure date in October (since we are living in the house). We have found a beautiful non-short sale house at a great price (estate sale) and are now in escrow. Fortunatly for us, the seller of the short sale has agreed to continue to rent the house to us until foreclosure date, with the agreement that we show the house for other buyers. The house had a showing right away, and I believe it is pending for some other poor soul to wait, and wait, and wait, and be lied to constantly.

I appreciate the advice that you gave us, I think it helped us make the decision to move on (especially the part of hiring an attorney, and fork out for an appraisal before bank accptance). We are so happy that we will be able to actually settle.

Thanks so much for keeping this blog alive. The posts from you and other buyers have been very helpful and interesting. Short-sale buying sure has been a journey, not one that we would be willing to go on again for our primary residence.

-Anne

It is not uncommon for a bank to instruct regarding the list price. What they will accept is an unknown, even to them, until they have an offer. If no one gives them what they want, they have to change what they want, the same as any seller. Your primary obstacle is not so much what the lien holder wants as it is another buyer willing to pay more.

I have several times seen the lien holder come back and instruct the agent to raise the price, if thier initial instruction brings in multiple offers that max out at that list price.

Yes, please do keep us posted of your progress. I very much appreciate people coming by anonymously and giving details. I can’t post the details of my own transactions due to confidentiality to my clients. So commenting on everyone else’s situations in the manner in which I advise my clients is very educational for all of our readers. So thank you for that.

Thanks for the reply. I just have a few more questions.

Does the fact that it is “approved for short sale” mean that the seller’s agent may already be aware of a price that the bank would accept?

The house’s listing price was suddenly dropped by 50%, which is when we bacame aware of it. Is the new listing price what the bank requires for the offer to be acceptable?

The listing agent said that she was told to list the house at the new price by the third party. Have you ever heard of this? Is the new price real or a ploy to get multiple offers?

I’ll keep you posted on the progress, if you would like.

A builder owned short sale should go much faster and be almost like a regular sale.

An agent can never refuse to accept a written offer on any property and must present all written offers to the seller, by law, of any house that is for sale. Whether or not the seller can accept another offer is the question. They don’t often do that but yes they can. Since your offer is subject to lienholder approval, all the lienholder has to do is reject yours and accept a different one.

Always good to be ready to proceed quickly to close once you have a strong indication that yours is acceptable. It’s not over until the property is in your name. If the lienholder gets a higher offer, they really can’t refuse more money, since they are taking a loss. They have to reduce that loss to the lowest possible point. Can the seller hide a higher offer from them? I really don’t think so.

But usually if you proceed as quickly as you can and in good faith, things will work out just fine.

Also, can the seller’s agent accept multiple offers if they have deposited our earnest money? I learned a lot from my previous experience and the comments posted here, but could still use your advice and expertise.

The biggest problem with short sales is it is also a learning experience for the professionals as well. By the time 10% of agents “get it”, we go another 15 to 20 years without short sales in the mix, and then we start all over again. (Hence my older than dirt opening of this post)

The system that had you confused just doesn’t lend itself well to short sale situations. Changing it so that it might be a better fit takes so long, that the market heads up by then and those improvements to the system never take place in full.

Thank you so much for keep us posted and I’m so glad you are back on “the straight and narrow” road.