Author Archives: Tim

How to stop escrow madness in an instant

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The most wonderful, beautiful and innocent thing stopped the frenzy,  processes and insanity of end of month escrow transactions in an instant.  That thing was the glow of a sharply dressed very elderly woman who happened to find her way to our office and came to our front reception counter and said,

“Hi, can you help me, I’m lost and I can’t find my way home.”

In the midst of all the domestic and world issues, real estate problems, war conflicts, economic woes, layoffs, stock market crashes, corruptness of Bank and Investment CEO’s, politicians and everything else that batters our minds;  for me, it all became meaningless and subordinate to this gracious lady and her memory ailment. At that point I didn’t care about anything but her and helping her find her way home, which I did.

Escrow.  You just never know what each day will bring.

Start 2009 by recognizing the unrecognized

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Rhonda has a post over at her Blog regarding the low interest rate environment that prevails today.  Rates under 5% are hard to believe even for very seasoned agents, loan officers and those in the title and escrow profession.

The last three weeks have been remarkable and quite frankly Lynlee and I, and I presume many others in lending and title/escrow business, have had little time to breath under the refinance work that came in during December and the Holiday Season.  I’m not complaining about work but, only speaking for myself, it was an incredibly difficult (and continues) period because 2008 was the Christmas that really never was.   It is the downside of being in the escrow business.  Your time.

Lynlee and I worked numerous nights into the wee hours at the office.  On the 23rd, we worked until nearly midnight to get funding packages ready for overnight delivery to lenders after a full day work and scrambled for loan officers and agents to get borrowers signed from Tacoma to Bellevue to Everett.  Oh, did I mention the snow?  It wreaked havoc on FedEx and UPS overnight deliveries for payoff checks and loan documents to lenders all across the country.  Some documents are seemingly lost forever, others just arriving this week.

I had to chain up for days to get to get out of my driveway and the hill I live on to get to the office, only to take them off once on the freeways, only to put them back on to get to clients homes in the hills of Bellevue and Tacoma and beyond.

The stories are plentiful of owners of other businesses such as mortgage brokers and title offices who had to pick up staff such as underwriters, processors, funders among others to get them into the office to work on transactions so that loan officer and agents transactions closed on time.

One late evening on my way home I dropped off documents and closing Settlement Statements to a local lender, only to peer into the lower level windows and see funding staff working on files while it snowed hard outside.  Glanced at my watch…9pm.  Didn’t we receive funding conditions from these gals via e-mail at what time????  Oh yes, it was 5:30 AM !   Still there at 9pm.

Who is going to say “thank you,” to those two ladies and all the others that work behind the scenes to make your transactions go without a hitch, while sacrificing time lost with family during the Holidays.

I did.  How about you?

To all the Title Officers, escrow officers, processors (big thanks to them), underwriters (unbelievably slammed), funding depts. and other support staff—those who are never in the limelight, don’t have sales awards or other platitudes adoring their offices, but come with their work ethic, lunch pail and get the job done, all the while wondering about the economy, how prior co-workers are coping with layoffs etc.. ……………..you deserve a great big “Thanks.”

– Tim & Lynlee, Legacy Escrow

Historic Snohomish Homes glow in winter wonder.

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Some of the many  Historic Snohomish Homes are oriented on wide tree-lined streets and remind me of growing up in the Capitol Hill neighborhoods very near St. Joe’s school, Stevens Elementary School and Holy Names Academy.   Some of the larger historic homes of Snohomish share similar architecture, classic lines and warmth that is accentuated when under the soft blanket of our local snowy weather.

I brought the camera to work this morning to hopefully capture some scenery (or crazy drivers) while coming to work and on my way home.  These are very amateur photos, but I tried.  Enjoy.

This photo above does not show it well, but there is a large wooden placard hanging under the front porch gable that reads, “Merry Christmas.”  It must be about 8 ft wide.  If you click the photos you might see it better.

Classic.  Gorgeous wrap-around radius deck and historical colors, probably from the Benjamin Moore palette paint line.   A wonderful treat to see a full Christmas Tree in the upper 2nd floor porch/deck.  Tremendous detail on this historic home, much of the 2nd floor shows wonderful wood work, pillars and dentil molding.  (Boy, I wish Snohomish had a lumber store similar to Seattle’s old Blackstock Lumber.   I’d probably be broke buying up all that clear VG Fir moldings)  Much is blocked from the trees, but who’s complaining?  Not me.

These homes are a lot to take care of and maintain, but there is nothing like them.

Snohomish river looking from park in downtown Snohomish towards the east.  Just weeks ago, this river was raging and near flood stage.   In years past, the flooding of this river would rise to levels above the bank, which is several feet high and cover those bolted down picnic benches.

Rising star or…

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Another sample of business ethics out the window

According to this Bloomberg story,  Eve Mazzarella, a high school drop-out and former maid from Seattle moved to Las Vegas and started a real estate career in the year 2000.   Evidently, she and her husband are now allegedly charged with fraud.  The story goes on to say that she was highlighted in the National Association of Realtors “30 under 30” list, which names the best young real estate agents in the country.

The NAR “30 under 30” article reminds me of the story of Puget Sound Business Journal and Washington CEO Magazine’s “40 under 40” story on a local young CEO.

From the Bloomberg article:

“The day before, the U.S. Attorney for Nevada had indicted the couple on 6 counts of bank fraud, later revised to 13. Prosecutors say the pair recruited fake — or “straw” — buyers to apply for loans to purchase 227 properties worth $107 million. They told the straw buyers they would pay the mortgages. Then they skimmed thousands of dollars from each of more than 432 transactions, the indictment says, stashing the cash in 80 bank accounts.”

Will the real estate community, Lending Brokers, Real Estate Brokerages or regulating bodies of each State do a better job of getting rid of the people who had a direct role in bringing down the housing market and impacting those who had nothing to do with it?

Quick snap shot of recent Snohomish Co. Notice of Trustee Sales (foreclosure)

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Spending time at the Snohomish Co.  excise tax and recording office today afforded me the opportunity to pull some records on current Notice of Trustee Sales recorded from Sept. 1, 2008 to today.   There were more than the 36 in my sample before I became restless and bored with basically the same theme that I knew would play out.

All were purchased within the last 4 yrs, most of the sample from 2006, one in 2008.    One was for $3 million in arrears, another for $1.28 million in arrears and even one at $56,000.00   So, foreclosures are affecting all property types and income strata.

Here’s the tally of when the homes were purchased in my quick sample:

2004: 2

2005: 4

2006: 18

2007: 11

2008: 1

Lenders represented (again no surprise):

WaMu, Countrywide (several), Flagstar, First Franklin, AEGIS, Homecomings, GMAC, Indymac, Everhome Mtg, HSBC, EMC, Wells Fargo, First Horizon (now Metlife), Greenpoint and US. Bank.

Side note: Short sales are taking 60-90 days from the sampling we are closing in our office.  It is UNREALISTIC for agents to expect anything sooner.   If it happens sooner then great, but do not expect quick responses.  On Monday, we received approval/clearance on a short sale from a Purchase & Sale agreement signed around from this past JUNE.

It is not terribly efficient to have borrowers lock in interest rates two months prior to receiving short sale approval.  We are seeing this happen.  The downside for the borrowers in this volatile mortgage market speaks for itself.

Spike in LIBOR rates may pressure ARM mortgage holders.

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I know everyone (including me) is rather distracted by the events going on in the financial market mayhem over the past two weeks, but many mortgage holders of ARM’s tied to the LIBOR Index should be re-evaluating their long term mortgage strategy.    Because LIBOR has been very low, many were complacent to make serious consideration of refinancing into a fixed rate.  I read many comments about LIBOR Index being very favorable, and to an extent is has been true, until…….

Bloomberg’s report

The overnight Libor rate in US dollars ratcheted up 3.3 percentage points to 6.44 percent, the largest increase in 7 yrs.

This could change the tone of all the ARM mortgage holders, whose mortgage index is tied to the LIBOR, who were hoping for little payment change when their adjustment period arrives.

About 6 million U.S. mortgages, including almost all subprime home loans and 41 percent of prime ARMs, are linked to the London Interbank Offered Rate, or Libor, according to First American CoreLogic in Santa Ana, California.

Further down the article, Seattle’s Bill Fleckenstein remarks:

“If the Libor market seizes up and stays that way, it’s going to complicate everything,” said Bill Fleckenstein, president of Fleckenstein Capital in Seattle. “What you are seeing is the unwinding of the financial system as we know it.”

In Honor of Sept. 11th.

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God Bless America and all those who serve including those who have sacrificed their lives.

This flag has flown at my house since 9-11.  For me, walking past the flag into my house has been a daily reminder of how lucky I am to live in America and how much sacrifice was laid before me, by prior family members of earlier generations, to enjoy the freedoms I have that we should never take for granted.

King County Median prices fall over 10% YOY. Quite frankly, maybe today's Seattle Times headline will help the market.

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This has been on my mind for a while, so I’ll throw it out there for people to discuss.  Sometimes a non-agent can introduce topics that the real estate community may be uncomfortable in discussing with their clients.  So, here goes…..

The topic:  Is this lousy news for sellers just the spice to get them to realize that the white- hot markets of 2005-2007 are long gone?

Price reductions have been taking place for sometime.  Months and months.   But, many have been token reductions and the conversations I hear and read on blogs is that,  in some instances, resistance has been fairly strong.

What good does it do when a seller who reduces a price by $3K on a $650,000 listing that has been languishing on the market for months?  If today, after weeks of small incremental reductions, the listing is priced at $550,000, there is no agent on earth representing a buyer that will take it seriously.  Especially after seeing the price reductions go on and on for months.   I don’t know who is torturing who:  the homeowner doing this practice or an agent who can’t pull the plug on the listing?  I’ve heard that not taking a listing is not in the DNA of agents (I’m teasing of course.)

I know of some agents who have broken their backs and have spent a lot of money on listings only for the seller to eventually pull the plug on the listing out of frustration.   And then, (drum roll please) have the $500K+ listing end up renting for under $2000.00/mo.  Any sellers out there understand the rent-to-price ratio relationship over the history of residential real estate?  Now, on the other hand, many of today’s agents have little experience in working through a correction and pricing and marketing a home effectively.  If we are honest, there was not a lot to do in a white-hot market to generate the offer: place the listing on the NWMLS and arrange a time with the seller to accept multiple offers.  I hear some were even nice enough to offer coffee and pastries to the agents sitting in cars outside of a property waiting for their turn to submit their offer.  How times have changed.

I have seen a couple of examples of the substandard work ethic and marketing in my neck of the woods in Snohomish Co:  outrageously poor marketing, only to have another professional agent come to the rescue and have a successful sale.  Good for that agent and good for the seller to recognize when a change is needed.

Will agents bring the Seattle Times clipped article to listing presentations?  When is real estate bad news good for moving sellers in the right direction and getting the market moving?  Perhaps today.  Or, maybe we still have a long way to go in understanding how damaging the excesses of next to zero lending standards will turn out to be and the artificial appreciation it fostered.

PS.  Those who are currently in the market to buy should be in conversations with your loan officers regarding the recent drop in interest rates.   Just today, our office is hearing that there are 30 yr fixed rates at 5.5% at par, some even indicating a small rebate at that rate.  Consult with your loan officer.

Some agents and loan officers need to just say, "No."

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There is a lot about the real estate industry that needs improvement.  But, there are some very stand-up hard working salt-of-the-earth real estate agents and loan officers that are working in a challenging market and who are literally bailing out financially challenged homeowners.  They are making things happen and are doing what they can to make transactions close.

I know it is a challenging market, especially in the outer lying areas outside of Seattle/Bellevue proper and cash flow is tough, but I’m growing VERY tired of LO’s giving broker credits and agents giving up commissions earned for “challenged” borrowers who obviously have a history of financial mistakes.

I say this in the similar tone and voice of Al Pacino in his famous scene in Scent of a Woman:

I know people want transactions to close, but sometimes consumers need to face the consequences of their own decisions.   Loan officers and agents sometimes need to say, “you know what?….enough is enough.  I’m not dipping into my livelihood to bail you out.  Dig yourself out of your own hole.

Don’t blame us for your prior agent selling you an overpriced home.  Don’t blame me as a loan officer for your garbage loan sold to you by a prior mortgage broker.”

If the Bubbleheads want to trash me because I’m part of the real estate industry, so be it.   But, this is the stuff that goes on behind the scenes that agents and loan officers GET NO CREDIT FOR AND SHOULD.