It appears that Chase Bank has a division that continuously checks the net for any posts or comments about them.  So it shouldn’t take them long to find this one.  It didn’t take them long at all to find the videos that my friends and short sale competitors, Kevin and Fred had at their site, Short Sale Power Hour. 

Then the lawyers for the Chase Bully and Threats Division got involved.  The videos in question had Kevin and Fred talking about their experiences and interactions as short sale agents dealing with Chase.  The Chase Bully and Threats Division didn’t like the videos of Kevin and Fred talking about Chase Bank’s short sale division but there wasn’t anything Kevin and Fred were saying in the videos that Chase could claim was false or untrue or that would justify asking for them to be removed or modified.  That didn’t matter. 

During a very lengthy (6 hours, I am told) conversation, the lawyer from Chase told the lawyer from Keller Williams Realty International that if the videos in question, mentioning Chase, were not removed from Kevin and Fred’s Short Sale Power Hour site,  Chase Bank would pull every REO listing from every single Keller Williams agent!  There are 80,000 Keller Williams agents.  Every REO listing that was a Chase listing from every single KW agent anywhere in the world.

Now that’s a damn nice threat!

I want one!  I want Chase Bank to threaten me.  Here is how they can get in touch with me so I can be threatened too.

In an effort to stop sellers facing foreclosure from gaming their system, Wachovia has completely stopped allowing any postponement of a foreclosure or Trustee’s Sale.  I have long felt that Wachovia was not simply a good lender to deal with for a short sale - truth be told - they were the very best.

I’m being told that this new policy isn’t going to be a "bad" thing.  I don’t see it that way.  To penalize everyone because of  the bad actions of a few is seldom good (even if common).

Here is a copy of a response from Wachovia that was sent to me via the title company:

**IF THERE IS A FORCLOSURE SALE DATE SET - WE WILL NO LONGER POSTPONE THAT DATE FOR ANY REASON - if there is an active foreclosure Sale Date we MUST RECEIVE funds no later than 5 DAYS before that Sale Date, also if there is a SALE DATE set we must receive the full package 10 business DAYS prior to that sale date (and again, we will not postpone that date)**

FOR EXAMPLE:

If you are SUBMITTING A SHORT SALE PACKAGE on a property that has a SALE DATE SET FOR AUGUST 30th, the SHORT SALE APPROVAL WILL BE ISSUED with an expiration date of AUGUST 25th and we will NOT EXTEND the Short Sale approval or SALE DATE.

Sandra Villalpando
Short Sales Manager
Wachovia, REO

I’m hoping that this new policy from Wachovia is reversed.  I do understand that some lenders say they will postpone one and then go right ahead and foreclose anyway.  I’ve just always expected much better from Wachovia.  And rightly so!

I don’t think Jeff Brown’s (BawldGuy) head is much larger than Jay Thompson’s head or my head.  But you wouldn’t know it if you looked here.  The three of us will be on a panel together on Tuesday, August 24th in Scottsdale.  Each of the three of us has a different approach to our business and yet I can’t remember a time I disagreed fundamentally with something significant that Jeff or Jay had to say about how to get and keep customers.

That last part of that last sentence is THE most important skill in business success: HOW TO GET AND KEEP CUSTOMERS.  If you are good at that one you could be bad at most of the other skills and still be a success.  I am not recommending being bad at the other important skills - just pointing how how important that one is.  If you are not good at that one it won’t make much difference how good you are at the other skills - if you are in business for yourself - you will still fail.  How we get and keep customers is what we will be covering - from three different perspectives.

In Gary Keller’s wonderful book, "The Millionaire Real Estate Agent" the idea of Leads, Listings, Leverage was a key concept.  If you are working on or solving a problem in your real estate business you were always solving or working on one of those three issues.  How to get more leads, how to get more listings from those leads or setting up or improving your systems.  Those three things: Leads, Listings & Leverage were THE things.  Just those three.  No matter how it might seem that our industry is changing or the economy is now "different" (it usually is) those three things really are what needs work.  Getting leads, converting leads into listings and being able to handle more and more and still give great service.

The "economy", various market conditions, etc. does not determine your stats or your income.  Your ability to adapt to the current market and lead generate in that market with an offer that seems desirable to consumers in the current market and then lead convert establishes your income.  That is all in the skill category and that is something you can do something about.  Always.

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A lot of blog posts have been written about what the National Association of Realtors is doing wrong or what they "ought to be doing" with regard to this or that.  I have written some of those posts myself.  I think it is important if one is going to find and point out things that are wrong that they also see and point out things that are right.

I believe that all members of the NAR have a debt of gratitude to the NAR.  Not just for the MLS either!  This includes all the various people who do nothing but find fault with whatever the NAR is doing - they do too.  I don’t know if what we have was by design or if there was a really really bright man or woman on some committee back in the day who realized the future impact of what they were doing or it was just a series of lucky breaks.  Either way, they did good.

Anyone who understands marketing (and there are NO exceptions to this rule) understands that you can be thought of by a public (whichever particular public you are marketing to - as there isn’t "a public" or "the public") just one way.  The result or "product" of marketing is owning shelf space in the mind of that person.  And you get to occupy precisely ONE slot.  They will think of you one way.  How they think of you may have nothing to do with how you would like them to think of you or it may be exactly how you want them to think of you - that all depends on the effectiveness of your marketing - which depended totally on who you were marketing to and how carefully you crafted the single way that public should think of you.

If not for the word "REALTOR" - which became our NAME, thanks to the individuals on some NAR committee a long time back, we would most likely be referred to by the home buying pubic as "Used House Salesman".  I like the title, Realtor a lot better.  I’m thinking you do too.  I’ve mentioned this to a few Realtor friends in person and thought it was about time I mentioned it to my friends here.

Thank you, NAR!!  Nice job.

Here is a link from an email I just received.  The people writing at this website http://narscandal.com/ may or may not have something worthwhile to say.  But there is pretty much nothing they will ever say that will get any applause from me.  Why?  Because they go WAY out of their way to hide who they are.  Maybe it isn’t a "they" but only a "he" or a "she" - pretending to be a group of "concerned people".

This isn’t a defense of NAR.  It is saying loud and clear - don’t take potshots or engage in name calling if you want to keep yours hidden.  Otherwise, you are just a covertly hostile weasel who can’t be trusted to tell the truth.

Nowhere on the site does it say who is writing any of it or who supports them.  I have nothing but contempt for the sort of passive-aggressive person who puts up a site like this.  You want to say something and be respected?  Simple: don’t hide who you are or who you work for.

Maybe I should have titled this post, "Attention All Lawyers - Bank of America Has Lots of Free Money For You".  What you are about to read might seem like something out of a Franz Kafka novel or a Salvador Dali painting that was somehow brought to life.  Only it is verified and real.

It is no secret in the real estate community what Bank of America does (and doesn’t do) regarding short sales.  In fact, typing, "short sales bank of america" into Google has this post right on the first page of Google.  Bank of America has routinely forced homeowners into foreclosure when a short sale was possible.  But when you read the next paragraph and get to the bottom of that paragraph - you will go back to the top and read it again because you will think you’ve misread it.  It just can’t say that.

In many instances - where a trustee’s sale has been postponed in order to complete a short sale - once the short sale is successfully completed and title transferred to the new owner - Bank of America then forecloses on the new owner.  Investors who have purchased the home at auction will then go the house, change the locks or in some cases break in to the home, thinking that the former owners simply haven’t moved out yet. 

The following all happened in my office with my staff:

Apparently BofA has no system in place to cancel trustee sales after a short sale is completed. Our office is currently working on getting trustee sales canceled on 3 files that have closed escrow on a short sale with BofA recently. On one file we closed escrow 26^th of January. The trustee sale was scheduled for February 4^th and BofA would not discuss canceling the trustee sale until 2 days before it was scheduled. So on February the 1^st (and 2^nd, and 3^rd) we spent over 5 hours trying to get someone at BofA to cancel the trustee sale. In exasperation on the 3^rd day of this, we finally told them “go ahead and sell the house that you have no legal right to foreclose on and you can undo it after the fact”. At that point the supervisor urged us to calm down that they wanted to work it out and they couldn’t understand why no one was doing anything.

They told us that Recon Trust (their appointed trustee for sales) charges them $3800 per foreclosure and that they didn’t want to pay that to foreclose on a home that was already sold. We had already spoken to Recon Trust trying to provide copies of the HUD1 that showed the sale had been completed a week ago, but they will only take instruction from BofA (plus there is that $3800 per trustee sale – legit or not). So far we have gotten called off 2 of our 3 homes that are closed but still scheduled for a trustee sale. This has taken hours and hours of our time to get BofA to do a job that is theirs to do. Buyers are reporting notices of sales being posted, investors trying to break in and look at their homes, etc. all because the trustee sale is not halted. The only bank currently doing this to our knowledge is BofA.

Maybe someone from Bank of America reading this could alert someone in a position of authority to actually DO something about it?  I know a whole bunch of people who would be very grateful.

One of the more remarkable methods used (even by "Intelligence Agencies") to establish if something is true or not is to is to label it true if it came from a "reliable source".  Who said it?  If he or she is considered reliable or an authority the data is considered true or factual.  The other - perhaps even more silly - system in use is multiple report.  If a report is is heard from several areas or people it is "true".   Five or ten people hear the same thing and pass it along, it becomes a "fact".

I have been hearing about the Shadow Inventory for well over a year now.  It is HUGE.  It is sensational.  A Big Giant Tsunami (BGT) of inventory is going to be unleashed by the lenders.  Get ready.  Like nothing you have ever seen.  The housing market will be flooded with inventory like never before.  No doubt it will change life as we now know it.

Only it is complete crap.  Nothing but invented data dreamed up and endlessly passed along by organizations and individuals who heard it from someone else (I have not yet tracked the original source for this shadow inventory nonsense as it seems to emanate from "everywhere").  What is really interesting are all the "new facts" dreamed up by "industry observers" to make the Big Giant Tsunami theory still possible - in spite of the overwhelming abundance of easily observable data that would directly contradict the idea of the banks having this huge inventory that they are holding back to be released later.

I bet I have your attention now.  Some of you may even be angry - you damn well KNOW there is a shadow inventory!!!  So lets look over why I am publicly saying it isn’t true and what the thought process was for the people and organizations who have been saying (and continue to assert) it is true.  These people would have no reason to intentionally forward false data.  So what data did they look at to conclude there was a Big Giant Tsunami of inventory the banks have and aren’t releasing?  Charts like this - graphically showing the Shadow Inventory are all over the the media and the internet.

So what system is being used by economists and others to calculate this shadow inventory?  Simple, take the cumulative total foreclosures recorded (the big number) and subtract the current active and pending inventory in the MLS, plus the sold MLS properties (the little number) and the remaining number is "the shadow inventory".  Simple, quick and it requires NO LOOKING at anything - just grade school level math.

To be clear, I am NOT referring at all to any foreclosures yet to come.  Inventory the banks may wind up getting in the future.  I am only talking about NOW.  It is no secret that REO agents are losing market share as they, as a group, have less and less inventory being given to them by their asset managers.  These same asset mangers who - last year - kept telling them that they had a lot more coming in to give them.  It just never arrived for them to give.  The only REO agents I know who are doing better these days are those REO agents who deal in higher end homes.  Those high end agents are getting inventory, lots of it.  This is not to say that all across the country there is no REO inventory, there is - just less and less of it.  The BGT crowd has invented the idea that the banks have the inventory but are keeping it until the prices go up!

How about a few facts that I know are true here in the Phoenix area - and I have every reason to believe are true right across the country (as I can think of NO reason for these facts to only be true here).

Fact: In my local MLS, there are about THREE TIMES as many bank owned homes listed in the MLS as the MLS actually shows.  I know this because two guys who actually look counted them all.  One by one.(Mike Orr of The Cromford Report and Tom Ruff of The Information Market)  They counted them and compared the addresses shown in the MLS, one by one, with the County Assessor records.  These are homes listed by banks who instructed the listing agent to NOT use the term "bank owned" in the listing.

Tom Ruff and Mike Orr spent months going over every deed transfer in Maricopa County (Looking at each foreclosure going to the bank and tracking that house for its current ownership and they could directly account for all but about 5,000 houses) and established that for the Greater Phoenix Area THERE IS NO SHADOW INVENTORY. 

Fact: Major banks often off load huge portfolios of inventory to hedge funds.  Huge portfolios.  Anyone or any organization who is claiming that they are "tracking" what the banks are doing who does not have sufficient access to track those portfolio sales is simply engaging in the simple grade school math referenced five paragraphs above.

No doubt there will be some readers who remain convinced that what they have read about and then co-created must be true.  That’s okay.  If you are happy believing that a Big Giant Tsunami is coming - enjoy the wait.  However, I’m betting you remain completely dry.

For his ground breaking book, "Good To Great", Jim Collins and his research team looked into just about every public company in the United States to find those companies that made the transition from good to great.  Good is the enemy of great - which is why most companies and most people never make that leap.  They are good. They are not great.  To get on Jim Collins "great list" a company had to significantly outperform the other companies in that industry for  a minimum of fifteen years.  Making the great list wasn’t going to be a fluke.  Collins first wanted to isolate the companies, then study them to find out what the great companies all had in common - which is the subject of his book.  A very interesting part of his study was also the direct comparison company chosen that had the same opportunities as the great company - but did not make the leap.  Those companies were studied, as well - to find out what they had in common.

The good to great company that made the grade in banking was Wells Fargo.  The direct comparison bank - that had the same opportunities, but did not act upon them and did not move towards greatness - was Bank of America.

Currently, Wells Fargo is the very best bank to deal with for a short sale.  The very best.  The other banks that are factually as good as, if not better than Wells (Wachovia, World Savings) are owned by Wells Fargo!

I’ve written before about Bank of America.  When it comes to short sales, from an agent’s, buyer’s or seller’s perspective, B of A / Countrywide has been, and is still currently, the absolute worst lender in the United States to deal with - and pretty much everyone in the industry knows it.

Now the good news.  A month or so ago one of the most powerful and truly influential people in real estate, Dave Liniger  assembled some top B of A executives and several United States Senators in the same room.  I think it is fantastic that Dave Liniger can contact them, tell them when and where he needs to see them and have them actually arrive.

Mr. Liniger proceeded to tell the B of A executives that their reputation - in the area of short sales was just awful.  He told them that he had about 100,000 agents with RE/Max and that he doubted very many of them would even consider directing loans to Bank of America.  He pointed out to them that if they had any hope of keeping their agent driven business they had better stop making enemies over in their short sale division.  The senators were a little surprised and dismayed at all the specifics Mr. Liniger pointed out had occurred with regard to loan modifications that never happened (after people were put on wait for six to nine months) and that the same thing was happening with short sales.

The Bank of America executives were shocked and said they had no idea such things were happening and (the good news) vowed to correct each and every one of types of behavior that Liniger had pointed out to them.  Dave Liniger is predicting that B of A short sales will soon be as easy to do as Wells Fargo short sales.

To be fair, B of A is already improving.  The loss mitigation companies they’ve hired to handle some of their short sales is not (repeat, is NOT) difficult to work with, at all.

I personally do not believe that B of A will ever consistently achieve the stellar results that Wells does.  The reason?   The executives were shocked at what Dave Liniger had to tell them - they didn’t already know.  A great executive would have not only known it was happening, they would have been able to predict it and prevent it from happening.  Great executives make it their business to know what is happening in their business.  That said, I still believe that B of A will make great strides and improve tremendously.  I want to add, I am grateful for Dave Liniger stepping up and to B of A’s top management for owning up.

Short Sales are only going to get easier!  So, THANK YOU!

I’ve personally written about B of A Short Sales before and so have many others.  I don’t know if this will get any real traction but below is an unedited (and unsolicited) email I received that was sent out to Realtors across the country.

It’s crazy. Agents are Bank of America’s biggest customer. But they treat us like dirt on short sales. It’s like we don’t matter to them at all. However, we do matter and a whole lot more than they realize. Did you know that their mortgage division is one of their largest profit generators? That means when you send them a buyer, you’re actually helping them make more money. Why are we helping them out by sending them our customers? 

Let’s simply stop sending them business. Hey, we all know they’re making money! They have enough in the bank to pay Ken Lewis seventy-one million in retirement bonuses. And now they’re paying out forty-five billion to the feds so they can hire on a new CEO. Maybe they could use that to hire on more staff to negotiate short sales. Nope! Getting a new CEO is more important than taking care of their most important customers.

Here’s the scary data. We all know that short sales save money. One study showed a 20% higher net on a short sale versus an REO. That’s a lot of money! On a $150,000 mortgage, that means a savings of $30,000. This is their Achilles heel But, they aren’t taking the losses personally. No wonder they don’t want to hire on more staff. But, it costs Uncle Sam. Let me explain.

I remember reading somewhere that 45% of BOA’s loans were owned by Uncle Sam, thru Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae. When we show the American Public that BOA is costing Uncle Sam and the taxpayers tons of money, they will be outraged. So, join me in telling them how we feel and help me get the word out on this atrocity. We can get them to hire on more staff and do a better job on the short sales. But, I need your help.

Go to my site, http://www.SSAgentAdvocate.com and sign up to stop sending your buyer’s loans to them. Do your part to help make short sales work so everyone benefits.

Sincerely,

Ben & Chris Curry - We work at KW in Gainesville, Florida

P.S. Don’t think BOA’s CEO, Ken Lewis, cares about agents. And don’t think that REOtrans is going to solve the problem either. No amount of technology is going to change the fundamental problem. They don’t have enough staff. How can negotiators even think straight when they’ve got 400 files on their desk? Would you?

REOtrans is like putting a band-aid on, when you lost your leg. Rather than take care of their most important customers, BOA think they have more important things to do. What do they consider more important than treating agents with respect? It’s paying their departing CEO seventy-one million in retirement pay and forty-five billion to the feds. Why don’t they use that money to improve their short sales?

If you think that’s outrageous, then pledge your help at http://www.SSAgentAdvocate.com .

P.P.S. Forward this e-mail to your friends. Let’s get everyone we know on board. Then, we can actually get them to change their policies. Here’s a story from one broker whose buyer got lied to by them.

"I just had the worst experience as a broker in the twenty years of selling RE. The local BOA prequalified a client of mine and gave her a prequal letter saying she was qualified for a $105,000 mortgage. I was concerned with her going to BOA  and was skeptical about them qualifying her because she had her own business and did not show a lot of income, but she had a good bit of money in their bank and I screwed up and trusted them. I tried to get her to check with another lender with no success.

Long story short,  after BOA made her pay off her car, transfer money out of CDs, having the loan processor go on vacation the day before closing without telling anyone. The final loan approval guy calls one week after the closing date to say that the Buyers ratios are over 30 points off!

I am not a mortgage broker but even I know that the first thing you check is credit and the second thing is Dept to income ratios.

The moron’s they have working for BOA allowed this poor lady to go through the expense and hassle of their loan process with Dept to income ratios that where nowhere close to being where they need to be.

They had the nerve to call her a week later to ask for a $400 fee they say she owes them for the loan process. Worst experience with a lender in 20 YEARS!" Paul. 

Pledge to stop your sending your buyer loans to them here http://www.SSAgentAdvocate.com .

Sent By: Ben & Chris Curry P.O. Box 2287, Lake City FL 32056.

If you found the above viewpoint interesting - look for my next post on the subject of Bank of America and short sales.  I think you are going to love it!