Elizabeth Weintraub • Sacramento Short Sale Agent • Land Park

Those short sale flipper investors are really getting active now. As a Sacramento short sale agent, I have been receiving a lot of calls lately from investors and their agents asking if they can lowball some of my short sale listings. It's not that I have anything against a guy trying to make a buck. Buy low, sell high is the name of the game in real estate. But I do object when those offers affect my sellers' chances of closing escrow.

My sellers don't hire me to make money for investors. They hire me to protect their interests, get them the highest price possible and to close the short sale in a timely manner.

A new twist that seems to be developing among short sale flippers is to submit an offer at list price with the buyer paying all of the closing costs. It is customary for the seller / short sale bank to pay those fees.  One might, at first glance, wonder what's wrong with that; full-price offer and the short sale bank pays no closing costs except commission. I'll tell you. When the buyer pays title and escrow fees, the buyer chooses the title and escrow company. Generally, the escrow officer is a person the buyer knows, and this person may or may not share certain information about the transaction with the listing agent. It means the buyer controls the transaction.

Why would a buyer need to control a transaction? Because there might be something going on that the buyer doesn't want the listing agent to know. It could be anything. It could be the buyer is planning to do a double escrow, that is, turn around and resell the property to an end buyer, and close both escrows concurrently without disclosing this plan to the seller. Many short sale banks prohibit resale within a certain number of days, and they try to hold the parties accountable. If a buyer agrees not to sell the property within a particular time period and instead immediately sells it, that action might be considered mortgage fraud.

It could also mean the buyer has signed an all-cash offer but is actually borrowing the funds from a private source, which may or may not be qualified to make such a loan. If the loan doesn't fund, the escrow doesn't close. Or, the buyer may be counting on transferring funds from escrow #2 to close escrow #1. So, if escrow #2 falls out, so does escrow #1. The seller has a right to know if the purchase is contingent upon resale, but often those intentions are not disclosed.

The title companies I work with in Sacramento typically will not open a short sale escrow on behalf of strangers. The liability is too great. The potential for fraud is too high. They work with me because they trust that I am ethical and are assured that I won't any allow hanky-panky to go on in my transactions if I can help it. I advise my sellers to just say no to those short sale flippers.

Photo: Big Stock Photo

I always ask my first-time home buyers if they would consider buying a halfplex, townhome or condo. Many buyers prefer single family homes, but sometimes a planned unit development can fit the bill and be less expensive to purchase. Especially if that halfplex, townhome or condo comes with a yard.

Much depends on how the layout is set up. Generally, the units are attached by a common wall. If that wall is part of the garage, you may never hear or see your neighbors. Some attached housing complexes belong to a homeowner's association and some do not. For example, I have a listing at 420 8th Street in downtown Sacramento that is a halfplex, and there is no homeowner's association fee to pay. It's listed at $329,000. What can you buy in the downtown area of Sacramento for $329,000 that is a three-bedroom, two-bath home?

My new listing in the Pocket is a halfplex, and this home does belong to an HOA. However, it's affordably priced at $150,000 as a short sale. The homeowner's association fee is about $250 a month, but after the new road is paved, the buzz about the community is that fee may go down.

This is a three-bedroom, two-bath home tucked away on a cul-de-sac in the Sagewood subdivision. It has a concrete tile roof, built in 1985, a big front yard and a very pretty patio in back with 3 decks. It's just like living in a single-family home for half the price. The living room, kitchen and master suite feature soaring ceilings. There is a fireplace in the living room. An added benefit is the beautiful parquet wood and tile flooring throughout, which is great if you have pets.

The homeowner's association has a pool; it pays for roof and exterior maintenance, too. Come check it out. This will go into MLS today.

1048 Johnfer Way, Sacramento, CA 95831 is offered exclusively by Lyon Real Estate as a short sale at $150,000.

Photos: Elizabeth Weintraub

Buyers who need to close escrow by June 30th to qualify for the first-time home buyer tax credit are reluctant to buy a short sale. That's because so many of those short sales take 90 days or more to get approval. If a buyer closes escrow on July 1, the buyer loses out on the $8,000 home buyer tax credit. However, this Lincoln Crossing home is a Wachovia short sale, which means it can close way before the tax credit expires. In fact, if a buyer bought this new Lincoln Crossing short sale today, which is March 1, I'd venture to guess it would close about mid-April.

Sure, you may hear horror stories about short sales, and many of them are true. The worst short sale in this Sacramento market, hands-down, no-holds-barred, is a double Countrywide. A double Countrywide short sale is two loans that originated at Countrywide, now held by Bank of America.

That's one of the reasons why I take all my Sacramento short sale listings for 12 months. It's my standard of practice. I'd say 90% of them close before that, but at least I don't have to track when the listings expire as I have enough other pressing issues to contend with on these short sales. Clients also prefer one-year listings because they know I will not abandon them 6 months down the road if those short sales take longer to get approved.

With a Wachovia short sale, the listing period is not a concern. Wachovia has its act together and has streamlined the short sale process. If a buyer is lucky enough to find a Wachovia short sale in Sacramento or Placer County, it's a double blessing. Not only will that short sale move as smoothly as silk, but the sales price is likely to be very attractive.

Check out this Wachovia short sale in Lincoln Crossing. This is a 4-bedroom two-story, with 2 full baths and 1 half bath. The living room / dining room has Berber carpet, a chandelier and no furniture. That room has never been used.

You'll find an island in the kitchen, with a hanging pot rack over it. The pots do not stay, but the rack does. The seller says when the home was purchased in 2006 from Centex, all the upgrades were purchased as well, except the flooring in the kitchen does not extend all the way into the family room. That's because the builder had already installed Berber carpeting in the family room. But the kitchen definitely sports all the bells and whistles -- granite counters, stainless appliances, cherry wood cabinets, wood-like flooring and a pantry closet with a frosted door. There is also a breakfast area.

The family room has soaring ceilings that reach all the way to the second floor. There is a fireplace with gas logs. It's a great room concept, meaning it's open to the kitchen. This type of layout lets family members interact during meal preparation. A mom can watch her kids in the back yard while she's making lunch. A guy can cook dinner in the kitchen and still speak with his roommate who may be watching TV in the family room.

The home has 2,248 square feet, according to the county assessor. All four bedrooms are upstairs. The master suite overlooks the massive back yard and affords views of the terrain beyond the home. It sort of makes you feel like you're out in the country. Yet, the train is close, as is the Highway 25 Bypass that's being built. There is something soothing and comforting about hearing a train at night, approaching from the distance.

As an added bonus, buyers for this Lincoln Crossing home qualify for membership in the HOA. The homeowners association has a pool, spa, gym, clubhouse and offers recreational activities. It also tries to ensure conformity within the community, meaning you won't find cars stranded on the street or forgotten trash cans at the curb, like other parts of Lincoln. The HOA dues are reasonable at $115 per month.

1046 Ashford Lane, Lincoln, CA 95648, is offered exclusively by Lyon Real Estate as a Wachovia short sale at $199,000.

For more information, please contact your Sacramento short sale agent, Elizabeth Weintraub at 916 233 6759.

Photos: Elizabeth Weintraub

Much of my work as a Sacramento short sale agent is handled through email. So, I almost had a heart attack when I turned on my computer this morning. My start-up programs loaded and I didn't have any emails. For a brief second, my heart about exploded. My immediate thought was my computer had malfunctioned, maybe my hard drive had been erased. Of course, nothing of the sort happened. I simply had too many emails coming in for the computer to immediately bring them up. I wasn't patient enough.

Many of those emails are one-liners that say: Thank you. Or will do. While it's nice to receive acknowledgments, they aren't always necessary, and those emails certainly don't require a response; yet, I am guilty of doing the same thing. It depends on, though, whom the email is from. If it's from clients, I do want them to know that I have received their documents. But I don't try to clog up my associates' or vendors' email in-boxes. I imagine they get as much email as I do.

I talk all day with my short sale negotiator via email. If it's a particularly difficult short sale, and which ones aren't, these days, I'll call her, or she'll stop what she's doing and pick up the phone to call me. This woman is a law school graduate and a real estate agent. A darn fine real estate agent, too. She started negotiating short sales a few years ago and has become an expert negotiator. Due to the volume of Sacramento short sales that I handle, I share some of my short sales with this agent and pay her half of my commission, too. She's worth every penny.

There are other short sale negotiators whom I could hire in Sacramento -- many who charge way less -- but many of those so-called third party negotiators do not have a real estate license. Therefore, they are breaking the law when they negotiate short sales. I would never in a million years want to place my short sale sellers in that position. I don't even go there. Besides, I want to provide my clients with superior service. I've heard too many horror stories from other Sacramento short sale agents who have hired these vendors.

For certain types of short sales, I tackle a handful myself. Especially some Bank of America short sales, because I've been working with Bank of America for years and understand its goofy systems. Since they've switched to Equator, the short sale process has been easier and faster. I also love, love, love a Wachovia short sale because they are so straight forward and simple, which few short sales are lately. Wachovia also gives my sellers cash bonuses.

Moreover, I also work with Litchney Law Firm on short sales. Particularly those that involve hard-money loans and cash-out refinances. The lawyers who work for Litchney Law Firm are methodical strategists and expert negotiators. Those lawyers are known for removing further collection rights verbiage from short sale approval letters and, in many ways, are miracle workers. They do things I can't. Sellers pay for Litchney Law Firm's services separately, and there are no referral fees passing between us, even when Litchney Law Firm refers clients to me. It's a clean association.

A lawyer doesn't need a real estate license to negotiate a short sale. And dare I say, a lawyer never clogs up my inbox with an email that says, "thank you." They're much wordier with their thanks than that.

So, if your short sale isn't moving forward, I suggest you take a look at who is negotiating your sale. Is it a third-party vendor that runs a short sale mill by volume, without personal attention to each file? Is it an agent without any experience? An agent who is too swamped with business to do the job right? Has your short sale dropped into a black hole never again to see the light of day? Because my Sacramento short sales tend to close, regardless of whether I personally do them, my associate does or Litchney. I've got a great team. I mean, am I lucky or what?

Photo: Big Stock Photo

Hardly a day goes by that I don't receive an email from some frustrated short sale buyer asking me for advice on some transaction that I'm not involved in. Most of the scenarios are as follows: The buyer has been in escrow for months, waiting for approval, and nothing seems to be happening. They feel helpless, stymied, stonewalled and disheartened.

I know how short sale buyers feel, which is one of the reasons that as an experienced Sacramento short sale agent, I stay on top of my transactions. Not only do I post daily progress reports on my website that my sellers, our buyers' agents and their buyers can read, but I try to send important advancements to the buyers' agents as they happen. Of course, I can't force the buyers' agents to pass on this information to their buyers, but I hope that they do.

See, short sale buyers are an important aspect to any short sale transaction. They are paramount. Without a dedicated buyer, there is no deal. They are a precious commodity who deserve to be treated with respect and handled delicately. Expectations need to be managed. It's very difficult for buyers to wait two, three, four months or longer for short sale approval.

But a buyer has no control over a short sale. None. Buyers can't speak with the seller's short sale bank nor can their agent. Only the listing agent controls the short sale transaction and pulls the strings. If that listing agent has no short sale experience or doesn't routinely follow up with the short sale bank, a buyer can be in for a long wait. In fact, it may never close, especially if complications arise.

Buyers don't see any of these things. What a buyer sees is a home the buyer wants to purchase. Hopefully, that buyer is in contract with the seller, and the listing agent has experience selling short sales. If not, that buyer is at the mercy of an inexperienced short sale agent, hoping for a miracle. That's a sad and sorry place to be. My heart goes out to them.

Photo: Big Stock Photo

Two things in this universe that mean the most to me (outside of family and pets) are my MLS access and my Display Key. For what seems like an eternity now, I've been using a token, some screwy little device that continually changes a series of 6 digits, which I have to enter into a security box as my final step to access MLS. When MetroList first came out with this token, I discovered that it was possible to sign on to MLS without it by entering an emergency security word.

Every time I signed on without the token, I'd get a warning at the bottom of the screen that this was a limited-time option. Yeah, right. I bet they say that to every agent. Except for the time when I really needed to get access and was denied. MetroList denied my access because I had used up all of my free entries. Ever since then, I carry my token everywhere.

I was delighted, of course, when MetroList announced it was doing away with the token dealie-bop and going to a password-protected security system. The only problem was they were doing it in alphabetical order by your last name. This was one of those times that I wish I had my maiden name back. I'm at the bottom of the alphabet.

I liked being in the B's when I was in school. There are advantages to having a last name that starts with the letter B. You might think it's better to be in the A's, but it's not. See, if you're in the B's, you can watch the A's make mistakes, learn from those mistakes and be prepared when your name is called. The A's are pioneers. Pioneers get arrows in their backs.

Being at the very bottom of the MetroList conversion system meant that this morning was the day I would get to enroll in the new system and become a free dog from that stupid little token. I could hardly wait to get out of bed. Today was a day to celebrate. Of course, I overslept. So, I was probably one of the last agents in Sacramento to choose an image, give it a name, select 3 password questions and answer them. I got a kick out of the onscreen notice that said MetroList does not remember your passwords and can't give them to you. That tells me MetroList expects a lot of phone calls.

As for the display key, I canceled out my cellphone MLS account because the procedure to access the lockbox was ridiculous. I was required to use a FOB along with my cellphone to open a lockbox. It didn't make sense to have to use 2 devices, not to mention, the BlackBerry BOLD didn't seem to work with the eKey system unless I removed the battery and put it back in. Now, I have a new display key that looks like something George Jetson would use to monitor a baby crib.

I have discovered that it malfunctions as well. I used my display key over the weekend while listing a Sacramento short sale. It opened the box for the key, but it refused to unlock the shackle. There is a trick to it. When it doesn't work, you can simply insert a straightened paperclip into the itty bitty hole, and the device will reset. That's the problem with relying on technology. Technology doesn't always work. The message for today is if you're touring homes with a Sacramento agent, be sure to carry a paperclip with you, because the agent probably doesn't have one.

Photo: Big Stock Photo

In an unexpected turn of events yesterday, I suddenly noticed that I have 9 Sacramento short sales in escrow. I usually don't count or track my sales, I just put them into escrow. All of these short sales are pending. A pending short sale is different from an active contingent short sale. When a short sale moves into pending status, it means the bank has approved the short sale.

Every day is like Christmas for me lately; because receiving a short sale approval letter is exciting. I don't care how many short sales I close over the years as a Sacramento short sale agent, I still get that thrilling sensation when I open my email to find an approval letter. It's like a validation of my work. It's also a document that means the buyer can move into that dream home, and the seller can walk away and get on with his or her life.

Waiting for short sale approval is like my wait as a kid for Christmas. See, my parents didn't put up a Christmas tree weeks in advance like other kids' parents. I suppose it was to save money because trees go on sale on Christmas Eve. My tree always arrived on Christmas Eve, making every Christmas a surprise for me. I knew that once it started snowing, Christmas wouldn't be that far off. But I was too young to know on which day it would fall. All I knew was that some morning I would get up, stumble into the living room, rubbing my sleepy eyes, and discover that Santa Claus had come down the chimney the night before. And he brought the tree.

It was magical. The night before Christmas our living room looked like any other living room of 1950's era. Green carpeting, green drapes, green walls, a green sofa, and a black-and-white TV. But on Christmas morning, the room was transformed. The scent of evergreen filled the room. Our tree reached the ceiling, topped by a shimmering star, decorated with an assortment of family heirloom ornaments, tinsel dangling from each branch. Under the tree, I'd watch our cat slurp water from the tree stand, and my eyes widened at the number of presents wrapped in glittering paper, curly-Q ribbon (which the cat had already chewed and hurled somewhere in the kitchen) with a tag that read: From Santa. Santa didn't have a last name.

I get that same exhilarating feeling when my Sacramento short sales are approved. I rarely know when the letter will arrive. But like as a kid, knowing that when it starts to snow, Christmas is just around the corner, sometimes I get an inkling that approval is coming, like when the lender requests an updated HUD or sends out arm's-length affidavits for signatures. Yet, often that short sale approval letter arrives completely unannounced and out-of-the-blue. So, while I can't predict exactly when the banks will approve my short sales, I do know that approval is likely to come to those who wait.

Photo: Big Stock Photo

Agents often ask me: how is it that I can write a daily blog? They want to know if I sit at my computer staring at a blinking cursor and wondering what to write. I suppose they wonder if I ever get writer's block. The answer to that question is in the negative, Spock. The thing that I struggle with on occasion is not that I have nothing to write about, it's which topic or situation I want to tackle. There are so many to choose from. Stuff happens every day. A lot of stuff.

The truth is I just write. Sometimes, when I pick a subject, the blog doesn't end up being about that topic at all. I go somewhere else with it. And you know what, that's OK. It's all right to make a U-turn in the middle of the road because I'm a real estate agent.

The way that I handle such a huge volume of real estate business, especially as a Sacramento short sale agent, is to be organized. I'm organized almost to a fault. For example, I rarely retire for the evening without filing away every single document that I've thrown on my desktop during the day. Each downloaded document has a destination. I don't want to get up in the morning to be greeted by a computer desktop littered with files. It would make my head spin.

I like a fresh start to each day. I wake up wondering what fresh new hell lies in wait. What will I tackle next? I know that I am subject to the attention span of a cocker spaniel, so I generally deal with situations immediately; that way nothing is overlooked or misplaced.

For example, when I receive documents that require signatures from both the buyer and seller, I file those documents in a "holding doc" folder, which I check daily. It tells me immediately if I've received executed contracts. If not, I follow up. I maintain a listing tracker spreadsheet in Excel to monitor progress on my listings. Every buyer has a separate folder with the buyer's name on it, not the property address, because all of my buyers are special individuals. I would never want them to be identified by the address of the home they are buying. They are people first, transactions second.

On the other hand, my short-sale seller folders are labeled with both the sellers' names and address for fast tracking. I never know when a negotiator will call and I'll need to immediately access the file. In fact, I was a little surprised yesterday when a Bank of America negotiator indicated that one particular short sale is about to be approved after working on this file for more than a year. Granted, it wasn't entirely Bank of America's fault. The first buyer had walked away sometime last fall upon short sale approval. But a new buyer immediately replaced the previous buyer, and the file was resubmitted in November. The new buyer says she'll wait indefinitely for this home because it's the exact model she wants.

Well, unless a replica comes on the market. Yeah, right. The person I feel for is the poor seller who has been waiting more than a year to put this horrible nightmare behind. For every 10 Sacramento short sales that close within a 90-day window, I'll generally get a Bank of America short sale that seems to drag on and on. But I never give up because eventually they do close. I have a digital record of just about every single action that has occurred on this transaction, which is how I know that when approval arrives, it will have happened before 90 days. Bank of America is improving its timeline for short sales.

In fact, I'll take all of the Sacramento Bank of America short sales that other agents don't want. Once you know its systems, Equator and Titanium, a Bank of America short sale isn't that much more difficult than any other short sale. They just require organization, a bit of patience, tenacity, persistence and the ability to laugh at yourself once in a while.

Photo: Big Stock Photo

Funerals make you hungry. Either that, or they make you cry. Last Saturday, I attended a funeral with my husband in downtown Sacramento. After the service, we went to Jim-Denny's Hamburgers Chili for lunch. This is a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant that has been a 76-year tradition in Sacramento. We've been meaning to go there for years and, in fact, did stop by a few years ago but it was too crowded, so we left.

Now, if you go to a Catholic funeral, they generally feed you. But the funeral we went to was Lutheran. I actually have very little experience with funerals. I realized that fact when I reached my mid-30s. I don't know how a person can be on this planet for 30-some years without going to a funeral, but I had managed it.

As a result, I reached out to my girlfriend who had more experience than me. I asked her to guide me through funeral etiquette. Clearly, somebody I knew would die soon, and I didn't want to be caught off-guard. I thought it would be easier to attend a funeral for a person I did not know, so I picked a death notice out of the newspaper, circled the date of the funeral on my calendar and considered that my practice funeral.

Here are some of the things that I learned:

• A death notice is generally an invitation in disguise to go to a funeral
  
• You don't have to wear black.
• Stuff some tissues in your pocket.
• If you don't know the family, don't sit with them.
• It's OK to cry.
• It's OK to sing, but not all by yourself.

I was pretty sure it's not a good idea to leave your cellphone on, so when we walked into St. John's Lutheran Church on Saturday, I turned my phone to "silent." The cantor had a beautiful voice, and I was mesmerized. But not so much that I didn't feel my cellphone vibrate. No, no, no, don't touch it. Bzzt. Bzzt. But I couldn't help myself. I looked around. We were sitting in an end pew. People would probably think I was praying with my head bowed. I did the unthinkable. I slowly slipped my cellphone out of my pocket and glanced at my email. Now, I'm probably going to hell for that.

But soon the guilt was overturned by the sense of hunger. Which is what led us to Jim-Denny's Hamburgers Chili. Going there just seemed appropriate for some reason. This little restaurant is located on 12th Street between H and I Street. Here is a photo of the interior. It's the size of a cable car and dates back to 1934. The signs on the wall advertise fancy ham, fancy hamburgers, back when anything better than ordinary was called fancy.

A handwritten sign next to the old wall phone warned customers that if they sit next to the phone and it rings, they must answer it and take an order. I was glad my husband had that seat. We arrived at 11:45, 15 minutes before lunch. Everybody at the counter, which is the only place to eat, were busy stuffing gigantic omelets into their mouths. The servings were humongous, along the lines of what you get at the Market Club in Land Park.

I ordered the 5-cent hamburger with raw onions, lettuce, tomatoes and no pickles. You can see it in the photo above. Well, you won't see the onions because the waiter forgot to give them to me. He also put mustard on the bottom bun but the top bun was dry. My husband got the Superburger with bacon and requested no cheese. They gave him a burger with cheese.

The french fries were pretty good, though. Sliced very thin and crispy without being too crunchy. The fries reminded me of those served at the drugstore where I used to go after school in the 1960s. In fact, the hamburger brought back those memories, too. Pretty tasty food for a 12-year-old. But now that I'm an old goat, my taste buds have matured. I prefer thicker hamburgers, like the Waterboy Deluxe Burger, made from ground chuck. Perhaps I should have ordered the megaburger?

By the time we slid out of our seats, $20 poorer and a bit fatter than when we walked in the door, there were so many people standing behind us that I couldn't reach my bag on the floor. I grabbed the handle and tugged it between the stools, almost knocking some guy in the face. That's when I realized my cellphone was still turned to "silent." Ah, the sweet bliss of no phone calls about my Sacramento short sales for two solid hours. It was back to business. If we go back to Jim-Denny's, though, I will definitely order the megaburger.

I should also mention that the funeral was for a real estate agent who worked at my midtown office of Lyon Real Estate. I suspect he forgave me for looking at my cellphone. He was the type who would understand. He was a good egg and will be missed. You know, we just don't have enough good eggs in this world.

Photos: Elizabeth Weintraub

There are days that I feel like Rodney Dangerfield. Well, not DEAD in the sense that Dangerfield is not around anymore. More along the lines of working my little tail off, only to discover that Sacramento short sale agents don't get no respect. We close transactions just like everybody else. But because we sell short sales, some people treat us like we're lepers.

You know what? I don't care. I'm not looking for respect. I respect myself plenty, thank you very much. My cats love me, and my husband is a saint. But don't come to me with an offer that's not an offer.

One of my short sale sellers signed an offer yesterday. It was beautifully written. Not an error on it, which is pretty rare. The buyer offered to pay a little over list price, the earnest money deposit was fat, and the buyer agreed to wait until April 30th for short sale approval -- all excellent signs of a committed buyer. However, before I delivered the contract, the buyer's agent called to ask if the deposit would be returned if the buyer canceled prior to short sale approval. Huge red flag.

When I explained to the buyer's agent that the buyer needs to be dedicated to the short sale process, the agent said the buyer had expressed reservations. Well, why did the buyer agree to wait until April 30th if the buyer has no intention of waiting? Perhaps that buyer doesn't want to buy this home? Perhaps that buyer should not try to buy a short sale? Maybe we should cancel the contract?

In one of my pending short sale transactions, the buyer's agent sent me an addendum asking the seller to repair a broken appliance. The seller lives 100 miles away. The home is sold "as is," meaning the buyer is purchasing this property in its present condition, warts and all. If there is a seller contribution in this escrow, the bank will want that money. Does the buyer want to cancel over the appliance?

I was speaking with another short sale agent yesterday who said she has learned a lot from her association with me. She is now not afraid to ask a buyer if the buyer wants to cancel, although in the past it was a frightening thing to ask. However, she has learned that it's actually an excellent question. Does this agent get respect? She doesn't know and doesn't care, either. We're both in this business to get the job done.