The short sale agent handles negotiations with the bank. If the agent has no experience dealing with loss mitigation and negotiators, the seller is the person who may suffer. More than half of my real estate closings in Sacramento for the past few years have been short sales. I know first hand what it takes to get them closed and, quite frankly, short sales are a ton of work. Novices should not handle short sales.
Searching for a Short Sale Listing Agent
Due to rising numbers of foreclosures and short sales in certain parts of the country since 2006, many real estate agents have decided to market themselves as short sale specialists. Some of those agents have little or no short sale experience.
Here are a 5 ways to find a short sale listing agent:
- Referrals From Family / Friends
In some areas, foreclosures are ubiquitous and more the norm than a regular sale. Sellers may already know someone who successfully closed a short sale, and that seller is an excellent source for providing a referral.
- Ask an Agent for a Referral
Agents who don't list short sale transactions generally know which agents are short sale specialists. Agents judge each other by harsher standards, I have discovered, than buyers judge agents, so you're likely to be directed to a top-notch short sale listing agent. Plus, agents regularly pay each other referral fees, which means the referring agent has an added incentive to make sure you end up in the right hands -- because if it doesn't close, they don't get a referral fee.
- Attend Short Sale Open Houses
Find out if the agent hosting the open house is the listing agent. Sometimes, agents let associates in their offices hold open listings. Talk to the listing agent and try to get a sense of how many short sales this agent has handled and whether the agent is knowledgeable.
- Use the Internet to Find a Short Sale Agent
Many short sale listing agents write blogs about their experiences, because dealing with negotiators can make one want to jump off the nearest cliff, and writing a blog provides temporary relief. It's almost like reading a diary because you're given an inside peek at what goes on behind the scenes. Be careful not to get suckered into a site where the agent relies solely on repeating the words "short sale" over and over to drive Internet traffic and doesn't really list short sales.
Go to several agent's websites and look through the agent's listings. Are any of them short sales? Are those the agent's own listings or somebody else's in the office?
- Run Short Sale MLS Searches
If you have a friend in the real estate business with access to MLS, run a search by limiting the returns to short sales. Look in a wide area and not a specific neighborhood because short sale specialists sell all over town. Then, pull up each agent's closed sales for the past couple years. Pay special attention to the DOM and select a short sale listing agent with lower DOM. Then go to that agent's website for more information.
