Urgent Short Sale Deal And The Lender Has Already Approved The Price
February 2, 2008
Time and time again, I keep reading the above-referenced headline in email after email sent to me by the obviously inexperienced, unqualified, unprofessional and completely oblivious real estate agent.
In this foreclosure explosion there has been the seemingly overnight proliferation of the so-called “short sale expert”. There are literally scores of real estate agents, with little or no experience, actually lying to their clients and posturing to the client as if they indeed had the requisite knowledge to properly handle a short sale transaction.
The local real estate boards and many brokerages have been complicit in this activity by hosting the most cursory and topical meetings imaginable, and subsequent to, sending their agents out into the field pretending to be short sale specialists.
Ever wonder why the credibility and prestige of real estate agents is so measurably low? Using your clientele as guinea pigs for your own amusement might be one of the reasons.
How many of these so called newly dubbed short sale experts told their clients that they descended upon that they have had no practical experience in the field? How many of these imposters actually told their client that they have never successfully completed a short sale and were going to try it out on their property?
These freshly anointed short sale experts armed with new business cards showing their new specialization might just end up being the next wave of real estate agents to find themselves on the other end of a misrepresentation lawsuit.
Take the case of this one young man I recently read about. This neophyte had the bold-faced audacity to write a post recently on Active Rain wherein he actually admits to the AR community that he used and compromised a homeowner’s position as a “learning experience”! Is this working in the best interests of the client?
Amazingly while some commented as to how hard it is for some agents to earn a commission on a short sale, no one chastised him for his actions. Well one person did and the author promptly deleted the post calling him on his actions…twice! He actually deleted it twice so there would appear to be no criticism for his action. Perhaps there were indeed more who stood up against this malfeasance and apparently fraudulent representation, who knows if they met the same fate.
The recent lawsuit involving the Ummel’s in California alerted and cautioned the consumer as to blindly believing or trusting a real estate agent. In fact we were admonished by the defendant’s in the case to “perform our own due diligence”. We are additionally told that we need to be savvy in our real estate transactions and not to just accept any information an agent provides us.
Are we now expected to know that in addition to performing our own due diligence that we also should not believe an agent when they say they are an expert in a niche of the business? I guess what is turning out to be the rule is not to believe ANYTHING a real estate agent says. And if we do, it’s our fault.
I don’t think that will hold up in Court. I think hundreds, maybe thousands of agents may end up in Court being sued by homeowners who trusted that they actually knew how to execute a short sale. I think you can see that advertisement now…
“Were you in foreclosure recently? Did a real estate agent approach you saying they were a short sale expert? Did you end up having your home foreclosed anyway and auctioned off? Well give us a call. You may be entitled to monetary damages. We’ll sue your agent and get you the money you deserve!”
If you took a short sale listing without any experience and allowed the homeowner to be duped by not disclosing your inexperience and allowing their home to be auctioned off it is not going to be hard to prove your ineptitude.
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