As we have basically written the book on short sales, it has come as a complete surprise to us when we learned of the special skill of an Ohio Realtor who supposedly can get short sales approved WITHOUT needing to submit a valid and fully executed contract.

If this is true, Ms. Vanessa V. Simmons needs to be heralded for opening the doors of opportunity for literally millions of agents and investors across the Country. This is breaking news! It is amazing…that is to say if it isn’t unadulterated bullshit!

Earlier today I was emailed a link to a post that Vanessa Simmons, a Realtor in Ohio, wrote on Active Rain. Here is her post in its glorious entirety:

No My Seller Will Not Be Signing The Contract…. (I don’t think yours should either)

This may be a bit controversial but I do not advise my sellers to sign contracts for short sales before obtaining lender approval.

Often it seems most agents insist on taking ‘short sales’ and trying to squeeze them into a ‘regular sale’ box. They refuse to believe or even entertain the concept that short sales are a different animal and should be treated differently.

When I asked Mildred Wilkins, National Speaker and Authority on Foreclosure, about this topic, her response was as follows….”Any agent that has their seller sign a short sale contract, prior to having bank approval, is putting themselves and their clients at risk.”

A fully excited (sic) offer is a contract. Although the seller is still in possession of the property, unless they are willing to make up the difference, they have no right to agree to sell the property for less than what they owe their lender.

If they sign an offer that will yield less than the pay off, that is exactly what they are agreeing to do. The lender is under no obligation to honor a contract that was entered into by the seller, agreeing to less than the payoff amount.

I have spoken to some agents who feel that the way around this is to stick in the contract that this offer is “Subject to Lender Approval”. I suppose this is possible but I believe that the safest thing to do to protect myself and my seller is to say…No my sellers will not be signing the short sale contract, until we have the banks permission to do so.

Wow…imagine my surprise. With over 200 successful short sales under our belt and with thousands of students who are both agents and investors out there killing it in short sales, I have NEVER heard of a single situation in which a bank approved a short sale and did not need the “sale” part to actually take place.

If we as investors and agents can get short sales approved without having to actually have a “sale” on the property, we’re all gonna be rich beyond our wildest dreams.

Seriously, tomorrow I could literally have 100 deals in front of banks and mortgage companies across the USA asking them to accept our offer..err…request…umm pipedream of a deal. Imagine to yourself right now. Somebody calls you and is in foreclosure and wants out.

Now with this new found information you run over, take the listing and let the client know that you’ll get this approved in no time at all. When asked if you have to list the property or put a sign in the ground tell them NO! Just say you’ll call the bank and make them an offer they can’t refuse.

So you call the bank. “Hey Yo…Banker dude…I need you to take about $100k off this deal so I can go sell it. Contract??? I don’t need no stinking contract!”

Then I want you to email me and let me know what happened.

Well not one to spit in the face of opportunity. Heck …I’ll even take my stimulus check when it comes. I know just where I can spend that $10 bucks Obama is sending my way. He’s da man! Maybe short sales without contracts is part of the Trillion Dollar stimulus package and I missed it.

So in an effort to obtain clarity and to stop myself from salivating at the prospect of being able to execute short sales without contracts, I asked Ms. Simmons for further clarification. Here’s the exact text of the comment I left on her “blog” on Active Rain:

I had the link to this thread emailed to me today and all I can say is WTF!! This is probably THE most ridiculous post EVER written on ActiveRain. (and that’s saying a LOT!!)

Ms. Simmons, I would have to call BS on this. However, if you can PLEASE tell me what banks you have closed with in the last 12 months who have fallen for your scheme of a process, I would LOVE to know. I am sure others would as well.

You show me a bank..ANY bank, that will even LOOK at a short sale transaction without a fully executed sales contract, then I will give you 50% of every deal I do with that bank. There..you have it in writing.

I will make you absolutely rich if you can provide me with the banks you have closed with that allow this to occur.

You want to make some serious jack? Then please do tell us the names of the banks you have closed with in the last 12 months using your process.

This should not be a problem for you. No confidentiality problems and I am SURE that the Active Rain world here would love to know these banks. Now this is what a social network is for!! We’re all about to go hog wild doing real easy short sales with the names of the banks you are about to share with all of us.

Can’t wait!

Don’t bother looking for the comment on Active Rain. She has deleted it not once, not twice, but three times. In fact, she must have reported us to the principal’s office because we then received this threatening email from Brad Andersohn who calls himself the “Community Builder”. Here is his email in it’s entirety:

You’ve received a contact message from your Contact Form on the ActiveRain network.

Message details:
From: Brad Andersohn ~ Community Builder
Email: bandersohn@yahoo.com
Subject: Refrain from Re-Commenting when deleted (Sent via Activerain)

Good Evening -

It’s been brought to our attention that your comment was deleted and not acceptable on another members post. Out of respect for our members and overall community, we would ask that you kindly do NOT repost your comments on Blogs where they have already been removed.

It is at your discretion to make comments on others blogs and it is at their discretion if they want to keep them. Beyond that, it may be considered harassment.

We only ask that our members try to get along and play nicely while in the sand box.

Thank you,

ActiveRain Corp.

Could it be that this post was indeed bullshit? I mean, I would like nothing more than to hear what banks Vanessa Simmons works with on short sales that don’t require the property to be actually “sold”.

Seriously, I have over 1,500 clients who have taken our award winning, top-ranked short sale course or live seminar and I am ABSOLUTELY sure they would be VERY interested in finding out what banks approve short sales without contracts being in place.

Ms. Simmons may single handedly cure the ills of the housing market and may have engineered a housing bailout plan of massive proportions. I know investors and agents who will go to their offices on the weekend even to begin faxing short sale transactions to lenders if they don’t need to actually have the house sold.

Heck, for that matter let’s just have every homeowner call their lender and ask them to just give them a number and they will go the FSBO route and get the deal closed.

Heck if you don’t need a contract, what the heck do you need an agent for? If you don’t have a contract, why pay commission…but that’s a different argument altogether.

For now, all of us in the RE.net would be MORE than satisfied if Vanessa Simmons would share with us the names of these lenders.

All we want is just to dip our beaks a little. Is that so bad? Isn’t that what the Active Rain network and all these RE Barcamps and stuff are about? Networking and sharing information so we can all learn and prosper as one big happy family?

Please, Vanessa, is it asking too much for you to tell us who these banks are that accept and approve short “sales”..deals..without having contracts in place?

We’re all waiting with baited breath. The world is your oyster. You have agents, investors, homeowners and I’m sure quite a few loss mitigators listening who would LOVE to know the names of the lenders that you have received approval from with no contract in place.

I realize this may not be the forum that you’d like to discuss this, and I realize that a lot of people may see this and wonder if what you said was real but just imagine how much business you will have as the result of this article.

That is, if what you say is true. How ’bout it Ms. Simmons? We’re all waiting!

Update: We received this email from Brad Andersohn informing us that our account on Active Rain would be deactivated for speaking out in open defiance of a censorship policy at Active Rain that is encouraged and promoted.

-Brett Wilson

for Real Estate Radio USA