I have made a point of it recently to read as much as I can and become educated on the short sale process. I have spent hours of time reading websites and talking to agents who have been involved on the listing side of short sales and have decided to get involved myself.

One of my real estate friends recently asked me why I would want to do that, after all as he put it, only about 20% get done and they are so much work.

As someone who has almost exclusively worked with buyers this year I have seen this first hand. I have seen many times where I had a buyer submit an offer on a short sale and after waiting weeks or months for answers they moved on to something else. Recently I have realized that while I was asking a lot of good questions from the listing agent, there were a few questions I was missing. And now that I know the right questions to answer I am realizing many, or even most, of the short sale sellers in the Phoenix and Tempe market are not getting the representation they deserve.

I have been frustrated for months of asking some basic questions and realizing the listing agent was not prepared for the short sale transaction. Now that I have become more educated and asking more questions, I realize that the number is even lower than I thought. Listing agents for short sales often do not have their ducks in a row. The home owners don’t know any better nor should they as it is the responsibility of the professional to make sure things are taken care of.

Buyers deserve the proper representation. Having your house go through the short sale process is going to damage your credit, but it is not going to damage your credit as much as a foreclosure will. Stay tuned, that is my next post. So if you can help your credit take less of a hit, you are truly in a hardship situation and you need to sell your home, then you deserve proper representation.

Short sale homes are becoming more prevalent in the Phoenix and Tempe are housing market and more people are turning to them as the foreclosure market in the east valley dries up. Both buyers and sellers in this market are going to need to make a new commitment to each other if we are going to improve the process. With the new emphasis on short sales it is the duty and responsibility of listing agents to understand the process and be on top of it, that is why I am continuing to educate myself on short sales and starting to represent short sale sellers in the Tempe, Phoenix and east valley area.