Courtesy of The Palm Beach Post, comes some fresh news for Florida, offering up to $20,000 to short sale vs. foreclosure.

The limited time offer has received little promotion from the Charlotte, N.C.-based bank, which sent emails to select Florida Realtors earlier this week outlining basic details of the plan.

Only homeowners whose short sales are submitted for approval to Bank of America before Nov. 30 will qualify. The homes must have no offers on them already and the closing must occur before Aug. 31, 2012.

This signals, in our opinion, the pressure they are feeling in Florida as the housing market continues to languish and the continued pressure to clear up these loans that are facing imminent foreclosure. Other interesting facts in the article include the fact that the current foreclosure timeline is almost 676 days – almost two years!

“I think this is a positive sign that the bank is being creative to try and help homeowners and get things moving,” said Paul Baltrun, who works with real estate and mortgages at the Law Office of Paul A. Krasker in West Palm Beach. “With real estate attorneys handling these cases, you’re talking two, three, four years before there’s going to be a resolution in a foreclosure.”

Guy Cecala, chief executive officer and publisher of Inside Mortgage Finance, called the short sale payout a “bribe.”

“You can call it a relocation fee, but it’s basically a bribe to make sure the borrower leaves the house in good condition and in an orderly fashion,” Cecala said. “It makes good business sense considering you may have to put $20,000 into a foreclosed home to fix it up.”

Bank of America says that if the program shows promise in Florida, it could be expanded to other states. Other companies, including Wells Fargo and J.P. Morgan Chase also have similar programs.

More details:

Bank of America’s plan excludes Ginnie Mae, Federal Housing Administration and VA loans.

Similar to the federal Home Affordable Foreclosure Alternatives program, or HAFA, which offers $3,000 in relocation assistance, the Bank of America program may also waive a homeowner’s deficiency judgment at closing.

A deficiency judgment in a short sale is basically the difference between what the house sells for and what is still owed on the loan.

HAFA, which began in April 2010, has seen limited success with just 15,531 short sales completed nationwide through August.

In our opinion, this is just again a math decision a bank makes that falls in line with the bank’s decision. How does the bank minimize their lost? Short sale with a $20k kicker; or something else?

Post your thoughts in the comments!

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Anyone who’s followed the Art of Short Sales for any period of time knows that we have not been a huge fan of the HAFA, HAMP, and other government programs designed to ease the short sale process.

This week’s CNN article by Diana Olick continues to prove that over a year after its inception, the program continues to draw poor numbers.

HAFA provides financial incentives for servicers and borrowers to do short sales (selling the property for less than the value of the mortgage) and deeds in lieu of foreclosure (basically just giving the property back to the bank). The program launched in April of 2010 and was later streamlined in December, 2010, based on feedback from mortgage servicers, real estate agents and homeowners.

So far, HAFA has completed 7,113 short sales or DIL’s. In April, however, HAFA saw 1,666 completed, up 74 percent from the 959 done in March.

The government is touting this is a huge success – “a 74% growth!” – but as Diana points out, a 74% growth of nothing is still pretty close to nothing.

According to the article, JP Morgan Chase alone does close to 5,000 short sales a month -and that’s just one bank. The expectation is that the top few banks are likely doing in excess of over 20,000 short sales a month – in that light, HAFA is still producing inconsequential results.

Similarily to what we’ve said here, HAFA’s targeted audience limits the exposure it could potentially have.

“HAFA is a taxpayer funded program, so it has eligibility requirements targeted at a certain segment of the population,” says Risotto, noting that the program is for owner occupants who can demonstrate financial hardship and whose first mortgage is less than $729,750. “HAFA is not meant to be for every person looking to do a short sale,” she adds.

That knocks out investors, jumbo loans and borrowers who don’t meet the “hardship” requirements of the Treasury. The big banks are likely more lenient on that last one, again knowing that a short sales will be cheaper in the end than a foreclosure.

What are your thoughts? Had any success with HAFA? Post in the comments and let us know about it!

Came across this article from CNBC last week discussing the impact HAFA has had (read: not what was expected!)

The treasure department says the following

“While HAFA has been widely credited with streamlining the short sale process by setting clear timelines, documentation requirements and procedures, feedback from various stakeholders including servicers, housing counselors, realtors and others supported that additional enhancements could be made to further streamline short sale transactions, to the benefit of homeowners.”

As a result, HAFA rule changes include the following:

A recent report from the folks who oversee the TARP (the Congressional Oversight Panel) said that the Treasury has spent just $4.3 million on HAFA for 661 short sales. So Treasury, last week, decided to change the rules a bit:

• HAFA no longer requires that servicers verify the borrowers finances
• HAFA no longer requires servicers to determine if the borrowers monthly payment is higher than a 31 percent debt-to-income ratio.
• HAFA no longer requires second-lien holders to agree to accept 6 percent of the unpaid principal balance owed them, up to $6,000. Servicers now decide who gets paid how much, with a cap still at $6000.
• HAFA now requires borrowers seeking a short sale get an answer/agreement within 30 days.

We have criticized HAFA since its inception and are not surprised at all to see it faltering. That said, the guidelines mentioned above look like they provide marginal improvements, but not enough to drastically change anything. In particular, one we wrote about in an earlier blog post:

Removing the case-by-case analysis that short sales need: Every short sale transaction is different, and lender should approach them as such. HAFA requires lenders to identify their minimum net proceeds ahead of time, and the guideline requires 120 day period to change that value. This means that if a property falls outside of the minimum net proceeds, it isn’t eligible under HAFA. That’s a shame; because the house is worth what the house is worth, and even in the span of 120 days the criteria used can change. It removes flexibility from the process, which is critical when handling these transactions.

This was not adjusted and really makes it difficult for lenders to truly handle transactions on a case by case basis.

What are your thoughts on the market forecast and the HAFA program?

Well, 2011 sure is off to a heck of a start, isn’t it? As we predicted here over and over again, the short sale marketplace is going to continue to be an important part of the still-stagnant housing recovery for the foreseeable future. So if you aren’t up to par on what you are doing, it’s time to get on board!

This recent article from Inman expands on what we have been saying, and predicts 5- 8 years of high short sale volume. What does this mean to you? You need to be competent in managing your short sales, and Short Sale Artisan helps you do exactly that! Even to 2020 and beyond!

The short-sale marketplace is not failing down anytime soon, and if genuine estate professionals wish to excavate into that niche, they should teach themselves thoroughly. That was a summary from dual short-sale specialists who spoke during Real Estate Connect Thursday.

“We’re looking during 5 to 8 years conservatively (of high short-sale volume),” pronounced Holly Maloney, a authorized short-sale dilettante and a Realtor during Huff Realty in Cincinnati, Ohio. “It’s a marketplace that’s going to be there. You possibly learn how to do it, teach yourself or work with someone who knows how to do it, differently you’re going to be giving business away.”

5 – 8 years is their conservative estimate!

Travis Waller, a authorized residential dilettante during RE/MAX Advantage Plus in Teaneck, N.J., expects disastrous equity to trigger a second call of foreclosures “that no one is even vocalization about.”

More than one in 5 homeowners with mortgages — scarcely 11 million borrowers — due some-more than their homes were value during a third quarter, according to a latest numbers from debt information aggregator CoreLogic.

“Until stagnation gets better, a market’s not going to get better,” Waller said.

Again making the case that volume and low home sales, and further depressing home values, as well as a jobless recovery, are contributing to home sales lagging some of the other gains that have been made throughout this economic “recovery”.

“It unequivocally comes down to display of your papers to a banks. The banks commend who has knowledge and who doesn’t,” he said. He generally represents sellers and carries between 15 and 25 listings in a month.

That is what we have been saying at Short Sale Artisan for well over a year. Formulating an ironclad short sale package is crucial to your package getting accepted. That isn’t going to change in the future, as you are always making the case to the bank that the short sale is the best way for the lender to mitigate their loss.

Both also offering agents this tip: Get a e-mail residence for a detriment slackening officer you’re traffic with. “It expedites a routine since during that indicate we can start e-mailing (him or her) PDFs,” instead of promulgation them faxes, Waller said.

This is a very key statement and underpins the importance of building relationships with loss mitigation representatives and banks you work with. If you are a high volume customer, they recognize you, and your offers are reasonable; you will dramatically improve the likelihood of speeding up your short sale offer and getting to approval.

Short sales will continue to play an important role for the foreseeable future – so you need to know them! What are you plans and predictions for the future of the short sale marketplace?

New home sales dropped to an annual pace of just 283,000, according to the Commerce Department. That was down 8.1% from a slow September and 28.5% from 12 months ago when the annualized sales rate was at 430,000.

Sales are off nearly 80% from the housing boom peak pace of 1.4 million, set in July 2005. Sales have remained near historic lows this year despite very attractive mortgage interest rates that slash the monthly costs of homeownership.

The Commerce Department also revised August sales figures downward to 275,000, which represents the record low point for new homes sales since it started tracking figures in 1963.

There’s a major factor depressing home sales of all kinds, according to David Crowe, chief economist for the National Association of Home Builders.

This likely has partially to do as well with the expiration of the homeowner tax credit. Many economists were predicting a rebound in the near future but this news puts the housing market in worse condition than anyone anticipate; which in turn means that loan modifications, short sales, and foreclosures will continue to play an enormous influence as people continue to remain underwater on their homes.

“So much bargain-priced, ‘used’ home inventory is available that the builders just can’t compete,” he said. “Over time, we’ll work through that mountain of existing home supply. But the key words are ‘over time.’ New home builders won’t have much to be thankful about any time soon.

The median price for existing homes sold in October was just $170,000, compared with $194,900 for new homes. That’s the lowest median price for new homes sold in seven years and down 13.9% from September.

The enormous inventory, coupled with continued downward price pressure (although we do believe the bottom is somewhere nearby!) means you need to make sure when making your short sale pitches to the banks you mention the status of the economy and the recovery that seems so distant in the future.

Crowe said that indicates many of the buyers were first timers. They’re less constrained than older potential buyers because they don’t have to worry about selling their existing homes in order to purchase new ones. One light at the tunnel, however, is a slightly shrinking inventory:

One encouraging aspect of the report for home builders is that inventory continued to wane. The number of new homes for sale at the end of October was about 202,000, less than nine months’ supply at the current rate of sales. The number of homes on the market has dropped about 20% since October 2009.

As we have been saying for some time, we think there is at least 3 – 4 more years of strong short sale potential in the marketplace. Conflicting information about economic recovery makes us believe that the optimism about rebounding home prices is, well, a little too optimistic.

What are your thoughts? Post ‘em in the comments!

Top mortgage servicers have completed 91,827 short sales or deeds-in-lieu of foreclosure on canceled trial or declined modifications through the Home Affordable Modification Program as of September, up 27% from the previous month, according to data from the Treasury Department.

This is pretty fascinating news. The HAMP program continues to fail such that there has been a 27% increase in the number of attempted modifications that proceed on to deed in lieu or short sale. Although, we have been saying for close to a year that HAMP and HAFA have been incredibly poorly executed.

The Treasury started HAMP in March 2009 to provide incentives to servicers for the modification of loans on the verge of foreclosure. Through October, those servicers have started 1.4 million three-month trials and converted 519,648 of them into permanent status, though conversions have been going down in recent months.

The top eight servicers — have canceled 551,821 trials either due to a redefault, lack of documentation, or the borrower was deemed ineligible. Those same servicers have declined 842,436 homeowners from entering a trial, according to the latest Treasury data through September.

Of the canceled trials in that time, 47,001 have been liquidated through a short sale or the homeowner gave up the deed-in-lieu of foreclosure. Of the mortgages that were denied from a trial, 44,826 went into short sale or deed-in-lieu for a total of 91,827.

Most of the short sales, however, are reportedly not being done through the Home Affordable Foreclosure Alternatives program, which was launched by the Treasury in April to incentivize servicers to conduct short sales and DILs on loans that fell out of HAMP.

All that hullaballoo about HAFA saving the day and the majority of them aren’t even being processed through HAFA (which was intended to be a relief program for those who couldn’t maintain payments even on a modified loan).

Even though the Treasury pays the servicers for a transaction done through HAFA, the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program reported 342 short sales and DILs completed through HAFA as of Sept. 30.

The Treasury has not released official numbers on HAFA, but has said it expects to before the end of the year.

We can hardly wait to see what those numbers look like! 342 short sales through HAFA as of Sept 30th!!

Late last week; there was quite a ruffle up in the Internet about copyright violation and plagiarism related to Cook’s Source Magazine. It’s quite an interesting story and speaks to the understanding of copyright and content ownership on the Internet. The reason I bring it into the Art of Short Sales blog is that many of us write our own blogs about short sales or real estate, and these are frequently ripped off without the appropriate acknowledgment or credit.

The Cook’s Source debacle, in a nutshell, involves an author, Monica Gaudio (who’s account of the entire debacle can be found here), who published a recipe with a corresponding article on her own website nearly five years ago. Cook’s Source magazine then blatantly copied it, verbatim, and used it in their advertiser-supported publication. Now, because they did use Monica’s name in the article; it certainly is not plagiarism. However, it IS very clearly a copyright violation, since Monica was never approached or asked for permission to use her article.

Monica was made aware of this and contacted the magazine’s editor, Judith Griggs. Ms. Grigg’s response needs to be quoted word for word, and I can’t do it justice by paraphrasing:

“Yes Monica, I have been doing this for 3 decades, having been an editor at The Voice, Housitonic Home and Connecticut Woman Magazine. I do know about copyright laws. It was “my bad” indeed, and, as the magazine is put together in long sessions, tired eyes and minds somethings forget to do these things.
But honestly Monica, the web is considered “public domain” and you should be happy we just didn’t “lift” your whole article and put someone else’s name on it! It happens a lot, clearly more than you are aware of, especially on college campuses, and the workplace. If you took offence and are unhappy, I am sorry, but you as a professional should know that the article we used written by you was in very bad need of editing, and is much better now than was originally. Now it will work well for your portfolio. For that reason, I have a bit of a difficult time with your requests for monetary gain, albeit for such a fine (and very wealthy!) institution. We put some time into rewrites, you should compensate me! I never charge young writers for advice or rewriting poorly written pieces, and have many who write for me… ALWAYS for free!”

What is very fascinating about this is that this editor of a regional magazine actually believes that the web is public domain. It’s an interesting story even beyond this from the social manifestations of this incident: the topic exploded on Twitter and Cook’s Source Facebook page was essentially over-run by Internet users who were furious at her blatant disregard of basic journalistic principles.

Again, the reason I bring this up is that the Internet makes it so easy to be taken advantage of. Many bloggers, including us at Short Sale Artisan, spend a significant amount of time writing custom content and trying to appeal to our readership. It’s great being linked and even re-use our articles where we can (we frequently syndicate our blog content on Articlesbase and E-Zine articles, for example). But then, there are always those who rip off content and re-use it on their site (or slightly tweak it) without providing the appropriate credit or asking for permission. I found at least three instance this week alone of our blog posts being used without permission. In each case, I notified the owner and of the blog and demanded at a minimum a backlink to the original source with a credit to the author.

A recent example; last week, Alexis McGee (UPDATE: The link was removed and the rip-off was fixed) blatantly ripped off my content on her own blog. Despite my repeated e-mails to her; she has still not removed the post. This type of behavior is not acceptable. It’s one thing to have someone contact us, provide a backlink, and mention Short Sale Artisan as the author; but Alexis used our article to advertise her own webinar and removed all links and references to Short Sale Artisan, without asking our permission. Alexis McGee is a thief, plain and simple, and her lack of response to our requests to appropriately credit or otherwise reference the author signifies a complete disregard for copyright and is clearly plagiarism.

Take a look at some of these excerpts:

Here is our post on Short Sale Artisan:

The question for short sale professionals is; does this adjust the bank’s motivations for a short sale? We think it does provide  abit more incentive to clear them up sooner – but on the flip side; also means there will be more attention paid to the value proposition a short sale offer presents. This means it is more critical than ever to provide an ironclad short sale package and bulletproof documentation – don’t give the bank any reason to dismiss your offer!

Here is Alexis McGee’s ripoff of our content:

Bottom Line – The Foreclosure Freeze changes the bank’s motivations.

But it’s more critical than ever to provide an ironclad short sale package and bulletproof documentation with your deal so don’t give the bank any reason to dismiss your offer.

Our Post:

This is positive news for the banks, although we still find it unbelievable that the banks did such a poor job auditing their foreclosure process that they literally had to stop processing them while they lined their ducks up in a row.

Her Post:

This is positive news for the banks, although we still find it unbelievable that the banks did such a poor job auditing their foreclosure process that they literally had to stop processing them while they figured out what they did wrong.

In case you missed English class in high school; this slight tweaking is still plagiarism.

From Wikipedia:

Plagiarism is defined in dictionaries as “the wrongful appropriation, close imitation, or purloining an publication, of another author’s language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions, and the representation of them as one’s own original work.

The lesson here is not one of self-pity. It’s to help you avoid this type of plagiarism and how to deal with it in the real estate blogging realm.

So, how do you identify these types of theft? I use Google Reader’s feature to subscribe to certain key words in search results. In the above case from Alexis; I have a Google Alert setup that searches for Blogs with the words, “Short Sale” in them. Alexis’ blog came up in my daily search and I immediately recognized from her headline that it sounded similar. When I went to go read her blog post, it immediately rang a bell.

The Cook’s Source story is not alone out there, unfortunately, even though it gathered the fury of the Internet this week. Just pay attention to what is out there and, if you put time into your posts, you will need to pay attention to those that rip off your content.

Thoughts? Comments? We’d love to hear about it in the feedback!

An article published on 10/19 by the Herald in southwest Florida discusses the growth of short sales as a result of the recent moratorium on foreclosures by several lenders, citing:

Short sales are in vogue in Southwest Florida, a direct result of the broad halt on foreclosures imposed by some of the nation’s largest lenders.

There is some indication that the logjam might be clearing, with Bank of America announcing Monday that it plans to resume seizing more than 100,000 homes in 23 states next week.

But the halt by the big Charlotte, N.C.-based lender, Ally Financial Inc. and JPMorgan Chase already has been felt in Manatee, Sarasota and Charlotte counties, a region where distressed property now accounts for about 50 percent of sales.

Realtors have lost sales, and some homeowners who had closed on a bank-owned property have been left in limbo.

But one positive is that lenders have ramped up short sales — where a bank accepts a sale for less than what is owed on a property — to get them off their books and to avoid additional foreclosures being snared in a mess that is rooted in questions of flawed documents.

It’s in this foreclosure stall that the lenders attempt to get rid of properties before they make it that far in the process – i.e. before foreclosure. This is positive news for the banks, although we still find it unbelievable that the banks did such a poor job auditing their foreclosure process that they literally had to stop processing them while they lined their ducks up in a row.

“It’s a total 180 by the banks,” said Matt Augustyniak of Bradenton’s Horizon Realty, which also offers title and mortgage services. “Banks feel they have no other options and they have to get this stuff off their books ASAP.”

The question for short sale professionals is; does this adjust the bank’s motivations for a short sale? We think it does provide  abit more incentive to clear them up sooner – but on the flip side; also means there will be more attention paid to the value proposition a short sale offer presents. This means it is more critical than ever to provide an ironclad short sale package and bulletproof documentation – don’t give the bank any reason to dismiss your offer!

A short sale initiated two weeks ago was completed from offer to closing in six days, he said. Just prior to the foreclosure halt, Horizon had been wrapping up short sales that had started in the spring.

That probably belongs in the Guiness Book of Records!A prediction by a realtor in Florida related to her market:

It will take at least six months for the cloud over foreclosures to fully lift and that short sales will be all the rage during that time.

For those specializing in foreclosures, the freeze has meant lost business.

Drew Peterson, a sales agent with Sarasota’s Re/Max Alliance Group, already has lost one sale and half his business is on hold.

“I could complain, but I think it’s a good thing because it will put in tighter controls,” Peterson said. “The banks’ main concern is selling these properties and getting them off their books, and I’ve been hearing from my bank contacts that they are shifting resources to short sales while the moratorium is on.”

A bigger concern is the ripple effect of the moratorium. Our bets are that the situation in Florida is replicated across the nation, especially in those heavy hit areas like California and Nevada.

But others worry that even if the foreclosure process starts grinding away again, the delays caused by banks’ review could have a profound impact in Florida, a state whose economy is so reliant on real estate.

“It will have a ripple effect into all of the businesses that rely on real estate and may increase the unemployment rate, which may in turn increase the number of foreclosures,” said Daren Blomquist, a spokesman for California-based RealtyTrac Inc., which tracks the foreclosure phenomenon. “This adds a whole new cloud of uncertainty to the housing market.”

It sure is an interesting time in the market. What are your thoughts on the article? Do you think short sales will experience a bounce because of this foreclosure stall and “blip”; or will REO and non REO delinquent properties maintain similar proportions for the foreseeable future?

Everyone knows that a good short sale professional needs to have leads to be productive. That means that part of your workload needs to include finding new opportunities and getting your name out there. It doesn’t matter if you are a short sale investor or agent; without leads you have no work!

There are two major methods to finding leads, passive and active. We will describe each type and then give examples of what you can do in each category (and you should be using both methods!)

Don’t underestimate the effort involved with finding leads. Some of our members report spending almost 50% of their working time just working on building leads and their pipeline! Remember that marketing  is is a curve; especially as you are starting out and building a name for yourself, it can take a lot of effort to build your reputation, but it is a snowball effect, so keep pushing! The most successful short sale professionals use a combination of tactics to keep leads coming in 24 hours per day!

Passive Short Sale Lead Finding

No, passive does not mean you don’t do anything at all! What it means is that you build systems where the leads come to you. This is a great system, and once setup, can drive business to you without needing too much additional upkeep and effort when compared to Active lead finding. There are a lot of ways that you can find short sale leads passively!

Maintaining a Short Sale Blog

Keeping a blog is a great way to get traffic and get your name out there. The National Association of Realtors has said that almost 9 out of 10 individuals use the Internet to research their home options. But it does take time and effort! All Short Sale Artisan users get a free WordPress blog that can be customized and used with their own domain name.

Using a blog for short sale leads is more than simply creating it, as we alluded to earlier. You need to post content. You can easily find content by searching Google News, other blogs, or writing opinion pieces. Be sure to use keywords from your local area to target local investors – for example, a headline could be “How to Handle a Short Sale in Las Vegas, Nevada!”.

Make it a part of your routine to regularly post content on your blog to keep it active, and encourage comments and networking. You should write at least a post per month at the absolute minimum (preferably one per week). A typical post should take you no more than 2 hours to write, proof, and put out there, and it helps you establish credibility as well.

Syndicating your Blog Content

Don’t keep your blog on your site – get the word out there! There are a few ways you can syndicate your blog content. One way is by submitting your blog using your blogs RSS feed – this RSS feed is a special URL that can be used to automatically feed updates of your site out into the Internet. You should also install plugins to your blog to automatically post your short sale content to Twitter, Facebook, and other social networking accounts.

You can also manually copy your blog content onto various sites that allow you to post blogs, including sites like ActiveRain, BiggerPockets, and RealTown.

One final thing you can do is author articles on authoring sites – such as eZine articles. Another benefit of syndicating your short sale content is that all these link to your blog and increase traffic to your site, which in turn builds awareness of your services and products.

Twitter

Twitter lets you push out your short sale tips in small fashion. Start by interacting with the vibrant short sale community that exists on Twitter. This will also help build a reputation for you. Find other people’s blog posts through Twitter and comment on them. It’s important as well to build followers on twitter, and there are several automated tools that will post relevant content to your twitter account on a regular basis, like Twitterfeed.

Facebook

If you don’t know about Facebook, you have been living under a rock. Using Facebook for short sale lead finding can be very useful – Start by setting up a “page” for your business and branding it. Encourage people you have worked with before to become a fan and post relevant information frequently. Remember, blatant advertising is often a turn-off in social networking, so be sure to give some good tips and advice, for free, interspersed with mentions of your services that you provide.

Word of mouth

Meet people! Visit your local chamber of commerce. Hand out business cards. Encourage people you have worked with to spread the word about your services. The Referral Engine for short sale leads is one of the best ways to keep business coming in – but it relies heavily on your clients having had a stellar experience with your services, so make sure you deliver!

Seminars / Conferences

A great way to meet people with whom partnerships can be formed is seminars and conferences. These occur at real estate and short sale conferences nationwide. There are local chapters nationwide of the Real Estate Investing Associations (REIA), Real Estate Agent conferences, and more. Find them, attend, and be liberal with your business card! If you are an investor, you will want to meet with lots of realtors who you can work with. For agents, you will want to meet with other agents and talk about their lead generating strategies. Networking in general is a great way to build your influence and seminars and conferences feature like-minded individuals in the same industry.

LinkedIn

Similar to Facebook, create your company (if you are self-employed) on LinkedIn and promote it!

Finding Partners

This doesn’t mean splitting your work. It means partners to do portions of the work. For example, an investor may partner with a real estate agent, or a real estate agent may partner with a short sale attorney. If you find a person that has been a pleasure to work with, keep the relationship thriving and they will think of you when opportunities arise that they are made aware of.  It is very similar to the referral engine from past clients in this regard.

Media Exposure

If you are a knowledge expert, pitch to the local news agencies. Foreclosures and the short sale market are in hot demand right now; and local news loves to hear from people involved in the industry to pitch their ideas and commentary. Another benefit of media exposure is that it also creates trust in your operation, which is very useful in an industry that certainly has its fair share of scam artists.

YouTube / Video Sites

Putting your mug up on YouTube or Vimeo is a great way to get your name out there. An example of two guys who have had good success with this is Group 46:10, who provides short sale training.

Active Short Sale Lead Finding

Active short sale lead finding means actively pursuing those who are in default. This is a tried and true method, but requires constant attention and pressure. Temporarily halting your efforts also temporarily halts any results or leads you may find from these methods!

Most of these methods involve scouring sources for potential leads and then actively following up on them. The benefit to this method is that you are targeting people who are in need directly; as opposed to blanket passive marketing where you hope someone will find you or be referred to you. This is more of the traditional “sales” types of activities.

Direct Mail

A tried and true short sale lead generating method. Sending direct mail to homeowners who are behind on their mortgages simply works. Short Sale Artisan sells leads to its members at discounted rates for homeowners in a given area who are behind on their loan payments by 30, 60, or 90 days but have not yet received a Notice of Default. These are prime candidates for a short sale, as they are behind on their payments but have not entered public record yet as being behind on their mortgages.

There are many methods of handling direct mail, but generally the suggested process is:

1. Identify who you will send our mail campaigns too (using pre-NOD lists is the best method)
2. Send out a first round of letters informing the service (Short Sale Artisan has full templates for all these docs in our Template Library!)
3. After a certain amount of time, send out a follow-up letter reminding them of the services you offer
4. After a period of time, send out a final third letter

It has been generally proven that going beyond a 3rd letter is unnecessary and wasteful. It does take time to build and manage these mail campaigns, but they nearly always result in new work in your pipeline!

Cold Call / Door Knocking / “Bird Dogging”

Similar to the Direct Mail, this often works but is time intensive. Pre NOD lists your purchase may include phone numbers. Door knocking is even more preferable than cold calling (be sure to dress for success!), but the disadvantage is time. You can call 15 people in an hour but perhaps only visit 4 or 5 houses on foot. Plus, phone calls can be used to market outside of your geographic area.

Another option on door knocking is “bird dogging”. This is basically outsourcing your door knocking operations to novice short sale investors. Bird dogs will go door knocking for you in return for a commission on any successful closes. The benefit is less time you need to spend going from house to house; but the negative is you lose some of your profit to the bird dog.

“Bandit Signs”

Bandit Signs are the signs you see on telephone poles and street lights around your home town that proclaim “We buy houses cash!”. These have limited success. Additionally, you should be aware of any town ordinances against public advertising – some towns will levy fines if you staple these signs on every streetlight in an area.

The benefit of bandit signs is that they are quick to put up and get you exposure. The call rate is very low, but even a handful of calls can make it very worthwhile if a lucrative opportunity pops up.

MLS Search

The MLS is a great site to find new leads. Search for keywords that are typical of short sale eligible properties, such as “Distressed” or “Quick Sell” or “Motivated Seller”. these are indications that there is a time constraint on the sale of the property. You can search the MLS directly from Short Sale Artisan’s Lead Finder.

Specialty Sites (foreclosure.com)

Foreclosure.com is similar to the MLS except it focuses on foreclosures and, more recently, short sales as well. Foreclosure.com contains REO properties and other distressed properties. The downside is it costs some money to become a member; however they do have a free trial period if you see something of interest.

Craigslist / eBay

Other searchable sites include Craigslist and eBay. On Craigslist, you can also post your services directly. eBay has a properties section, and similar to the MLS, you will want to search for keywords that correspond with short sales, like “distressed” and so on.

Keep it up!

Remember, marketing is not a one – time job. Finding leads takes a considerable amount of time – so build a system and a process in place where you utilize all the marketing channels effectively.The best marketers use a variety of methods and integrate them cleanly – for example, new blog posts are automatically posted on Facebook and tweeted on Twitter.

Do you have any tips of additional ways to find Short Sale Leads? We’d love to hear about them in the comments!