Updated Jun 18, 2012 - 11:29 am
Short sale or heartbreak? I'd rather get dumped!
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You have fallen in love with your dream home.
It has the rooms, the yard size you want, the sparkling pool. You can imagine whose room is going to be whose. If you're a guy, you've got your man cave all staked out.
It is perfection. You want it bad. Then you find out. Shudder.
The shudder is coming from me, your real estate agent. I know what this is going to do to you. You, on the other hand, shiver. You shiver with delight because you are so in love with this house. You're about ready to sacrifice whatever to get it. You have already convinced yourself you need this house. And if you've ever tried to talk common sense to someone who is head over heels in love, forget it. It's futile.
I try and explain that this new object of their affection will cause them pain, more pain than they may ever experienced before, but like the forbidden fruit, that just makes them want it more.
Make no mistake, the emotions involved when trying to buy a short sale don't differ much from unrequited love. At least when you get dumped by a person, you know where you're going to live.
Oh yes, you'll feel lost and cheated that you've spent all your time and energy waiting for this house. You can't move forward, but your lease is coming due on the place you rented while waiting for this to come through.
Stress sets in.
You thought for sure it couldn't take that long even though you were warned -- by me -- several times. You're just locked in limbo.
And then there's the feeling of being ignored. Week after week of no answer from the bank, no acknowledgement from the bank that you even exist. Did they not feel your love too?
But that's not all.
Take that short sale mixture of mucky feelings and add time, mix in frustration, fold in anxiety and a huge dash or irritability. Are we all ready to pick heartbreak yet people?
No matter how much I explain how frustrating short sales are, the love and desire for the new house seems to outweigh all of that, at first. Then the third or fourth month rolls around and that love seems to slip a little. The time it takes for a short sale to be approved will slowly diminish the beauty of the home just like the lack of personality will whittle away the good looks of the hottest girl in high school. And just like I warned them, they get pissed off.
Really, really pissed off.
"I'm not mad at you Diane, I'm mad at the banks," they say.
And no, they don't get upset with me, but they do start yelling through me like the bank's asset manager is standing behind me. I take it all in. I calmly answer and explain over and over and over again the process, the uncertainties, the frustration. Sometimes all the warning and the talking in the world just doesn't do any good.
Like a parent, sometimes you have to let your friends and clients go down a path you know they shouldn't. All you can do is advise and warn and give options but, ultimately, people are going to do what they want to, so you watch them go through the pain they could have easily avoided.
You're there for support, comfort, encouragement. And you refrain. You refrain like I refrain from yelling out, "I told you so!"
Diane Brennan is Your Voice in Real Estate for the Phoenix, Arizona metro area. She also co-hosts That Real Estate Show with Linda Williams every Saturday at 3pm on News Talk 92.3 KTAR. She failed miserably at pursuing a career in Gold Digging and currently helps people buy and sell property everywhere in the Phoenix metro area from Scottsdale to Paradise Valley to Goodyear and Chandler. Rumor is she knows her stuff and can be quite enjoyable to be around for long periods of time. Her driving….not so much.
Diane Brennan, That Real Estate Show, Realtor, weekend host
