2009-07-24 00:00:00
Short Sale Statistics

Why does it seem like every home we're asked about these days is a Pre-Foreclosure aka Short Sale?  Here's my theory:

First of all let's look at the numbers.

IN UTAH, 14.9% of all homes listed are Short Sales
IN UTAH, 10.2% of all homes sold in the last six months have been Short Sales

IN SL COUNTY: 18% of all homes listed are Short Sales
IN SL COUNTY: 11.4% of all homes sold in the last six months have been Short Sales

So if only 15% of all homes are Short Sales, why do we get soooooooo many calls on them.

The answer is pricing.  Short Sale homes are normally listed at a very low prices to spur interest in order to get an offer to send to the bank.  Once the bank receives an offer they start the process of determining a) if they will sell the home as a short sale and b) if they decide to sell the home as a short sale, what is the minimum they will accept

So as you can see, there are going to be many listings out there with bargain pricing which attact attention from buyers.  They look like a great deal when compared with normal listings or even Bank Owned Homes.

The problem is, not all of them will sell as Short Sales, and if they do, they might not sell for the listed price.  This makes the market very difficult for homes that are actually listed at market value.  They have to compete with Short Sale homes which are listed at a guessed at price.

RickSmithHomes.com makes it easy to see which homes are Short Sales.  You'll see a RED Pre-Foreclosure message on these properties.  I'm not saying you shouldn't pursue these homes, I am saying you need to be prepared to wait a while to see if a) the bank will sell it short and b) what the actual price will be.