Mel Martinez
United States Senator, Florida
Dear Senator Martinez,
I am a real estate broker in Destin Florida. I primarily represent sellers who are in the process of short sales. As you know, a significant amount of our population has lost jobs and income and are unable to keep up with their mortgage payments or keep their properties. Their best solution is to sell their property as a short sale. Unfortunately, the sellers' lenders processing these requests take three to six months and sometimes longer. During that time, buyers lose interest or must go on to buy other properties. These long delays are contributing to declines in market value over and above the economic cycle we are in. My suggestion is to REQUIRE those banks getting bailout funds, and all of them, to staff up their short sale departments, so that this inventory can be reduced and home purchase time can be normalized to a standard 30 day period. By speeding up short sale approvals to normal time frames, there will be one less contributing factor to price declines. Further, speeding up short sales will reduce the amount of foreclosures in our market. Foreclosed properties cause surrounding market declines. In many cases, these short sale lenders reject offers or lose buyers, end up foreclosing, and sell the properties for even LESS than they would have received in a short sale. If the banks are being granted funds from the citizens, then they have to STOP causing further losses and START helping the taxpayers and property owners. I would be happy to speak with you in more detail, as every day I get calls from homeowners trying to do the right thing, who are prevented from doing so by the very banks we are giving funds to.
Wendy Rulnick
Broker, Rulnick Realty, Inc.
Destin FL 32541
850-650-7883 ext 204
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Excellent letter Wendy. If only he would act on it!!
Bill - Thank you very much! I emailed it to him today! My congressman is next, then I think the Secretary of the Treasury.
Wendy, It sure would help if they had some mandatory guidelines for banks to go by when handling short sales. Billions could be saved if they would just let us experienced brokers do what we need to do to clear up inventory.
Bryant - Totally!
Oh, man, you go get 'em, Wendy. The response time of some of these banks is inexcusable. Did you know that Countrywide has a new policy that if you change buyers mid-stream -- and we often do as buyers go south -- they close the freakin' file?
Elizabeth - I know, Countrywide is inexcusable! I am going on a rampage.
Excellent letter Wendy. There are so many things being overlooked that will hamper any housing market recovery.
Laura - Thank you - I unfortunately got a canned email response from the Senator. I will try again. I think they read the word "housing" in my email then just went through a checklist.