Foreclosure is a devastating financial and emotional process for a homeowner to go through, and in many cases they do so alone and without help of any kind. A Licensed Realtor who has earned the CERTIFIED DISTRESSED PROPERTY EXPERT designation has dedicated their time and effort to understanding the issues distressed homeowners are dealing with. The CDPE Professional is an agent who understands the full range of solutions and is ready to help. While experiencing financial distress is difficult for any family, the process of finding a real estate professional shouldn’t be. Selecting a CDPE agent ensures you are dealing with a professional ready to address your needs.
Do You Qualify?
While the misconceptions of what qualifies a seller for a short sale are many, the reality is actually very simple. Following is an explanation of the three major items that most lenders are looking for to see if you will qualify.
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Financial Hardship
First and foremost a lender will want to see that you have a “financial hardship”. A financial hardship is a verifiable issue that has or will cause you to miss payments or have financial difficulties. Financial hardships can be issues such as:
Mortgage Payment Adjustment
Job Loss
Too Much Debt
Business Failure -
Monthly Shortfall
Almost every lender will want to see that you cannot afford to pay your current mortgage. The way that this is demonstrated is on a financial worksheet that your agent will provide. This is essentially a monthly profit and loss statement. While this may sound difficult in reality determining whether you have monthly shortfall or not is actually relatively easy.
The equation is:Total Monthly Income – Total Monthly Expense = Monthly Shortfall
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Insolvency
In order to qualify for a short sale, you must not have the means to pay down your mortgage. This means that the mortgage company wants to see that you owe more than your have in cash.
You do not however have to be completely broke – this is a common misconception; the lender will want to see that over time you will not be able to pay your mortgage obligation. Having money in the bank for living expenses is common and will not disqualify you.