The Best Options to Save Your Arizona Home from Foreclosure

The Best Options to Save Your Arizona Home from Foreclosure

To find out your best options to save your Arizona home from foreclosure, you should consult with a housing counselor, a real estate professional and/or a foreclosure defense attorney to find out all your options.  Here are some of the most popular options that today’s distressed homeowners are taking advantage to successfully save their homes from foreclosure:

Short Sale

A short sale is when you owe more on your mortgage than you can sell your home for. In a short sale process, your lender must approve the sales contract before the sale can close. Basically what the bank is approving is the sale price and closing costs are reasonable, so they net the most money possible. They then send over a letter stating they will take the lower payoff amount. Short sales are time consuming and can take up to six months to get approval. Also there is no guarantee that your lender will approve the sale.

The government is working on a plan to shorten the process up by offering lenders and buyers incentives to participate in a successful short sale closing. The proposed plan is in the works now and hopefully will be implemented shortly. Currently the government is putting a tremendous amount of pressure on banks to cooperate with short sales.

I have found that most every short sale we handle is approved in one way or another by the lender or bank. The biggest issue is the time it takes. If the government wants to fix this problem, they could mandate a response in, say 30 days from receipt of full short sale package from the seller or their representative. Yes, or NO. That is all we need. Instead, most banks take 30 days just to log in, review and assign your package. That is the problem with this system and why it takes so long!

Your Realtor’s Role

Talk to your local Realtor about selling your home via a short sale process if you owe more on your mortgage than your home is worth in today’s real estate market.  An experienced short sale Realtor is the only person who can help you sell your home with a short sale because they can market your home to the largest pool of buyers by placing it in the MLS, and advertising it on the Internet, newspapers, magazines and holding open houses.

A Realtor can give you the information on how to price the home properly so that you will be able to save your home from foreclosure by finding a qualified buyer who will purchase it. The Realtor will work with your lender or your short sale negotiator once a contract is obtained to help the process move along and get your home closed.

Some Realtors negotiate directly with your lender and others use a title company, professional negotiator or attorney to do the negotiations. The Realtor will keep you and the buyer and the buyer’s agent informed on the process from beginning to end.

We are certified short sale experts that work with a professional negotiator who has an 80% success rate with short sales, that compared to the 30% industry average for approvals.

Short Sale Negotiator’s Role

Many homeowners choose to hire an experienced short sale negotiator to get their short sale approved by their lender as soon as they have an accepted contract with a qualified buyer. The negotiator’s role is to:

• Send all the required paperwork to get the short sale approved to your lender in a timely manner.
• Negotiate the short sale approval with your lender.
• Coordinate the process with your Realtor, the buyer, your attorney, the title company and escrow holder to make sure everyone is informed about the status and the closing date.
• Lastly, their role is to know the different banks and their systems. Have back doors, know someone to help with issues and understand how to get around bank obstacles.

A short sale is a great option to use if you need to sell your home and avoid a foreclosure. We have great success closing many short sales. In fact, we closed a dozen in the past few months.

Mortgage or Loan Modification

If you are planning on keeping your home, then a mortgage modification or refinance might be a better option.  You may qualify for a mortgage modification if you are about to default or are behind in your mortgage payments. A mortgage modification modifies your existing mortgage. Your lender agrees to reduce your interest rate, add your arrearages to the back end of the loan and/or extend your loan term. Under the government’s Home Affordable Mortgage Modification Program, lenders get an incentive from the government for approving the modification. To find out more, please visit the government’s website at:  http://www.financialstability.gov/. You should educate yourself about similar programs in your local area as well that are available to help you obtain assistance with a mortgage modification.

The Cameron Team is available to help you with your mortgage modification.  We can help, call or make a private request through our website:  www.NoForeclosureAZ.com.

Refinance

When you refinance your loan, you get a new loan which pays off your old mortgage. The refinance interest rate is lower, making your monthly mortgage payment affordable. You need to have some equity in your home to refinance.  Check with your lender to find out what type of refinance programs are available as well as your local state agencies.  We work with many area lenders, and can refer you to one of our reputable lenders. You may also want to learn more about the government’s Home Affordable Refinance Program by visiting their website at http://makinghomeaffordable.gov/.

Other Options:

• Deed in lieu of foreclosure. Sign the deed and return the home back to your lender.
• Selling your home if you have equity.
• Reinstatement. Pay your arrearages current.
• As a last resort, filing bankruptcy.  But believe it or not, this can have its advantages over foreclosure.

Before you make any decisions, talk to your lender, mortgage broker or real estate agent and/or consult with your real estate attorney. We also offer to our clients a referral to an attorney that offers our clients a FREE 15 minute consultation.

For a FREE packet of information about how to avoid a Foreclosure, go to www.NoForeclosureAZ.com

Or

Are you ready to take advantage of this market? Do you want advanced notice to new bank owned properties before they hit the market? www.ArizonaBankDeals.com see new foreclosure homes before most other agents even know they exist!