Worst to best with a flaw

Two years ago when a client told me they wanted me to short sale their home and their lender was Wells Fargo, I would visibly cringe. Dealing with Wells Fargo in those days was a nightmare. They didn’t have sufficient staffing to handle the requests, their process was weak and it took so long that when you got the approval the buyer had moved on so you had to start all over and nobody at Wells cared. Today they are one of the fastest, they make status update calls to you and often you can deal with the negotiator through email.

There flaw is bizarre. When they have more than one loan on a property they have not figured out how to let one negotiator manage their interest. You have to deal with two different departments, each with their own interest so they double the work for themselves and believe it or not the junior lien holder part of Wells Fargo often kills the deal because they demand more money than the other department is willing to pay for the lien release. They should be embarrassed!

If you want to read more about short sale negotiations, check out my weekly real estate column, “Getting Short Sales Done,” over at Rocklin and Roseville Today and reprinted at Sacramento Today.