Oh, the new found power of the Short Sale.  Just wondering if anyone else is having problems with these in their area.  We've got lots of agents claiming to be short sale specialists.  Once our clients get excited about a bargain home we're told it will be 30 days or more to get bank approval.  Many of these homes end up withdrawing from the market and later show up on the foreclosure list.  I know our Association of Realtors really frowns on practicing outside of your area of expertise.  As a seasoned pro I've attended short sale classes and ended up feeling like I only knew enough to know this probably wasn't an area I needed to dabble in right now.  I also was told the golden rule is to make contact with the bank in advance, lay out a sound financial statement for the sellers etc.  Yet, I'm finding many of the agents representing these homes in our area don't even know who the lender is.  How can that be???

I'm seeing agents attempt these short sales without a real understanding of how to handle it.  That results in unhappy buyers and unhappy sellers who find out too late that even though they have a buyer in hand, the bank is not going to approve the deal and they are off to foreclosure.

What's more alarming is that most of these sales are SO far below market value ($50k or more) even on homes in good shape?  I'm not understanding what the incentive is for an owner to pursue a short sale when they could just reduce the price below market value, get a quick sale, and not need bank approval.  I'm not speculating on this I've actually seen cases where the Owner has equity at or just below market value and the house is still being sold at an even bigger discount via the short sale.

Anyone with insight is invited to "school" me if I'm missing something here :)