The dilemma of short sales!

Two thirds of homes in Las Vegas have negative equity. That means if someone wants to avoid foreclosure, but needs to sell their house, they need to consider a short sale. A short sale is where the house is worth less than what is owed on it.

Logic would say that it may be better for a bank to negotiate a short sale rather than let a home go to foreclosure. One big advantage to this from my experience is that short sale homes are usually in much better condition than foreclosures.

When I reflect back to when short sales began increasing I was not prepared that the banks would not get them closed and foreclosure was the outcome. It makes me wonder if the banks had sold these homes would we now see as much reduction in our home values.

Only about ten percent of short sale homes actually close escrow. You never hear any discussion about this on the news. We only hear about foreclosures. I wish they would talk more about the failure of the short sale process. Then, maybe then we could see a reduction in foreclosures thus helping our Real Estate Market stabilize.

The buzz now is that those sinking in debt should just let their houses go. The bank will ultimately take a loss so why not do it sooner than later?

Does anyone disagree with me?