Bank of America has launched a nationwide program that offers delinquent mortgage customers increased assistance with relocation expenses – from $2,500 to $30,000 – at the completion of a qualifying short sale.

To qualify for the enhanced relocation assistance payments under the new program, the seller must work proactively with the bank to obtain a preapproved sales price prior to submitting a purchase offer to the bank. A short sale must be initiated by the end of 2012 and close by Sept. 26, 2013, to be eligible for the payment. Qualifying short sales that have already been started but have not closed may be eligible for the relocation assistance.

Frequently Asked Questions:

Q: Do I have to do anything special when initiating or completing the short sale?
A: No. But act quickly by initiating the short sale at agent.equator.com. This is a limited-time offer that your won’t want to miss out on.

Q: If a short sale is initiated with an offer, will it qualify for this relocation assistance?
A: No. This relocation assistance is only available on preapproved price short sale programs. Short sales initiated at the time an offer is received do not qualify for the enhanced relocation assistance funds.

Q: Will the relocation assistance funds be reported on the HUD-1?
A: Yes, funds received at closing will be documented on the HUD-1, and a 1099-MISC will be issued.

Q: Can the relocation assistance funds be used to pay off existing liens?
A: Yes, the homeowner may use funds to pay off existing liens or to help with relocation expenses.

Q: Is the relocation assistance added to any other incentives, such as the HAFA or Bank of America proprietary program incentives?
A: The homeowner incentive will be inclusive of the $3,000 HAFA incentive. For example, if the homeowner is eligible for a $5,000 homeowner incentive, $3,000 will be from the HAFA incentive, and $2,000 will be from the homeowner incentive.

Q: Is the enhanced relocation assistance available for other programs?
A: Currently, the enhanced relocation assistance is only available to short sale programs initiated without an offer. However, as we gauge the success we may extend this incentive to other programs.

It will take 46 months to clear the market’s supply of distressed homes, or the shadow inventory, according to estimates from Standard & Poor’s Rating Services based on first-quarter 2012 data.

The agency’s latest estimate came in one month shy of the liquidation timeline determined in the fourth quarter of 2011.

While national residential mortgage liquidation rates appeared stable over the first three months of this year, these rates varied widely between local markets, which prevented any significant reduction in S&P’s months-to-clear estimate, the agency explained in its report.

Regional variations in how quickly servicers can clear the backlog of nonperforming loans are primarily due to differences in foreclosure procedures, judicial vs. non-judicial.

As of first-quarter 2012, S&P says its months-to-clear estimate in judicial states was almost 2.5x as long as non-judicial states. 

S&P includes in the shadow inventory all outstanding properties on which  the mortgage payments are 90 or more days delinquent, properties in foreclosure, and properties that are REO. The agency also includes 70 percent of the loans that became current, or “cured,” from 90-day delinquency within the past 12 months because S&P says these loans are more likely to  re-default.

S&P’s calculation of the months to clear the shadow inventory is the ratio of the total volume of distressed loans to the six-month moving average of liquidations. Although S&P’s analysis of the shadow inventory uses only non-agency loan data, the agency’s analysts believe the months-to-clear is similarly high for the market as a whole.

The volume of these distressed U.S. non-agency residential mortgages—which excludes loans from government sponsored entities, such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac—remained extremely high at $354 billion in the first quarter, according to S&P. The agency does note, however, that the industry’s distress volume has declined in each quarter since mid-2010.

To put the shadows into perspective, S&P says this latest number, which is based on the original balances of the loans, represents slightly less than one-third of the outstanding non-agency residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) market in the United States.

The New York City metropolitan statistical area (MSA) has the highest months-to-clear in the nation, at 202 months.

S&P also reported that the U.S. monthly first default rate fell to 0.67 percent in March 2012, the lowest level since May 2007. The first default rate is the percentage of loans that became 90-plus-days delinquent in that month for the first time, as a percent of all loans that have never before been at least 90 days or more past due.

This means that properties are entering the shadow inventory at a slower rate. S&P says with this improvement, the speed at which servicers can liquidate or cure nonperforming loans will determine the size of the shadow inventory going forward.

Default rates have been falling since first-quarter 2009 and the average national liquidation rate has stabilized, according to S&P—both factors that  bode well for getting a handle on the magnitude of the industry’s shadow inventory and its inevitable impact.

Source: DSNews.com
Reported by Carrie Bay

With vacant homes stretching the capacity of banks’ balance sheets and homebuyer demand lackluster at best, short sales are becoming a top loss mitigation choice for private lenders and investors, particularly in especially hard-hit markets.

According to Barclays Capital, the benefits of pursuing a short sale are compelling for servicers and investors who are able to liquidate delinquent loans in an expedited fashion with fewer payment and interest (P&I) advances and who take “quasi” possession of the property in better condition and at better prices than REO, lowering severities.

Barclays’ analysts say they’ve found much of the reduction in severities from utilizing a short sale over an REO sale are explained
by better composition and trimmed timelines. While the discount stemming from the stigma associated with an REO due to upkeep and vacancy still plays a role, it accounts for only about 30-40 percent of the severity difference, they explain.

Mark Kunce discusses the qualifications for a Short Sale.

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The number of U.S. home short sales surpassed foreclosure deals for the first time as banks became more agreeable to selling houses for less than the amount owed on their mortgages, according to Lender Processing Services Inc. (LPS) 

Short sales accounted for 23.9 percent of home purchases in January, the most recent month available, compared with 19.7 percent for sales of foreclosed homes, data compiled by the Jacksonville, Florida-based company show. A year
earlier, 16.3 percent of transactions were short sales and 24.9 percent involved foreclosures.

“It’s a fairly recent phenomenon that short sales have been increasing,” Jonathon Weiner, a vice president in the applied analytics division of Lender Processing Services, said in a telephone interview. “Short sales should be the dominant way of disposing of assets” in distress, he said.


Lenders are catching up to short sales after being slow to provide the staffing and incentives necessary to complete the deals, Weiner said. The transactions typically fetch a higher price for banks than sales of homes that  have gone through foreclosure. In January, foreclosed homes sold for an average of 29 percent less than comparable non-distressed properties, compared with a 23 percent discount for short sales, according to Lender Processing Services. The gap has narrowed as short sales become more common, Weiner said.