Rant About Santa Clarita Short Sales

Short Sale Santa Clarita Rant
Just an everyday rant about Santa Clarita Short Sales

I tried to stop myself, but I couldn’t. Read between the lines, where you can. Some homeowners need to perform a short sale on their Santa Clarita home. That’s understandable. It’s happened to a lot of people due to home values that plummeted. Things aren’t as dire any longer, in fact, home values in the Santa Clarita Valley have greatly improved over the last year or so. My beef and this rant are dedicated not so much to the homeowners that hire these agents I’ll warn you of below, but to the agents they hire.

Take today for example, and I see this each week by the way…

Today there was a new listing by a company and agent that I won’t name… but this company and agent are based (it appears)… in an area that is NOT Santa Clarita. Ok… that happens. We all do a bit of business in an area we don’t typically specialize in sometimes. But, if you’re going to do business in an area you’re not exactly the most familiar with, come correct and do your homework.

This listing agent today, listed a home that’s easily worth about $425-50k or so. Even if it needs “TLC”. Said list agent, however, listed the home for under $250k. WTF?!

Why would he or she do this?

And why would he or she also note that the area is served by Los Angeles Unified School District?

I know why!

Because described agent is NOT familiar with the area… nor the home values. I can only surmise just that!

What’s happening? Let me tell you what I think.Ā 

Some of these Santa Clarita homeowners are in a bad spot. Financially speaking. When we’re in trouble, who do we turn to? We tend to turn to people we already know. It just so happens that most people know a real estate agent, and or know someone who knows one that they refer to. For some reason, a lot of homeowners in Santa Clarita who are in short sale position, turn to a real estate agent who typically services another area… because that’s who the homeowner knows.

I see a lot of these out of area real estate agents for Santa Clarita short sales, basically drive into the local area and price the home like crap. They do so most likely because: 1) the seller isn’t making a profit anyway and 2) price it low enough and they might just get 20 offers+ in a seller’s market 3) might even pick up a few buyers while they’re jumping into the boat like flying fish

The worst part of this is… some of these listing agents push these short sales through and actually get the banks to approve them at such low prices. Great for the buyers at least. I’m all for buyers getting great deals… but at what expense? How the banks let this happen, I don’t know? Quality control can sometimes be absent. Shocking? Nope! And what’s worst than even that… is that these low priced Santa Clarita short sale closed deals can certainly hurt innocent neighbors’ home values. And what’s the “mostest worstest” of all the worst, is some of these list agents double ended the short sale deal, and then help the buyer flip the property a few months later for a major profit; all on the backs of the seller who sold for too low and the bank who let it happen, whether they knew it or not.

OK…. there’s an inside glimpse into my view of some of the shenanigans that happens in any real estate market… I just hate when it happens so close to home.

If you’re a homeowner looking to short sale your home, turn to an expert in your area. Turn to someone who is professional and trust worthy. Turn to someone who can at least price your home accurately within $100k for Pete’s sake.

Author: Robert Mickalson

Robert Mickalson created the Mickalson Group at Real Brokerage in Santa Clarita. He has been serving home buyers and sellers in and around Santa Clairta, CA for two decades. Robert's passion is to empower his clients with the most relevant housing market information. Bringing a boots on the ground perspective to this blog and also to his newsletter, SCV Cul-de-Scoop, are just a few ways Robert is able to help his clients, and the citizens of North LA County as a whole.