subject: Avoid Foreclosure With A Short Sale [print this page] With the collapse of the real estate market many homeowners in Las Vegas are facing foreclosure. However an option to having the bank take over ownership of a house is to sell it before the foreclosure is sent to auction. For many homeowners a short sale in Las Vegas is their best hope for avoiding having a foreclosure reported on their credit. By working through an attorney who can negotiate with the mortgage company, people that are behind in the payments and who have received a letter of default can work to reduce the amount of money that they own to their lender and sell their house before the bank takes possession of it.
Short sales are so called, because the money that is due on the mortgage is less than the amount that the lender may accept to cover the debt. Shorting the difference in the value of the money owed, the banks are willing to negotiate for less than the homeowner owes them because they are willing to take a reduced portion of their money rather than losing all of it. Because so many homes are in default in Las Vegas, the mortgage lenders stand to lose hundreds of millions of dollars through foreclosures. By avoiding taking ownership of the properties the banks can save money on legal fees and other expenditures to have the homeowner evicted.
As a viable option for people that must sell their house before they lose it to the bank and are blacklisted from applying for another home loan for a number of years, the ability to find a buyer that is willing to offer a lower price for the home than what is owed on the mortgage, is helping many Las Vegas residents to escape their mounting debts, interest charges and late fees. Even though the term short sale refers to the shortage of the loan and not the amount of time a house can be sold in, there are some individuals that believe they can quickly climb out from underneath their mortgage with a short sale.
The truth is that a short sale in Las Vegas can take up to a year to be completed and for the buyer that has offered to purchase a house that amount of time can be an eternity. However, there is good news for the seller, and that is that while the banks and attorneys are negotiating the short sale Las Vegas residents can continue to live in their home without having to make a payment on it, during the six months to a year that the negotiations are going on.
