Banks offering $35K to delinquent homeonwers to sell their homes.

Banks, accelerating efforts to move troubled mortgages off their books, are now offering as much as $35,000 or more in cash to delinquent homeowners to sell their homes. Banks are nudging potential sellers by pre-approving deals, streamlining the closing process, forgoing their right to pursue unpaid debt and in some cases providing large cash incentives, said Bill Fricke, senior credit officer for Moody’s Investors Service in New York. Losses for lenders are about 15% lower on the sales than on foreclosures, which can take years to complete.

I can confirm this to some degree… I was inspecting a short sale, the agent commented that the house across the street was being offered as a short sale and the seller was to receive 20K.

Seems like the sellers should be vested somehow be it by dangling a carrot or not… This could protect buyers from all sorts of things happening… like nobody there when we show up to do the inspection, cabinets missing when someone moves out… and so on.

Without skin in the game, I’ve seen $170K pool systems thrashed beyond all definition, because the owner simply left the pool go to crud and all the pool equipment freeze… whata mess.

I think it’s a good idea… for the most part.