In Danger of Losing Your Home?

In today's turbulent financial times, many homeowners are struggling to make their monthly payments. Many are staring foreclosure and the possibility of being homeless right in the face. Whether you have lost your job, had your adjustable rate mortgage make your payments impossible, or simply think you can't sell because you owe more than the home is worth, you need to know there are solutions.

Most lenders don't want to take a home back, especially through the foreclosure process. Why? It costs them too much, they already have way too many defaulted loans to deal with, and then they are still faced with the problem of selling the property if they do take it back. In fact, many lenders are getting "jingle mail." That's where a homeowner simply gives up trying to make their payments, moves out, and mails their keys into the lender. The two most common solutions available to you are either "loan modification" or "short sale." Right now, lenders are much more willing to work with you to modify the structure of your loan so you can stay in your home. If that is not possible, most lenders are also willing to allow you to sell the home for less than you owe and forgive the balance. They will even let you hire a real estate professional to help you with no money out of your pocket! Both of these solutions are complicated, and will usually require the help of an expert. I know some great ones.

There's always an upside!

It is always amazing to me how much the media can impact the minds of consumers, and in turn, our economy. I'm not saying that we don't have some real economic issues to solve, but over the last year, consumer confidence has been beaten up by negative reporting. Issues regarding rising national foreclosure rates, the sub-prime financing market implosion, the credit crisis & frozen credit markets, Wall Street's recent free fall, and today's falling home values are real. At times, it's enough to make anyone want to go hibernate in a cave for the winter!

But before we do that, let's take a look from a little different perspective. What are many of the world's most wealthy people doing right now? They are not panicking... they are buying, not selling. Hop on the Internet and check out what Warren Buffet is doing. He's investing like crazy. Despite all the doom and gloom he evidently sees something extremely positive - OPPORTUNITY.

Over the last 5 years as house prices were racing upward, I remember having hundreds of conversations with parents in the "Baby Boom" generation. Most of them had kids that were either just starting college, or were attending college with the finish line in sight. In virtually every one of these conversations, the parents were wandering how their kids were ever going to be able to afford to buy a home. Well, here's some great news... today I am seeing some incredible homes sell for what they were selling for in 2004/2005! Although it sucks to be a seller in today's market, it's a great time to be a buyer! Right now seller's that need to sell are having to price their homes lower and make concessions (like helping with closing costs, interest rate buy downs, etc.) to get their homes sold. And yes, despite the news stories, home financing is still available (but you do have to have a job and decent credit - go figure!). Remember the old adage "Buy low - sell high?" It hasn't changed. Maybe you should seriously consider that investment property you've been contemplating, or maybe help those kids get into a home!