Buying A Home
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Is this short sale fee legit?

We submitted an offer on a short sale to the bank a couple of weeks ago. My agent tells me this week that now all of a sudden, there is a 3rd party short sale negotiator involved.

 This 3rd party is insisting we use their attorney to close as opposed to the attorney my agent uses (not a huge deal to us), they would "prefer" that we use their mortgage company (as opposed to the company I've already been working with an preapproved for AND now they are telling us there is a 2% fee to be paid to this 3rd party

Apparently of the 2% my agent pays .5%, the seller's agent pays .5% and we have to pay the other 1% which is over $3000. The seller pays nothing.

Anyone hear of this? My agent said he never had this happen before.

I googled it and I'm seeing all different answers from buyers are not supposed to pay the 3rd party fees because it's fraud to it's common and acceptable for the buyer to pay.  Huge range there. 

My agent wants me to walk away from the house but we really don't want to do that.  

Just wondering if anyone had this happen.  

Re: Is this short sale fee legit?

  • I'm confused. Is the third party affiliated with the bank?  What does the attorney you are already working with say?

    ETA: Personally I think it is sketchy that they are insisting you use a specific attorney and mortgage company.  I do not know if I'd be comfortable with it because I would worry about the legal advice I was getting and if I was getting the best mortgage possible.
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  • According to my agent, the seller's agent is not comfortable handling a short sale so she suggested using the 3rd party.

    I hadn't really started working with any particular attorney since we are still waiting to see if the bank accepted our offer. However once we began the closing process, we were just going to use the attorney that my agent normally uses. The 3rd party won't allow us. That has my agent more upset than I am.

    I've been doing a lot of googling and apparently 3rd party negotiators are more and more common and they pass their 1% fee on to the buyers. Then they lower the buyers and sellers agents' commisions from 3% to 2.5% each.

    So everyone pays BUT the seller. I'm reading everything from it's fraud to it's perfectly normal. Sigh.

    I feel like in 2011 that a real estate agent should know how to handle a short sale. The whole thing is weird.  

  • I wouldn't suggest paying it.. On short sales, the seller should always pay for any negiotiators, as they are the sellers! I'm an agent and we are always told not to listen to the "fees" out there, as generally they aren't legit, or some kind of scamming company. Be cautious!
  • imageSydney02:

    According to my agent, the seller's agent is not comfortable handling a short sale so she suggested using the 3rd party.

    Then why the heck would they take a listing that was a short sale??? 

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