June 4th, 2010 - Beware of the real estate agent recommended by a radio talk host!
Ok here’s my rant today… I recently listened to a radio talk show host who is a wizard in helping you get out of debt…I thought; now here is a person who is a consumer advocate and he cares about his listeners. So I called to see how I might be added to his list of preferred agents and was told that I don’t close enough sales to warrant being one of his preferred agents! So of course I said: I don’t get it.. I would have to sell at least 150 houses a year to become one of your preferred agents? That breaks down to 12.5 houses a month! ~ It isn’t even possible to represent 12.5 people buying houses in one month.. How could I possibly actually represent my clients if I tried to juggle 12.5 clients a month? That is insane! To which his representative said: well unless you are producing that many sales, we won’t recommend you. So the real truth is they are making tons of money recommending discount real estate brokers to his listeners and it is not actually about the quality of the agent, it is about the amount of money the agent makes the radio talk show host! So it is simply a numbers game.
If it walks like a greedy person, sounds like a greedy person then it is indeed a greedy person.. so beware. The money is in the recommending, not the actual wanting to help consumers.
June 19th, 2010 at 4:20 pm
Noel: The loan modifications are bank specific. There are some banks that are anxious to help the borrower keep their house.. but some banks are not going to work with you no matter what if you are late on the payments.. So the first thing to do is to go to the bank and ask for a modification. You will have to send them a hardship letter explaining why the late payments, ie: loss of job, illness, etc. The borrower still has to have an income or they won’t listen.
There is another way through HUD. HUD approved counsleors are free to the borrower and loan modifications are done at no charge. There is no need to pay a fee to a so called “loan modification expert”.