If this past Tuesday’s Conference on the Future of Housing Finance is any indication, the government and its many advisors are still in the agree-to-disagree mode. The conference was supposed to be a prepper for developing a comprehensive housing finance reform proposal to send to Congress in January 2011.

Here’s a Cliff Notes version of what came from the meeting. Conference attendees included Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan, representatives from Bank of America, Wells Fargo, American Enterprise Institute, founder of the largest U.S bond fund Pimco and numerous other economic and housing experts.

Apparently the old saying of getting too many people in a room and you can’t even get them to agree on what to order for lunch rang true at the conference. Sadly, we’re two years into a housing crisis that helped tank the American economy and it seems we are no clearer on how to move forward and out of the muck. Read more here…

Short Sale Daily News is an online publication that I subscribe to.

…as good as the people you have working in it.

I was on Greg’s website reading and learning as much as possible and I came across this article I thought I might share with you. Greg and I have never meet, but I have learned a lot about real estate and how to leverage the internet into my business from him.

I wanted to share this article with you because I feel it is so true – I hope you enjoy!

“I learned this early on and it’s been proven to me time and time again. There
is no way that I could do what I do and no way that our business could be where
it is today without the awesome people that I have on my team.

I feel like I have an eye for talent and am able to quickly see the people who
will make a difference in our company and the people who will not. Sure, we
have hired people over the years who appeared at first glance to be the type
of talent that we needed, but turned out not to be.

Do you know what the best thing to do when you realize that’s the case? Cut
them loose. I don’t mean to be cut throat, and that’s probably the furthest from
an accurate description of me and my personality, but when you recognize that
someone is not going to make the type of impact that they need to make on your
company, it’s best for you and for them, to let them go. There are just certain
people who will not fit in to the type of work environment that we have
here, no matter how hard they try.

But when you find the right people with the right talent, your company will quickly
soar to heights you may not have even expected”. Read more here…

A report released recently claims that cases of false reporting in mortgages rose 7% in 2009. The report notes that this rise is far less than previous years thanks to increased industry reporting and policing. But these measures can’t keep everyone safe.

Fraudsters look for vulnerable homeowners who are desperate and confused by their situation. The legal and financial hoops that borrowers need to go through to save or sell their homes can make them prime targets for those seeking to take advantage of them.

The report urges companies in the mortgage industry to reevalutate how they oversee their processes and file fraud incidence reports. Fraud schemes are only going to get more complicated.

The number one trick to look out for is application misrepresentation. Second in the list is fraud regarding appraisal and misrepresenting value.

If fraud isn’t curbed, the industry is going to have to take drastic action to combat the risk involved. This could have negative consequences on everyone’s ability to complete short sales and do other transactions.

If you’re involved in a short sale on whatever side of the deal, make sure you get all the facts and legal jargon clear. You might just wind up getting yourself (and the rest of us) in hot water.

At the end of 2010, the Federal Housing Administration was holding 60,739 properties that it has essentially repossessed by foreclosure. This number was up a staggering 47% from 2009. When this number is combined with the REO holdings of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the U.S government has approximately 360,000 REO properties on its books. With those kind of numbers, the American government has clearly gone into the real estate business (whether it wanted to or not). It may as well form a real estate company!

And that doesn’t include the inventory to be added in 2011 or any shadow inventory. According to Capital Economics, the FHA alone has nearly 600,000 mortgages in serious delinquency. No word on Fannie and Freddie estimates.

What this means is the government’s real estate holdings will clearly be increasing again in 2011. Hey Uncle Sam, I have a few good investors, give me a call and perhaps we can take some of those off your inventory!

Based in Atlanta, Amy Ransdell founded The Southeastern Group Loss Mitigation and licensed Home Team in 2005. Five years later, this morphed into Southeastern Realty Group, of which Amy’s Southeastern Home Team, comprised of several members (and growing!), remains an integral part. Amy has rehabbed homes, sells real estate, works regularly with real estate investors, is an investor herself, negotiates short sales, continues to expand her real estate team, has become a much-sought-after Mastery Coach for FortuneBuilders, and regularly writes articles with a bite for Creative Real Estate Daily and Short Sale Daily News. Follow her today on Twitter, ActiveRain, or LinkedIn.

Posted on 28 February 2011 Amy Ransdell for Short Sale Daily News

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