That’s right…$128 large. Here’s some math. The program from TARP that was to help homeowners modify their loan, has to date helped 390,000 homeowners. On its own merit, that sounds excellent! What a talking point! Here’s another number $50,000,000,000 (fifty billion dollars, if I were to spell it out on a check) is the budget for this little corner of the TARP blanket. Take $50 billion and divide it by 390,000 and you arrive at $128,000.
Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for TARP was most critical, calling the program “one of the greatest failures” by the Treasury Department, because it lacked clear goals. (Seriously, that many pages and we couldn’t get our goals clear?!) Elizabeth Warren, Chairwoman of the Congressional Oversight Panel and Richard Hillman, managing director of financial markets and community investment at the Government Accountability Office (!) echoed the criticism as well.
What it all boils down to is this: People are living in homes they cannot afford to live in. It really doesn’t matter at this point whose fault it is. We can figure that out later. In the aggregate our country is $4 trillion dollars upside down in our homes and something has to be done. The government has come up with north of 15 programs, which have helped only a handful of homeowners. The government cannot force these programs upon banks and investors (and they won’t even participate in their own programs (!)
The only “Hope for Homeowners”, in most cases, is to look the situation square in the face and determine what is going to help them have a better life five years down the road and bring the most permanent feeling of peace of any of the options before them. In almost every case, a Realtor is the only person who can provide that peace. A Realtor is the only person with the tools to sell the home quickly, help the homeowner find a nice rental for the next couple of years and work with a company like Complete Short Sale Processors www.completeshortsaleprocessors.com (shameless plug) to process a short sale transaction. Of course, we always recommend that a homeowner contact a Real Estate Attorney to go over their options and help provide legal counsel. (we provide one at no charge in most states-another shameless plug…)
Our services do not cost any out of pocket expense to the buyer, seller or either realtor…ever. If you are a Realtor and finding cleints and providing them with relief is of interest to you, send me a message, so I can learn more of your current situation.
Trent from CSSP
marketing@completeshortsaleprocessors.com
The market is definitely distressed out here as well, BIG TIME! We’ve also made a niche helping home owners avoid a foreclosure with a short sale.