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bleigh_gw

Hardship Short Sale

bleigh
13 years ago

Anyone have any experience with a hardship short sale? We are finding ourselves considering going this route, but it's painful and very scary. Painful because it would be hard to just pack up and walk away from our home. Scary because what happens to us financially? Definitely not taking this lightly and do plan on speaking with an attorney in the near future, but in the meantime my mind is full of "what ifs."

The reason for the short sale...we've been on the market for over six months. Our decision to sell is almost solely based on my husband's deteriorated eyesight. His commute is about 55 miles one way through Atlanta and can spend anywhere from 2-4 hours commuting a day. He has a disease of the cornea that has progressively worsened over the last year and the contacts that gave him great vision have been rejected (which now makes him a candidate for cornea transplants). So now he's barely legal to drive in the state of GA with his current lenses and has severe eye strain by the time he's commuting home. He doesn't know this, but I've noticed his depth perception seems really off too especially at night. Bottom line, it's not safe for him to be in this commuting situation for much longer.

We just lowered our asking price by 10K which is our absolute rock bottom. We can't go any lower. Looking at house prices in the area I'm not confident we can get a full price offer. We just had a short sale close in our neighborhood for $110,ooo (we're listed at $139,900). While we have put alot into this house and it looks great, it still needs a new roof, has some Louisiana Pacific siding left, new windows and HVAC. While these items are still functional they will be an issue for most buyers. I've given a rough estimate of about $15-20K of work that still needs to be done. We are already under our purchase price by more than 5K...not to mention the several thousand we've already put in. At this point we're just throwing away money on anything we do to this house. Which would be ok if we were able to stay here for a few more years.

I did talk with our mortgage lender (Wells Fargo), but still can't believe the advice I was given. The rep was very nice and sympathized with my husband's situation. She said his safety comes first and what we would need to do is just move. Move right on out of our house and into one closer to his work, get a month behind on our payments and then file for a hardship short sale. I forgot to ask her if they would come after us for the difference and how long this would affect our future ability to buy another house. Thankfully we're planning on renting for at least a couple of years.

Neither of us is excited about doing a short sale. We can afford our house and my husband is really having a hard time coming to terms of walking away. I admit I am more concerned with keeping him safe and getting him out of the commute. I think my biggest fear is the bank coming for the difference. The credit hit or our buying ability does not scare me too much.

I know this is a long story about my situation. I guess I'm hoping someone has been through a similar situation and can share their experience. Appreciate any advice.

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