The white Board

Tom is making lists of things to accomplish. He had me pick up a white board and dry erase pens. Fred Meyers didn't have a big one, neither did Walgreens. My next stop was Ace before I would have to drive out of town to Walmart to find a white board. As I have said before, Ace is a great, helpful store. Right by the front door they had a white board, and just the right size, not too big and not too small. They had one last pack of dry erase pens to go with the board.

Now, in my living room, rather than a painting on the wall, I have a 2 foot by 4 foot board that Tom is putting lists of chores up each day. I haven't looked today. I am still overwhelmed by all that needs doing.

The Real Estate agents came yesterday. They will run the comps and list the house on Thursday. We are not letting a day go by without accomplishing something on a grand scale. I have less than two weeks to get the house ready to show to agents for their Tuesday walk about.
With our neighbor's house already being shorted, our price will be comparable to theirs, somewhere in the $230,000 to $250,000 range. $100,000 below our purchase price in 2006. If you go to the assessor's page of the county, there are more unqualified comps of closed sales then there are qualified. The quit claims and short sales dominate the market. Mostly they are quit claims. Probably because the banks are refusing the short sale offers.

There is a huge back log of vacant houses. The banks are clueless as to the giant mess they continue to create by not allowing the the short sale houses to move off the market by being sold. This is the time to do a walk away if you have any inclination. You will be one of a great mass of people, the majority of the country. When your credit score is checked a few years down the road, the response will be " Oh, you were part of the great housing walk away of 2010 and 2011, understandable."

We have a straight up mortgage loan, 80/20. The house is the collateral. I have already paid the taxes for the year and the insurance. The bank would take the keys back willingly if the house was worth more than the loan. If it were a business loan and the business were going under, the bank would take the assets. That is how it works. Take the emotion out and make the hard decision. Hopefully, if enough homes backlog the system, the banks will stop trying to get blood out of the stone and let go.

Meanwhile, we will wait. Our mortgage company told me they would not talk to us until we were three months late on our mortgage payments. They probably wont even consider a short sale for six months. We have to find a buyer first anyway. If I were a buyer I'd wait.

Tom and I have almost perfect credit, way up around 780. Now we must purposefully stop paying the mortgage, that is the system. We can live in our home rent free for months, the bank told us it was the only way. They would not work with us until we stopped paying. OK by me.

I will continue to look in Longview for someplace we like, but free rent is good at the moment. The mortgage will be the only late payment we have. I think history will show this era as the great housing walk away, unless the banks start loosening up. They can't always be the winners. But I am staying away from bank stocks for a while.

When we initially bought the house our mortgage changed hands three times in less than a month. We will see who still owns it in six months. There is a program called HAFA. Its an Obama program. Once we miss our three months we can apply. The bank gets paid the difference between the short sale and what we owe by the good old government. We can even receive $3000 towards moving expenses. The bank never has to feel the pain. Then they will probably sit on the house waiting for the markets to turn round while they collect more vacant homes in their portfolio.

Don't think buyers are looking at those vacant homes in the neighborhood wondering what will happen to them. Could someone just move in and start paying utilities. Would the bank even know there were squatters. I see a nightmare happening.

I checked every address in our old neighborhood in Longview. Solid, not a bank owned home except for the property we want. Unlike our neighborhood where we are living now. Overbuilt and crashing. We are rats abandoning the ship. The last scene in Fiddler on the Roof comes to mind with the Jews walking way with all they can carry, headed for America. "Tradition, tradition".

So, we make our lists and pack our bags, and read the white board for our chores.