MANY KANSAS CITY HOMEOWNERS GET AWAY WITH DEFAULTING ON MORTGAGE PAYMENTS FOR YEARS.... Never realizing the long-term impact of all of those missing payments on their credit scores.

MANY KANSAS CITY HOMEOWNERS GET AWAY WITH DEFAULTING ON MORTGAGE PAYMENTS FOR YEARS....

Never realizing the long-term impact of all of those missing payments on their credit scores.

Reggie and his wife Barbara called and asked me to help them market their home for a short sale.  We had an in-depth telephone conversation prior to our meeting.

I was shocked to hear they hadn’t made a payment in over 2 years.

Some homeowners have discovered that if they want to default on their mortgage payments and let their home fall into foreclosure, they might be able to do so and get away with it for years, according to a recent CNN Money report.

“Thanks to record long waits for foreclosure reviews this year, 40 percent of homeowners in default have been sitting pretty in their homes for the last two years without paying a dime,” writes Business Insider.

The foreclosure process can take much longer depending on where you live. In Florida, the process averages 1,027 days — nearly three years. In D.C., foreclosure averages 1,053 days and delinquent borrowers in New York often stay in their homes for an average of 906 days.
Nationwide, the average time it takes to process a foreclosure — from the first missed payment to the final foreclosure auction — has climbed to 674 days from 253 days just four years ago, according to LPS Applied Analytics.

“It is happening and it’s happening more frequently,” says Chantay Bridges, a senior real estate specialist with Clear Choice Realty & Associates. “[Homeowners] know they have a least a year [for the foreclosure to go through], at minimum, and people are taking advantage of it.”

This isn’t to say that all borrowers are defaulting. But still, nearly 40 percent of homeowners in default have not made a payment in at least two years, according to LPS.

Some market analysts are convinced homeowners are simply not paying because they’re aware of how long it will take for the lender to foreclose. There is rarely a dispute over non-payment, said David Dunn, a partner at law firm Hogan Lovells in New York, who represents banks and other financial institutions in foreclosure cases.

Yet here is the issue; Just because you CAN avoid making a payment, doesn’t mean you SHOULD.

The downside is that this will kill your credit, and whenever the hardship you are currently facing is OVER, you are left with a tattered credit report and an awful position to purchase a new home.

Better to pursue a course of action that will enable you to meet long-term goals....Let’s get a cup of coffee and talk.

RE/MAX sells more homes than any other real estate company.
For a reason...should we talk?

Blog post written by the Dowell Taggart Team of RE/MAX Premier Realty 

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