Suggestion for Selling Your Condo
December 9th 2009 09:28 am
As I have mentioned before in one of my updates, selling a condo just got a lot harder because of the new FHA guidelines that require all condo projects to be approved or re-approved as of yesterday. The only way around this is if the project was approved in the last 12 months or if it is a HUD owned property. HUD apparently does not seem to think they need to play by the same rules. Anyway, spot approvals are still allowed up to February 1, 2010 but here is a suggestion to you if you are thinking of selling your condo. Check with an FHA lender to see if the project was approved in the last 12 months. If not, then maybe you would to consider taking it upon yourself to get the proper documentation together to try to get it approved (or have your HOA do it) . The cost could be up into the $400 to $600 range and will require the HOA to fill out a questionnaire and getting some other documentation together, and then it will need to be submitted to FHA for approval. First of all the buyers are not allowed to pay for this process and if you wait until an offer comes in, it might take too long to get it done in time for a closing. In addition, you may be waiting for an offer that never comes in because if the project is not FHA approved then no FHA qualified buyers will likely make an offer in the first place. FHA loans make up a very large portion of the marketplace right now and you as the seller may be cutting yourself off from that portion of the market unless steps are taken to get a project approved up front.There is at least one consultant in town that I know of that will do all of this for you at a fee of around $300 to $400 and then the HOA may charge a fee to fill out the questionnaire.
One more thing, this does not apply to Townhomes with a lot and block legal description.
I know that you may be thinking that this is a lender responsibility but we will only do a loan based on the FHA approval status and we are not compelled to get that approval done. We will facilitate getting it done but from a practical standpoint it just makes sense to get the approvals done up front before the property is on the market.
So if you are considering putting your condo on the market, check out the current status and then consider helping get your project approved up front.
Let me know if you have any questions or comments. Mark
I would also like to ask a favor. I did a loan for a military veteran awhile back and he just got back here to Denver from active duty in Afghanistan. He needs to find employment and is extremely good at anything to do with administration. If you think you may know of a connection for him, please let me know and thank you.
A great site for all things REAL ESTATE is www.insiderealestatenews.com This is edited by John Rebchook, formerly of the Rocky Mtn News.