What sells in PDX: Short Sales, REOs, or Traditional Home Sales?

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2011 Portland MLS market statistics.

Foreclosures in Portland: In rough terms, nearly 100% of foreclosure properties in Portland, also known as REOs, sell in a 6 month period. If you are looking to buy or make an offer on a Portland foreclosure, know this: it won’t stick around for long. Banks do not take low ball offers, in general they sell the property site unseen. I have found banks will typically lower the sales price in Portland by 3% every 60 days or so. This means that they will eventually bring the foreclosure to a price that demands the market’s attention and gets the home sold in short order. It is common for a Portland foreclosure to sit for a month or two without any offers and then suddenly after the next price drop (bringing it to “deal” status), multiple offers are received by the bank in short order, and often these competing offers outbid each other so the home sells for more than the previously published price!

Short Sales in Portland: In rough terms, nearly 30% of Portland short sales sell within a 6 month period. Also, 1 out of 5 short sale offers actually succeed. Buying a short sale home in Portland is the hardest way to go about buying a home, but it is not impossible. There are a number of things an informed real estate agent can do to help improve your chances. Since the bank typically deals with one offer at a time, it increases your chances if no other offers have been submitted. If the Portland short sale price is already preapproved by the bank, this also can help to streamline the process – only if you offer exactly what the bank has preapproved. (For those considering selling their home via short sale, I have a 90% sucess rate mostly due to my experience and persistence in working with the banks.)

Traditional Homes Sales in Portland: In rough terms, nearly 50% of traditional home sales in Portland sell within a 6 month period. It is not as easy to buy a Portland home as it was in the past. Many home owners are underwater, bringing money to closing to sell their home, or have limited equity and negotiating room. Just because a property has been on the market for a long time does not mean the Portland homeowner has the equity available to even consider a low ball offer. However, dealing with a Portland homeowner is nearly always easier than dealing with a bank. The process can be much smoother with a greater amount of consideration for both parties. Banks do not play nice, to put it simply. You have to jump through all of their hoops without mercy or the Portland foreclosure or short sale will not succeed.

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What My Clients Are Saying

Stephen was just simply a fantastic realtor to work with in selling our home. If we had another 50 properties to sell, Stephen would be in charge of all of them. He was so professional in handling every detail of our sale, and he was so responsive to every question that came up in the course of our transaction. My wife and I are very thankful that we found Stephen.

Alan