step one and counting

so... i put an offer in on the house today. you wouldn't believe how low it was. i'm not going to disclose any specifics until after i see what is going to happen, but i'll say that in this market, nothing is too ridiculous. i could have offered the asking price and they still could have rejected it. the reason is that this is a short sale. this is a new term in many markets since the real estate avalanche, so if you don't know what this is here is the long story short of a short sale (bwahaha):

the house is in pre-foreclosure. neither the sellers nor their lender want it to go to the f-land. the seller wants to save their credit and the lender wants to avoid any extra liability in a decreasingly poor market. so a short sale is a deal between the two of them: the seller gets as much as they can for the house, below the amount they owe, and pray that the lender takes pity and also accepts the offer, then just writes off the remaining debt. this is still not great for the seller's credit report but it's better than a foreclosure.

so firstly, the seller has to accept my offer. they probably will because they are so desperate to get the property off their hands. then the bank decides if they'll take it. this is where it's a crap shoot, and it's a 60-day long one at that. the bank could take up to TWO MONTHS to decide if they will take it or leave it. so this is a long wait, but please keep your fingers crossed for me. if each blog reader takes a portion of the 60 days to cross their fingers, the less painful it will be. i'll take days 1-5 and days 55-60. please volunteer for the time in between!