Quote:
Originally Posted by nostatic
About their only hope is short sale and then rent. My g/f is in escrow short selling her house (oddly enough, in Highland Park). She was underwater and had a fairly criminal loan (though not as crazy as your sister's). Her issue was she just didn't make enough money to live close to comfortably. She tried to refi multiple times but since she actually made her payments every month she didn't qualify for any of the programs. She finally decided to short sell and everyone eventually signed off. I think she sold for $249K and owed $375K or something (bought at the peak of the market).
Your sister has a couple of options:
1) stick it out and hope that the value comes back up. Be ready to wait 5-15 years depending.
2) try to short sell. Will likely be stuck renting unless they have a bunch of cash for another down payment. Minimal credit score hit.
3) "strategic default" - walk away. Will be stuck renting and will take a big credit score hit.
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you guys have to tell me these things. I would have love to buy it from her.
HP went way up 5-6 years ago. Nice ones are still in the 300k+ range. Traditionally it was a working class neighborhood. the up swing in the market drove the price up, because there were no affordable housing left. Once the market went south, young working professionals who saved, bought in HP in droves. They still are. There are still hot pockets in LA, but not too many fixed up starter homes on the market. A nice one will come on the market. If you don't make your move, its gone in a couple of days.