Melissa Zavala is the Broker/Owner of Broadpoint Properties and Head Honcho of Short Sale Expeditor®. Before landing real estate, she had careers in education and publishing. Many folks say that Melissa is genetically pre-disposed to success with short sales. In fact, last year she and her staff obtained over 500 short sale approval letters! When she isn’t speaking with lien holders, Melissa enjoys practicing yoga, walking the dog, and vacationing at beach resorts.
Melissa has written 79 article(s) for the BiggerPockets Blog.
Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | February 7, 2012 
When I was first invited to write for BiggerPockets, I was told that I had editorial freedom—but I should keep to my all-time favorite subject, short sales. Between the BiggerPockets Blog and my other gigs, I think that I have probably written about 2000 articles about short sales. I also calculate that sometime in 2012, [...]
Read the full article → Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | January 31, 2012 
Crazy, crazy, crazy. One of the agents in my office recently got an assignment for an REO. How exciting!. Agents love REO assignments, and this wasn’t his first. Here’s the crazy part: When I was going over the paperwork, I noticed that the property had been foreclosed upon by the lender in 2008. I couldn’t believe it, so [...]
Read the full article → Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | January 24, 2012Rumors, just like viruses, spread like wildfire. One of the biggest topics that goes through the rumor mill seems to be the subject of the pre-approved short sale. Is there some such a thing as a pre-approved short sale? – a short sale whereby the seller calls the bank and the bank agrees to a short [...]
Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | January 17, 2012If you have ever received a short sale approval letter, you have probably felt quite a strong thrill. All of the drama involved in negotiating a short sale, keeping the buyer and seller content, and finessing the details with the bank make the approval letter feel like a multi-million dollar win on a scratch ticket. Unfortunately, just [...]
Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | January 10, 2012One of my Realtor® friends showed me a letter that her client had received about a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure program (à la Fannie Mae) whereby the seller would receive up to $7500. My friend was a little displeased that her client had received this letter because she was about to close the short sale transaction. [...]
Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | January 3, 2012 
Many people say that 2012 will be the year of the short sale. There are lots of reasons that short sale sellers might be getting off the fence and selling their homes as short sales in the coming year. First off, the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007 is set to come to an [...]
Read the full article → Real Estate by Melissa Zavala | December 27, 2011I’ve been known to say that I am much more popular now, as a short sale aficionado, than I ever was in high school. I’m not vain, and I realize that right now, I actually have something that lots of people want—information about and experience in the distressed property arena. This morning I caught an [...]
Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | December 20, 2011 
With over a year’s worth of contributions here on BiggerPockets, I’ve written a few pretty conversation-worthy articles and some that did not seem to hit home for readers. Here were the reader’s top five faves. If you are thinking about distressed properties and short sales this holiday, maybe you can add these to you bag [...]
Read the full article → Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | December 13, 2011 
People are always surprised when I state that I have an almost perfect success rate in obtaining short sale approval letters. Short sale approval letters are not so difficult to come by. Yes, they often take forever to obtain, but often it is not the short sale approval letter that gets in the way of the closing of the [...]
Read the full article → Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | December 6, 2011 
I had a call last week from a buyer’s agent who was frustrated because the bank did not accept her buyer’s (very low) cash offer on a short sale. In fact, the bank did not even make a counter offer. The bank employee made it clear that the offer was significantly below the BPO value, [...]
Read the full article → Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | November 28, 2011I received an email over the long weekend from an agent who had a short sale question. It seems that his sister needed to sell her home as a short sale. He wanted to buy it, and he wanted to represent both sides in the transaction (remember that California allows dual representation). All I could [...]
Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | November 22, 2011 
Equity investors and folks buying short sales are often involved in a waiting game—only to learn at the end that the bank is not interested in their offer because their offer price is too low. But there are other factors that can impact the closing of a short sale at the eleventh hour that have [...]
Read the full article → Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | November 15, 2011 
Triage is a form of prioritizing patients in an emergency room so that those with the most severe or life threatening injuries are attended to prior to those that have milder injuries. While reviewing multiple offers has little to do with medical emergencies, it is vital for listing agents to consider and prioritize offers based [...]
Read the full article → Commentary by Melissa Zavala | November 8, 2011 
On September 7, Kerry Curry wrote an interesting article on Housing Wire entitled “New Normal Means a Lot More Pain to Come.” I read the article, which addresses our existing housing market. In it, an economist for the Federal Reserve Bank in St. Louis discusses how our “new normal” in housing is marked by 2% [...]
Read the full article → Short Sales by Melissa Zavala | November 1, 2011 
When checking out newspapers and magazines and even the Internet, I see many agents who advertise that a short sale transaction can be closed at no cost to the seller. When I see those ads, I always look for the fine print (and I do not always see any). When you take a short sale listing, [...]
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by Melissa Zavala | November 8, 2011On September 7, Kerry Curry wrote an interesting article on Housing Wire entitled “New Normal Means a Lot More Pain to Come.” I read the article, which addresses our existing housing market. In it, an economist for the Federal Reserve Bank in St. Louis discusses how our “new normal” in housing is marked by 2% [...]