Originally posted at www.bigbearilluminated.com

In today's uncertain market, never count your chickens until they are hatched. Even if the buyer seems rock solid, the carpet can be pulled out from under your feet at a moments notice. Lenders are canceling programs at a rate that is difficult to comprehend. They will preapprove your buyer at one rate, only to change it the next day.

A perfect example of this happened to me this week. My buyer was, in my opinion, very solid. He has a long term job and is paid a good salary. As I always do, I asked questions to ascertain his ability to buy on our appointment together. He has already been approved for an FHA loan on a home off the mountain he decided against purchasing. He was very certain he would have no problem getting preapproved again through the same lender as nothing had changed but the location of the home. As a matter of fact, the new place was significantly less.

Our first day out, we found a house which he really loved. It was a great property, well priced, in a very sought after neighborhood. We made a solid offer and it was accepted. The battle is half over, right? Nope. The next thing we know, he isn't eligible for the FHA loan because his job is too far away from the house. I didn't know that you had to be in an area within a certain distance from your job. I should have suspected. I closed a property with a CalHFA loan a few months back and they made us jump through so many hoops I felt like a circus animal. So the FHA loan was out.

His lender felt like she could get it done with a conventional loan, so we went that route. For the FHA loan, he only needed 5% down. Guess what, for a conventional loan there are zero 95/5 LTV's available. There was a possible scenario where the seller would carry 10% for two years with monthly interest only payments, but he wasn't interested. So, we investigated 90/10 LTV loans. It took several days, but we finally found one, but they raised the interest rate from 6.1% to 7.8%. The difference in the monthly payment was around $300 dollars. That is a huge raise in a monthly payment for most people. This pretty much sank the deal. We eventually found another loan but they wanted 20% down and he just didn't have it.

So, in a nutshell, be prepared for anything in these crazy times. I have had some deals I thought would never work, go through and some that I felt were sure bets, fall to pieces before my eye's. It's almost enough to make a grown man cry. In the end, I was very happy that my buyer did everything he possibly could to make this work. So many times, people will just make us work our tails off with no intention of really sticking it out. In the end, I know we both did our best and hopefully, when things get better, he will remember my efforts and use me again.