What is a "short sale" in real estate jargon?

Question

where can i get info about a property in DC regarding liens, judgements, negative info which a title search would accomplish.?

Answer 1

You have more than one question here.  Let me just answer the main one.  A short sale is when the owner of the property owes more on his mortgage (or trust deed) than s/he can sell the property for.  The bank will work with him/her to sell the property and the bank will take less than the value of the mortgage and the seller walks out without tarnishing his/her credit rating- However the owner will usually not get a penny out of the sale.  Needless to say the owners aren't very motivated for a short sale to go thru so they aren't usually very cooperative.  And- the longer they put the sale off the longer they get to live in the house often without making payments.  Also since both the non-cooperative owner and the bank he/she has a adversarial relationship with have to agree on the terms it can take weeks and weeks for an offer to be accepted.  The biggest problem I see is they aren't even a good deal yet.  If you're thinking of buying a short sale you might be better off letting it go into foreclosure then picking it up at a better price without all the headaches of the other two parties that hate each other basically not working with you.