Steve:

Unfortunately, as a potential buyer of a short sale property, your options to get information or to expedite the process are very limited. A lot of times, the first mortgage lender for the seller will respond to your offer in a reasonable period of time. Where the hangups generally occur is when there is also a second mortgage on the home and the parties are trying to settle on the amount the second will receive from the sale. I recently represented a buyer on a short sale offer and the first signed off on the offer within 48 hours....the second took 4 months.

You should be able to withdraw your offer without forfeiture of your earnest money if you do so within the dates and deadlines on your contract. Check with your agent for clarification on that matter. You can then submit another offer at a different price but you will have to go through the cycle again with the seller, first mortgage lender and second, if there is one.

Many times, the seller's agent even has a difficult time getting information and updates from the lenders involved and I have seen several short sales fail because the Public Trustee Sale comes up before the short sale in consummated. Then the home generally becomes a bank owned property and it becomes a slightly different process becuase the original home owner is no longer in the picture.

As Vickie said, patience is definitely the name of the game. If you can hold out and be patient, you should have the opportunity to make a great purchase of a property with built-in equity.

Once a property goes into a foreclosure, the length of time to get any information lengthens significantly. Departments and employees inside the banks that are dealing with foreclosed properties are overwhelmed by the shear volume of inquiries and the lack of resources available to them. As a result, ,they are slow in getting back with answers. Unfortunately, there isn't anything you can do, or that your buyers agent can do to move the process along more quickly. Your Buyer's Agent should be able to find out from the Listing Agent though, or from the bank directly (that owns the property) where they are in the process. This would at least give you some indication as to how much longer it could potentially take.

Talk to your Buyers Agent about submitting a lower price offer. Depending upon where your offer is in the process, (i.e., if it hasn't been accepted yet), you should be able to withdraw your offer, and submit a new offer at a lower price.

Patience is definitely the name of the game when it comes to buying properties in foreclosure. If your time line alows you to wait it out, however, the benefit is of course that you can purchase a property at a much lower cost than a property being sold at market value.

If your time line is getting to the point where it is more immediate, then I suggest you speak to your Buyers Agent about withdrawing your offer, and looking for a property that is not in foreclosure.

Good luck!

Is the home foreclosed on? If so the bank should own it.
Sometimes it takes 6 or more months for short sales to come together and there is no way to speed up the process. You need to ask your buyers agent about the offer part of the question