If you haven’t figured it out by now the bpo (also known as broker’s price opinion) is the most important part of the entire short sale process. You could have a nice house, cooperative sellers, cooperative buyers and easy bank to deal with all with a completely filled out neat short sale pkg but if the bpo doesn’t not come in at the right number you can pretty much bag the deal in most cases….
What is the bpo for?
The bpo is usually done by a realtor and ordered by a bank. Some lender require a full fledged appraisal. Realtors seem to get what is going on in the market place and are able to determine what a house will really sell for as opposed to an appraiser believe it or not. The bank needs a bpo ordered on every single deal so that they can determine what the market value and condition of the property is. Whatever this number comes in at they typically need to net 80-95% of that. It is VERY important that you or someone qualified is present when the bpo is done(In other words if you just give the lockbox code to the agent when he/she calls you for access you might as well just bag the deal 90% of the time because it will usually come in too high).
