RISMEDIA, April 30, 2010—Equator LLC is now an official RE/MAX Approved Supplier. Equator is the exclusive Web portal for listing, managing and closing the short sale and REO (foreclosed property) transactions of 7 of the top 10 banks in the U.S. Equator’s recently developed short sale tracking process provides much needed transparency to more efficiently move properties off the market.
“Since distressed properties now make up about 40% of the marketplace, our industry needs a way to effectively market and sell these properties,” says Mike Ryan, Senior Vice President, RE/MAX University. “This relationship with Equator means that more short sale and REO experts in the RE/MAX network will be able to help struggling homeowners and the asset managers who manage their files to find swift and appropriate solutions.”
The new RE/MAX Approved Supplier relationship – Equator’s first partnership with a major real estate franchisor – is the result of an April 5 live broadcast from the RE/MAX University studios in Denver. The broadcast presented the U.S. Treasury Department’s new Home Affordable Foreclosure Alternatives (HAFA) short sale guidelines that took effect that day. Among the program’s guests was Equator CEO Chris Saitta who provided key information to the audience of RE/MAX associates about Equator’s online resources designed to assist consumers who are pursuing alternatives to foreclosure and the lending institutions who hold their mortgages.
Homeowners who are upside down on their mortgages and have not been able to receive a loan modification under the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) may still qualify for a short sale based on new HAFA guidelines. This means banks may be willing to approve a sale of a home for less than the balance of the borrower’s loan.
“RE/MAX and Equator share a commitment to short sale and REO training for real estate agents,” Saitta says. “Equator proactively created a HAFA based solution for its bank clients that has already allowed them to handle more than 150,000 short sales, while other servicers are just now thinking about how to handle them.”
For more information, visit www.remax.com.
