California Divorce & Real Estate – Important Issues To Consider
In this interview we talk about all the things you will want to consider when going through a divorce and what to do with your home or other real estate.
We talk about important issues related to Divorce and Real Estate such as:
- When to consult with a Real Estate Agent during divorce
- How to agree on a Realtor of choice when getting divorced
- Is using two Realtor’s a good idea during divorce
- Selling your home at a date after divorce
- How to split proceeds of a home sale during divorce
- and much more…
Tim: Alright, this is Tim Blankenship and we are here live with Connor MacIVOR. Let me put my mic on. This is our fifth live broadcast.
Connor: Oh, very good!
Tim: And we almost got things wired pretty well. So today we’re talking Real Estate and Divorce.
And I’ve wrote down some questions even for you. And I have some very cool slides. We wanted to share it with everyone.
So let’s take a look. How about that?
Connor: That’s awesome! I appreciate you have me on your show.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: …as well this is such an important topic especially with what you do for a living and what we do as a living.
This comes up and it’s a painful process a lot of the time.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: Very few times is it easy.
Tim: Yes, and if you have property and you have Real Estate and you’re getting Divorce it has to be dealt with.
Connor: Yes.
Tim: In the Divorce one way or another. So I wanted to get these types of videos out there so people know what options they have.
Because usually when they call us they have no idea. The first time let’s say they realized they have to do something is actually call our office and start the services with us.
Connor: Plus a lot of times something that’s interesting to know as well it’s like buying a new car. You go out. You go to the dealership.
You find the car you like. You test drive. You take it out. Prior to that, you’ve probably never seen that car much at all.
After you buy it it’s everywhere.
Tim: Right.
Connor: Everybody has most cars. The same thing when you’re starting to go through the process of Divorce everybody now becomes an expert.
They may have never been Divorced but all of the sudden you’re getting all these information. You got to do this. You got to do that.
This is what you need to talk to this. This is what you need to do. And in essence a lot of people get mislead that way.
Tim: That’s probably the one the biggest challenge that we faces in all aspect of the Divorce is people talking to friends.
We’ve been through the Divorce process or haven’t like you’ve said, and giving them pointers or kind of put things in their head. It kept stirring the pot sometimes.
So you probably do a lot of Real Estate? You’ve been doing this a long time?
Connor: Yes. We got in 1998. So that’s when we started. I started in a couple different smaller brokerages when I’m down in San Fernando Valley.
I was a full time cop at that time. Paris my partner in Real Estate came about the following year.
So 1999 and she settled with Cola Banker for a little while and then REMAX is where we both been since–
Tim: Forever?
Connor: 1999 or 2000 so as far as, do we sell a lot? We’re top 5, top 10.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: It’s just going to depend on month, time of year, number of foreclosings.
Tim: Sure.
Connor: As far as Divorce goes this is something that coming from the background of law enforcement, there’s a lot of Divorce there.
A lot of Divorce amongst attorneys, a lot of Divorce amongst contractors and sheriffs, so—
Connor: Yes, we’ve dealt with that for sure.
Tim: Have you run into any common teams or aspects that people should be aware of? UCPD like, ‘Okay, this keeps happening.’
Connor: Yes.
Tim: That people like you can kind of give them heads up on.
Connor: Yes. One party usually is the saint but it’s usually not the person saying they’re the saint. So the other party’s usually the horrible one.
The more difficult one to deal with I should say. So that seems to be a very common thing.
People have their own perceptions of how they are. And with Real Estate, another common thing is blame.
So while you might have one party that just wants to get out and get away, you’re having the other party that wants to do everything they can.
They either forward the deal or mess it up or cause an issue with it. And even though at the beginning they said that’s how they wanted it to be.
Things change.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: You have time to think, you sit there and I’m going to afore that if somebody comes to us after we’ve gone through whatever it is to lease the property and get a market and speak with all parties, get mutual agreements.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: Even if somebody says, ‘You know we don’t want this to go through.’ It does take two people. It takes both.
Tim: Sure.
Connor: Unless the court says you have to or some other legal mechanism.
Tim: Right! So we have people that come to us not usually disagreeing. They know they have to get rid of the property one way or another.
It’s either to sell it, refinance it, or even someone staying in the home and keeping the current mortgage if they can’t refinance.
At least our clients, we’re doing more amicable style cases here as opposed to litigated cases. And they’re trying to work on it.
But sometimes they have questions like what are my options?
So I brought up some other slides here that I wanted to kind of just go over, see if this is going to cooperate. Go down and up, okay.
Connor: One of the things that we fight? I know we’ll probably get through this further in the conversation but when somebody is looking for a Real Estate Agent to handle their Divorce, there has to be a clearly laid out plan.
And it has to involve rules, rules that cannot be broken or sacrifice by neither party including a Real Estate Agent.
So these are actually written out rules. How are all the parties going to communicate?
How are they going to express themselves throughout the transaction? How are they going to come to an agreement?
Because it could be for example you put a property on the market and at a pre-agreed to price from both parties, let’s say $500,000 and then one of the party changes their mind and says, ‘We want more.’
Tim: Right.
Connor: So now we’re kind of stucked. So all of these things professional agents that know Divorce is going to have them written out.
And there’s going to be rules. And all parties have to sign it.
Tim: So you have specific agreement kind of between them?
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: This is not a Real Estate form? This is something that you have them kind of –
Connor: Correct.
Tim: Which actually say, ‘This is what we agree to do.’
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: Smart.
Connor: And even with the form, I mean ultimately, is going to hold up in court? Who knows? But at least it’s going to keep us out of harms way because on that form itself there are other methods that hold me accountable and my staff accountable too.
Tim: Right.
Connor: For example, in the attorney world and you were a cop for a long time and so on so as I that Ex-Parte Communication, the party is going and speaking with one another outside of everybody else’s ears when they shouldn’t be not speaking with those other parties, we establish that on this form that we have that our client signed that that’s not to take place.
If we’re all in agreement, I can’t accept the phone call from one of the sellers because it’ll takes two to get Divorced, right?
Tim: Right.
Connor: You can’t accept the phone call without having the other party involved. Even if it’s to ask me something that seems very innocent.
Tim: It’ll take one thing for them to say, ‘Oh, you’re talking to my spouse!’ and that’s it.
Connor: Done, yes. ‘Oh, I thought we had this agreement.’ and without the agreement all that stuff is null and void.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: So that’s why we have it all established that papers. So when we get to that point of process and it’s happened.
When somebody call, ‘Hey Connor, it’s Mr. Smith. I know you’re taking care of our Real Estate with regards to our house and our Divorce and such. But I just had a quick question.’
Well, Mrs. Smith now finds out that Mr. Smith talked to me. And I actually gave him an answer even something innocent that doesn’t have to do with anything, now that’s a violation of trust.
Tim: Right.
Connor: So it has to be put down on paper and everybody has to adhere to it.
Tim: I even heard of each spouse having a separate realtor. Have you heard of that?
Connor: I have.
Tim: It sounds like a nightmare.
Connor: It comes up. And again now you have and it makes a lot of sense in some cases depending on the relationships and how easy the break apart is going to be.
But yes, we encounter that where the Mrs. is going to have their own agent of representing them. And then the Mr. is going to have their own agent representing them.
And that now you have more chefs in the kitchen. It really creates a lot of drama which brings me to something important.
You need to find out the source. If you’re being referred to an agent, if you’re in the middle of the Divorce, you’ve been referred to by an agent and that agent is telling you and they’ll say, ‘Okay, this is the person that we need to use.’
I would ask straight up the person that I am divorcing from, I would say ‘Well, what’s your relationship with this person?’ because everybody is always concerned with somebody making more money.
If there’s a $150,000 profit after everything is finished in the Divorce, each spouse is always thinking at the back of their mind ‘I hope my Mr. isn’t taking me forgranted.’ or ‘My Mrs.—‘ because typically it’ll all comes down to money, I’m sure.
Tim: Usually with anything I mean money the spousal support, child support and all usually it has something to do with money.
Yes, I had a client of ours who is selling their house, going through Divorce and the concern was how is the check going to be dispersed?
Is it going to go in our joint account? What if my spouse gets through to it first and takes it all out? Is there a way of dispersing the money from the sale to separate accounts or can it be, how can that be?
Connor: That’s a part of the mutual agreement.
Tim: Okay.
Connor: With Escrow, typically, how it’s normally done is both. And it’s going to depend if there’s a Court Decree in place, excuse me.
A Court Decree can label an Escrow account when the money goes in and separate and then it’s divided up by the court whatever the pre-arrangements maybe.
Let’s say it’s one of these easier Divorces if you can even say that then at Escrow they can drop an instruction where if it’s a 50% split or 30-70 or 60-40 or whatever it maybe then that particular once it closes after the funds is going to record, then as soon as those funds would typically get diverse.
First by check, they would be wired or separate checks mailed or –
Tim: There’s a way to deal with that?
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: That’s good. So one of the things I want to talk about today was the options people have when how to deal with their property when they’re going through Divorce.
What are their options and what are the plus and minuses of each? But the first thing, I want to talk about is consulting with the real estate agent.
That should probably something that is done early on in the process, right? Kind of get this information about a written agreement that’s fine they even know.
That’s great coming to an agreement and coming to the terms on appraisal or even deciding on an agent to use.
Connor: It’s funny a bankruptcy attorney said something really valuable when I was speaking with him and we just came out of this speed foreclosure short sale market.
And I asked him, I said, ‘So when should somebody call you like in your Paralegal Services with Divorce the same answer is going to apply, same with the Real Estate Agent, when should they call you?’
He said, ‘At the very first sleepless night. Whatever it is Divorce, Bankruptcy, issue with the house or the kids, that’s when they should first contact me.’
So at the very beginning whenever you’re speaking about Divorce that first sleepless night they should be making a few phone calls, talking to the Paralegal to get the Divorce started if in fact that’s what they decide.
And at least sitting down with an agent and getting a game plan together so they can explain to you how the process is going to play out. We’re not there at that initial meeting to sign.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: And a lot of times couples don’t want to be together. That’s another thing that should be asked by a Real Estate Agent because some of them they get together.
And it’s like throwing a chlorine and oil. I mean the thing just goes nuts and boils up and everything else.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: But yes, if that first sleepless is when they should at least one of the parties.
Tim: So early on the process is about where to go?
Connor: And then it’s going to be. And another thing too Tim is it’s not going to be a fast process because in that particular point they haven’t even decided.
Tim: Right!
Connor: And I would say probably 70% or 80% of that point aren’t even going to go with it, at least within the next year.
And there’s going to be periods of working that out and going to this sort of this honeymoon stage.
Tim: No!
Connor: Now we’re back in the same crap that we were before and he promised to change or she promised and so on.
Tim: Well, I’m glad you came out because part of what we do is making sure that the people that come to us have the information and resources available.
We bring up things that they probably don’t even know or something they need to think about. So if you do not want to file for Divorce you don’t need to do that.
But they haven’t thought about all the other things that are involved with this.
So selling their home or potential for needing mediation are all leading to Bankruptcy and all these things can kind of intertwined with.
It’s just depends on what’s going on. I’m so glad to have you as resource for folks who they can call and I can say, ‘Call Conner. Let’s talk about your options.’
You need to find out your appraisal informations and there are lots of stuff that has to go in to this in getting the agreements and all that.
So that’s it. I want to talk about the three options. I came up with three, I put three options and then I added the fourth.
So four options–
Connor: Excuse me.
Tim: They can either sell, right? They can refinance.
Connor: Okay.
Tim: They can keep their existing mortgage.
Connor: Right.
Tim: Right? One can kind of stay there and pay the existing mortgage and there’s reasons why they may want to do that.
Well, they can sell it at the later date. So maybe we can talk about each of these options. I kind of do the sliding for each one.
So selling your home during Divorce.
Connor: Important with that process is everybody again with each one of these potential outcomes that you’ve described here.
First part, of course, we need mutual agreement by all parties. If the parties can’t get together then we can talk to the party separately or maybe over the telephone together.
But everybody needs to hear what’s going to happen—
Tim: Right.
Connor: …on what the process is going to work. So as far as selling it only takes one signature from one of the parties to start the process.
However, to finish it both parties have to be in agreement. Both parties have to sign everything.
Tim: That’s assuming they’re both on the loan and on title?
Connor: Correct.
Tim: Correct?
Connor: Correct.
Tim: Now what if only one is on title?
Connor: It’s still going to come down to the loan.
Tim: So the loan depends on? So both can be in title if only one’s in the loan that you can sell it with one signature?
Connor: No, you still need both.
Tim: You still need both, either way it depends —
Connor: We’re going to look on title. That’s going to be the first thing. And I have to correct myself.
I apologize. However, title lender that is going to go contract. Those are the signatures we need.
Tim: Okay, so it’s title, not the loan?
Connor: I apologize, that’s correct.
Tim: Okay.
Connor: Now the other thing and this is interesting whenever you’re in Escrow or you start that process what I show on title could be different than what’s actually there.
And the only way to verify that is pulling something called preliminary title which is what Escrow does.
Tim: Okay.
Connor: They typically don’t do that until you’re a little bit deep into the process because it costs money.
Tim: Right.
Connor: And they want to kind of make sure. But if things change that addendums have to be drawn up establishing the other people that have to be a part of the contract and then they have to be spoken to as well.
Tim: Okay, sometimes selling the home and making that decision is their only option. They can’t refinance.
Maybe they don’t qualify. And that we’ll talk about those in the other slides.
Hopefully, there’s equity. And we had cases where there’s equity. We have cases where there’s no equity.
And they just have to short sale that and they fall into that other options of maybe just having them stay in the home.
It just sometimes it’s not up to their mutual agreement. It’s based upon their circumstances financially or otherwise.
So that’s option number one, selling the house. Option number two, we have refinancing your home during the Divorce.
What we find, we need to catch you up?
Connor: No.
Tim: Just from our perspective is two things. One spouse usually wants to stay in the home. But usually because of they have their kids and they want continuation of their kids—
Connor: School—
Tim: In the house and in the school and they’re trying to keep a little bit of normal scene.
But the issue they run into is, does that single parent have the financial ability to refinance in their name?
After one of the spouse wasn’t working obviously that’s not the case. If it’s the working spouse, perhaps they can qualify it for refinancing.
And of course taking into other factors that finances is available. There’s equity in the home and so forth as the negative equity scenario.
So that’s some of the things we come across where, ‘Tim, I want to keep the home but I can’t afford to refinance on my own.’
Stay in the home and the husband can make the mortgage payment or the spouse can make the mortgage payment you can get kind of convoluted.
So do you see those types of things from the transactions you’ve had?
Connor: It does happen quite a bit. And a lot the people that are purchasing houses there are two income deals.
So I have one of them trying to pull out and be able to take this house and have a refinance so the spouse’s name is nowhere in association with it.
A lot of times it’s an impossibility.
Tim: Right.
Connor: It can’t happen. And just like you stated which is really important, you need that equity there. You have to qualify for the whole deal.
Tim: Right.
Connor: All pie! So that’s refinancing, some do want to stay. A lot of times though, I would say 85-90% it just can’t happen?
Tim: So do I. So it’s going up in a sale?
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: Most of the time?
Connor: The other I know, it might be, I don’t know if we can talk about it here maybe part of one of your sides but some of them also think about renting the property out or leasing the property.
Tim: Okay.
Connor: And but again when that comes to the play, we can help you with that. But usually in Divorce people just want to break.
I mean they want to get that thing cut right down the sooner they wanted and just move on. Now you have a property.
Now you have to still communicate with the ex and discuss issues pertaining to property, rather than paying rents, is there damage in the property, is the lawn dying, did they move pets in there when they weren’t supposed to, lots of things.
So that comes up too. But again, we’re there just like you are there to serve the clients.
And also believe what they want to get but they need to go in armed with all the knowledge.
Tim: Yes, that makes sense. In refinancing if one party is going to stay in the home, refinancing is probably their best option?
Because sort of that if you’re on both parties are on the loan, both parties are on title and you give that property to your spouse and they’re going to live in refinancing, if they don’t you’re still entitled.
You’re still on the loan. And if the default, I mean you’re going to go down with them.
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: Right, because you’re still entitled to the property. One thing I’d like to add to that real quick is the agreements that you make with the court, let’s say you get a court order, you guys come to an agreement that spouse is going to keep the house.
And you’re not going to refinance because it’s not possible. And the default on the loan, you can’t take your court agreement that is signed by the judge and say, ‘Look Bank of America, I don’t have—and your lives are actually more–
Connor: ‘I’m free and clear because the judge said it.’
Tim: Right.
Connor: So now this isn’t going to impact me when I want to go out there and buy something out, yes!
Tim: It doesn’t work that way. So despite the agreement you have with your spouse in the court and the judge signed off on it.
Connor: The same thing with a quick claim deed.
Tim: It’s going along.
Connor: Yes, other people and that’s another thing too. Some people are misadvising their clients or in Real Estate and say, well, you can pull the spouse off with the quick claim deed.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: But that doesn’t fix it with the loan.
Tim: No.
Connor: So the cleanest break you would ever had, would be just get rid of it, sell it.
Tim: Or refinance it completely out.
Connor: Absolutely! If one of the party is capable and one of them wants to stay in the house, absolutely!
Tim: I have to say we’ve had a lot of clients just of financial reasons quick claim off the house and just take the risk of being on the loan.
And just because they don’t want to short sale and ruin their credit and the mortgage were still a lot less than—you know what I mean?
Connor: Sure.
Tim: That they can make that mortgage payment, the other spouse staying in there. And so the credit and they could stay in there.
But I’m telling you the risk is that if they default, you need to come up with some way of making sure that, that payment would be made either they send you a copy of checks being cashed or somewhere verifying just trust your ex to do the right thing.
Connor: Some people I have to look at my own situation. At this point, I would trust my wife of 23 years probably.
Tim: Most likely.
Connor: Yes, most likely to do that. And again, there’s a lot relationships. I know you see it too.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: I mean the spouses are, so friendly, it’s almost weird. It’s like they’re both about to give released it from prison.
And they’re willing to do whatever it takes. And there’s no argument at all. But I think that’s the smaller part of the people that get divorced.
Tim: Yes. Alright, let’s talk about keeping the existing mortgage and letting in your spouse stay. We kind of test on this a little bit.
We actually test on it a lot. If the spouse stays in the house, it’s not refinancing just staying on that same mortgage, there’s a risk involved.
Connor: And the other things too let’s say there’s only one party that’s on the loan maybe the other spouse could consider writing up a lease agreement for them.
Actually doing it official, but it’s a sticky situation.
Tim: I don’t know. Make sure we understand that.
Connor: Well, let’s say one of –
Tim: Oh, the one who’s on the loan!
Connor: Absolutely.
Tim: Makes lease to the other.
Connor: They could write up an official agreement stating this is what the monthly amounts going to be. This is when it’s due. This is your part of the obligation with the up keep of the house.
You’re not to sub that rooms, whatever that maybe to try to supplement income because now instead of one eviction, if that’s the way it happens to go and see that’s your enforcement mechanism in contract –
Tim: Got you!
Connor: Instead of one, now all of a sudden if they’re renting rooms to five or six different people that’s a $50,000 bill all day long to get all these folks out.
Tim: Yes, we’ve seen that happened once. Now we don’t get those types of crazy cases in our office but we’ve got people to do that.
It is funny when you’re just talking, you remind of a certain scenarios when we had someone, both on the home, both on the—you drop your mic?
Connor: Yes.
Tim: Both on the home and both on the loan and title and one spouse had moved out. The other one stopped paying the mortgage.
And so it was in default. Then they filed bankruptcy, so, we could delay it even further.
And all the while, renting out all the rooms and sections of the living room, he had like six people paying them 500-600 bucks a month.
So he’s making 3,000 or 4,000 a month.
Connor: Wow!
Tim: A month and not paying mortgage.
Connor: What a nightmare!
Tim: Until the last we heard in two years he’d been doing this. So it’s just crazy.
And all the while we get spouse versus team who got the judgment to sell the house. And now he’s squatting and he won’t move out.
So we got those types of issues as well. So alright let’s see what else we got here.
Oh, I want to talk about evaluation. So they get to sell. Now they have to come to an agreement on what it’s worth.
We had clients in here a couple weeks ago, they have everything settled. The house is actually paid off in cash. So they are in good shape financially.
The issue was what is house worth? So if they’re going to divide it evenly coming to a firm work evaluator. In this case one party thought the house was worth $50,000 more than the other party.
And they’re looking at comparisons and all that. But what’s the best way to come to an idea? Do they get independent appraisers?
Do they get independent agents to do like of a compared market analysis? This particular client I said, ‘Look, you’re talking about $50,000 whole. It’s really about $25,000 to you, if they’re dividing which they’re like ‘Okay, that’s not that bad.’
If they can meet in the middle, I mean there are lots of options.
Connor: It’s always said there are three values for a home. And it’s like when you’re buying a business there’s three sets of records.
There’s what the owners going to give you to sell it.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: …to show you that it’s awesome. There’s really what it really makes so he knows exactly where he is every month and then it’s going to be the other ones where he shows the IRS which going to be a lot less than his earnings.
With a home evaluation it’s kind of the same thing because you have the agent that’s going to probably try to tell you what you want to hear in order to secure the leasing.
Tim: Right.
Connor: Unfortunately, that seems to be more a case than the exception. The other value happens to come in where what do you think it’s worth.
And then finally really what it is and what’s it worth. So the way that we do it and I think any good agent would is we have to look at factual properties that have closed Escrow.
And we have to stock those properties up making allowances plus or minus whatever percentage points or real amounts for the different amenities that they’re property might have versus the ones that we’re able to compare it with.
So the other you mentioned was an appraisal? Yes. If it’s a big deal then you could have hire independent appraiser to go out and evaluate the property and establish that value.
So that’s probably the cleanest way because with the agent, now you got to trust them.
Tim: Right.
Connor: I’m not trying to put us down as an industry but the world view isn’t so good. If that agent comes since both you down and looks at the sold comparable properties comparing apples to apples—
Tim: Right.
Connor: Not gaming in the system having you be able to verify that those are true and indeed the actual comparables within six months within a half an hour radius comparing the same types of property your property and be able to verify that with an offline or excuse me a non-realtor base source online somewhere else that won’t have any reason to game you.
Tim: Right.
Connor: …then that’s also another good way.
Tim: It’s interesting because when people are splitting say in this particular case they had the house paid off but now they’re splitting up and they need to cash out.
Connor: Right.
Tim: So he wants to keep the home. So he just took out a second. He had the financial ability to qualify for that and cash it up.
And the questions that became were what’s it worth? And do we use today’s fair market value? What if the property declines in value a month later or —
Connor: Right.
Tim: We see this declined in market. And the half is a lot less then do you take the fair market value? Let’s say the $100,000 in equity based on the appraised value?
And you just say well $50,000 as half or would you take out that percentage of the sale? There’s a lot of ways that you really can loot this.
Or you can just say you know what, there’s $100,000 in equity if we sold. I mean you can count the commissions and Escrow and title fees and we will let down by 10-15 grand.
Connor: Sure.
Tim: I think what people need to do is just move on. Don’t fight over the penny, just focus on the meat, not the potatoes if you will.
Connor: And what we talk about kind at the beginning, usually in a lot of cases one of the spouses they don’t want go. It’s not their ideal scenario to be Divorced.
Tim: Right.
Connor: So a lot of times that’s where a lot of the renters will come in. And they’re hiring you to do service.
They hired me to do a service. My service is to try to balance everything so nobody gets hurt as a result of them wanting to sell this piece of real property.
Ultimately, that’s the goal. Commission aside, success aside all the sellers stuff aside, that protection is important and them having all the facts to be able to make good decisions.
Tim: Now, I skipped one of our four. I missed see the slides. Sell at a later date.
So if I had four options. You had another about the rental. That was good.
So sell, refinance, keep existing mortgage, sell at later date or rent it out. We have people doing that.
But selling at a later date, we have folks that having their primary residence or a vacation home –
Connor: I’m so sorry!
Tim: …or a rental of some sort, that they’re making rents on. Okay, let’s say, it’s a rental or any of those types of homes.
And either the values not there or they want to hopefully go up in value so they can sell. So we have a specific circumstance with a client, vacation house, they make rent.
It’s like an [Aspen 28:25] or something like that [big bear 28:26] I don’t know. And they rented out and they make money up but they sold, there’s not enough value. They overpaid for it back when real estate is blooming.
So they want to wait several years before they sell it. That was the agreement. We’ll continue to share the rents and ends the property together but we don’t want to sell it because it’s going to be at lost.
So they short sale it. They don’t want to ruin their credit. So that’s it.
Another option is to sell at a later date. And usually you have to make sure you have enough language in your Divorce agreement, that doesn’t leave us so open-ended that you can’t go to court and say, ‘It’s time to sell.’
Connor: Enforcing.
Tim: It has enough language to have some enforceability. So it can’t be totally open-ended.
So you need to say something to the fact of like in this case we said, within five years the parties will meet and confront on a yearly basis to determine their appraised value for purposes of selling, not to cover the fees and so forth of selling the property and without a loss.
So that way if you get to that point and it’s there. And the other party said, ‘No, I just want to keep it. You can go back to the court and say, ‘No, this is what we agreed to.’ and get the court intervene.
Connor: Yes, I think that sell at a later date thing even though and I totally get that scenario. It’s tough.
I mean how do we know? Again just like back in ‘06 and ’07 shared properties are going up hand over fist like money was free.
And been practically wise but the whole general consensus even from some really brainy financial advisers out there was its trend was going to continue but it didn’t.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: So it fell off. Sell at a later date, tough. I know any agent would always be there for their client.
And if in fact that’s what they decided to do in a future, they would. But again you have to ask yourself where are we going as a market?
Where are we trending? What possible obstacles would there be in the future? It’s a tough scenario.
Tim: Yes. I mean it sound as already a negative equity. And it was going to be a short sale now.
And let’s say it doesn’t go up in value. And they sell it five years later. And at least they’ve got some rents I suppose or—
Connor: Yes.
Tim: Let’s give it a quick sale than throw it away, I’m sure the plus is that maybe they get out of it break even buy.
Connor: Yes!
Tim: Okay! Because in today’s market and you’re asking people to basically an agent to say like the stock market.
Yes, they think the house is going to keep going up or down. I mean you’re really taking chance there.
Connor: Yes, that’s a trade line, right? So somebody called a real estate agent on the phone and says, ‘Is it a good time to buy?’
‘Yes! Buy right now!’ That’s the typical way it’s done.
Unfortunately, right now in Santa Clarita Valley, here’s some truth, we’ve seen prices being flat for the last couple of months.
And it doesn’t look like the prices are going to continue to go up.
Tim: Really?
Connor: It would give an appearance right now because now we’re getting more and more inventory. We’re seeing a lot of pricing changes.
So this is something to ask that agent, ‘Where are in the market?’
Tim: Right.
Connor: ‘Is there a buyers market?’ We’re still in the seller’s market. But that trend is now shifting because of the excess inventory we see more days on market timeframes.
We see a lot more properties having their prices changed. And those changes are positive or negative they’re actually reducing.
We don’t see the actual sales prices changing. But again that will eventually happen if we keep on the trend.
There’s no new buyers that come out in to the market wanting to purchase at the current levels. There’s no other place where to go.
Tim: The whole evolution is so interesting in the transition from equity growing and home prices going up to how buyers and sellers realizing, ‘Why is my house is on the market too long?’
And then buyers saying, ‘Well, I noticed that there’s price reduction.’ so everyone just kind of sits on the fence.
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: There’s like this delay.
Connor: Correct. And so that’s where we’re saying right now. A lot of buyers they’re waiting. And we have a plethorawe’re working with.
They’re just waiting. And I get that. And we have sellers. The biggest question today from a seller is ‘When am I going to move?’
‘Okay, so I want to upgrade from this house. Is there going to be a house for me?’
It’s not to that point where I could say, ‘100%, yes!’
Tim: Right
Connor: And then the other question ‘What do I do if I sell this?’ We should make this sale contingent on me finding the home of choice.
And so then that becomes a tough scenario for a buyer when there are 50 other houses.
Tim: And you kind of tie up three different people, right?
Connor: Yes, so then the other buyers so ‘I don’t want to ride this far. This house is contingent. I’m finding another house.’
Tim: And now will I be contingent on them buying one.
Connor: Oh, real deep! And then it’s like a house of cars.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: You go through the whole thing. And it could be 10-20. I mean infinite numbers deep one person in there that’s contingent, they give the whole thing done.
Tim: Collapsed.
Connor: Yes, It’s very interesting. I have to say the Divorce scenario is if you’re going to hire somebody to do it, make sure they’ve done it.
Make sure they understand the process. Make sure you get good advice. Make sure they sit you down and get a game plan with you.
Don’t take it forgranted that they say, ‘Oh, I’m an expert at doing Divorces for Real Estate and in selling out.’ Don’t take the word for it.
You got to sit down. They should be able to explain to you how the process works just like you know Tim what’s good about you is we’ve talked a lot before.
You’re good at scenarios. You know we have this couple in here last week and she said such and such and he said so and so.
And it relates to what these people are now going through. That’s the best way to convey information.
Tim: It’s like troubleshooting. We do so many Divorce cases here all throughout California and we see all these different scenarios.
And now from doing this along we can troubleshoot and give suggestions, ideas which is all the reason we’re doing this episode regarding Real Estate because this is one of those things we’re trying to inform our clients about.
This is one of the options that I sit when we have our consultations. When they have Real Estate, I say, ‘Look, when it comes to your house these are the three options you have or four or five now that we have.’
And depending on their circumstances financially, I can tell them right there on the spot, ‘This is going to be your only option because of X-Y- and Z.’
And that has to sink in sometimes because usually now what they want because everyone wants to keep the house and all of that.
But what we tell folks is if regarding money and finances when you live apart when you separate from your spouse, you have the same income whether it was you working alone or both spouses working.
The money doesn’t go as far when you’re trying to handle two households.
Connor: Right, absolutely. It’s an additional expense.
Tim: Whether it would be the original primary residence or you both have separate move out and go that route.
So well anything to add?
Connor: No.
Tim: Talk while you have a chance.
Connor: Sorry for all the hacking.
Tim: No, it’s fine.
Connor: I’ve been trying to get over cold. And then I’m still contagious so there you go.
Tim: Oh God!
Connor: And then the other thing, I’m sorry I dropped my mic. When I was bending over your lap was right there.
And I didn’t know to appear some crazy stuff that was going to happen.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: I had to reposition.
Tim: No, that will look interesting!
Connor: Yes, put that out.
Tim: I will keep the mic—what is that where they have like the three second loop thing. What is one of those—?
Connor: I don’t know what it’s called but by I get a chance—
Tim: By I guess around that seven seconds…
Connor: Right.
Tim: …and do that all over and over again.
Connor: Keep that when coming up, that’s perfect.
Tim: Dropped the mic and wardrobe malfunction.
Connor: Right, in the office.
Tim: So Connor MacIVOR, Santa Clarita Real Estate expert. I’d be surprised if you’re not able to watch this. I’ve already watched one of your thousands of videos.
Connor: Oh yes! Most of my crappy videos I have two views, one is to me and one’s mom. So that’s pretty clear.
Tim: My kids joked at me because they say, ‘Dad you only got five views on that video.’ And I said, ‘Yes! But I have 500 videos times five and some get more five some get over hundreds or thousands but yes they’re not like viral videos.
It’s an information base there out there for people who are researching for this information.
Connor: Right!
Tim: …to find it.
Connor: We don’t have the cute kitten.
Tim: No!
Connor: That’s fur is particularly near the baby in the bath tub.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: That was a funny video.
Tim: So you have I mean you have, I kind of copied everything you’ve done just so you know. You have podcast. You have video you do daily.
You do slideshows. You do blog post too. I mean you have so much content out there no matter what mode you like to digest it, it’s there, it’s available.
Connor: You know what this is good for and you embraced it. And I’m so impressed!
People want to see you. They don’t want to see an actor. They don’t want to see somebody that’s trying to pull themselves through another person trying to be the best of the best.
They want to see transparency.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: This is an off the cuff interview basically between you and I. And this is what people want to see.
Tim: Exactly!
Connor: We’re not going win wars. We’re not going to go viral.
I’ve had some videos that have gotten a lot of views that I don’t know why. I can’t pull it apart and figure out why that one.
But maybe the key words were right, maybe the story was right, maybe the day was right, who knows? But this is how people learn.
And I know when I’m watching videos on YouTube especially if it’s interview format, I’ll just let the playing go on—
Tim: With the background, yes?
Connor: Yes.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: Because it’s such educational.
Tim: That’s the whole point education. We get all videos and podcasts. We have this live broadcast on Thursdays –
Connor: Got your radio show?
Tim: Actually, well I had it open. People can actually go on and chat real now. This is only our fifth one.
So as soon as we start marketing this, I think this is going to catch on three or four months. People are going to start coming in and I hope asking questions.
And we won’t even have to have a topic. It’ll just be ‘Okay, what’s the question? Call me now.’
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: And do it that way. So that’s really what I’m hoping for that route. So how can people get a hold of you? I mean they should call you if they’re thinking of Divorce and needs some information?
Connor: Yes, we have everything primary displayed on our website Paris911.com.
Tim: I did that. Are you impressed?
Connor: [inaudible 38:22].
Tim: Yes.
Connor: Yes, it’s good. I love that [inaudible 38:25].
But yes, just go there in any contact on that site you’re going to get me. So you’re going to talk to yours truly. Usually my voice is an S sexy
Tim: Very raspy.
Connor: Yes, now. But it’s like a bedroom voice. Some mic I do pretty well. But anyway, yes, that’s the best way.
Reach out and I’ll answer your questions. One of the things that’s important, interview multiple agents. The thing is to whenever you’re looking to get information, don’t sign anything right away.
If they’re bringing you to their office to talk to you and they hand you a piece of paper they say, ‘Well, I need you to’ – ‘Come on, really?’
You just want information. So understand that going in, not all agents are crazy. You will know but not everybody is the same.
So interview those most you find to be the most comfortable because you’re about to go on a journey that could get really ugly.
It’s already probably ugly because now here you are getting Divorce. Find somebody that sympathetic to that.
Tim: Yes. And you have an AP?
Connor: Oh!
Tim: I love that AP. I have it on my phone. What do they need in iTunes? What do they search for to find your AP?
Connor: Yes, as far as searching for housings.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: There are couples. You can look for California Homes. That’s our AP in the AP store. It’s also in the Android market place.
You can also text the letters SCV to 87778. So if you have your cell phone right now or iPod just text the letters SCV for Santa Clarita Valley to 87778.
So that’s pretty easy. So yes on our website Paris911.com and get there you’ll see the Mac Box at the top part.
It’s like a search thing, you can also punch the word AP in there and you’ll get all the downloadable stuff.
Tim: Very cool.
Connor: Yes, you’ve done a fantastic job with Divorce661.
Tim: Can you tell I copied you?
Connor: Oh, don’t say that.
Tim: I copied you.
Connor: I didn’t think of that.
Tim: Yes, I did. I see your blogs and it works, let’s do that. The videos do videos and—
Connor: You’re just—I like the informational approach. And I think people like that. People don’t like to be sold.
You’re not asking for anything.
Tim: No!
Connor: You’re not saying 70 50 Bucks and I’ll do this. You’re showing people how to save. What was that thing you had coming out that came out this morning? Saving $492—
Tim: For filing fees yes.
Connor: Yes that’s awesome.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: I mean really? Who’s doing that?
Tim: Yes.
Connor: Who’s even mentioning that?
Tim: Right.
Connor: It’s—
Tim: It’s funny in that sequence that was the most open email.
Connor: Yes.
Tim: So people have money on their minds when—
Connor: Absolutely!
Tim: …when going through this. But going back to what he said about just being real people and not actors and giving out information, people watch this and they see who we are. And they’re going to make their decision.
Do I like that person or not? So it helps people make that decision so they’re not going call if they watched us and getting in to something that we don’t like that guy and –
Connor: Yes, he’s got no hair.
Tim: Well good then that saves me time. People that call us they usually say, ‘Tim, I saw you. I watched several of your videos.’ They already know you.
Connor: Yes.
Tim: When they come in to for services we go out there and they’re already getting up the couch, I don’t know who they are. But they already know me.
Just so the video, my voice and all that now in town people are starting ‘Oh, I saw you on Facebook.’
Connor: Buy you drinks and offer—
Tim: Yes. Well I appreciate you coming out here Connor. This was great.
Connor: You’re welcome.
Tim: Yes.
Connor: Absolutely.
Tim: I really like this whole interview set-up we got here.
Connor: Yes, it’s really nice and you’re doing a great job.
Tim: Cool! Alright let me see if I can figure out how to shut this down. I tell you this is a three man operation and I’m doing it all by myself.
Every Thursday live broadcast at 1pm. We have a chat room if you go to Live Cast, tap on the Divorce661.com website and it’ll take you right through the most recent broadcast coming up.
And the chat room is just below the video. And we’ll know if you’re online and watching otherwise you can ask question.
We are monitoring it. So hopefully this will catch on.
Connor, Paris911.com thanks so much for coming. I appreciate it.
Connor: Pleasure.
Tim: And well, hopefully to have you back on again soon.
