EQUATOR AND BANK OF AMERICA....Agents, get ready to do somebody elses work too!! AND PAY TO GET WORK AS WELL!!!

Short sales for Bank of America and some other banks will now be handled through Equator, a privately owned company that will profit from selling subscriptions, areas of influence, certifications, and other services to the Real Estate Agents, (that is if they are interested in working with this banks....they could also find a different job).
The following are some of the goodies that we will be looking at:

EQUATOR requires the Borrower/seller to describe their hardship, if the seller has an undue hardship like military relocation or death, there is no way to input that information into the system...hardships are all the same to the system.

SELLER needs to upload their financial docuements (statements, etc...) Equator doesn't care if the seller does not have a scanner. Each of the documents have to be scanned and cataloged for Equator, so the bank has everything served at the table when they decide to consider it. Obviously this job will have to be done by the Agents.

AGENT needs to all input all the figures in the HUD statement and spend time figuring out all numbers, just to be asked to UPLOAD THE HUD sheet at the end, meaning: more work for the agent and complete disregard for his/her time;

There is no information for the agent as to what is expected to be input in different fields, for example: "SETTLEMENT FEES" do they mean ESCROW CHARGES OR THE SETTLEMENT CHARGES TO SELLER? OR SETTLEMENT COSTS, What does it mean (all costs??)

Asks for closing date. (if only we knew when they will approve??), we have an offer with BofA in my office that has been negotiated for ONE YEAR, vice-presidents come and go, I have lost 3 or 4 buyers, and still these guys cannot approve or reject the short sale.....closing date, yeah right!

IN THEIR "hud" There is not a field for NHD that is required by law.

Why is the commission is always 5% when the industry standard is 6%, and recent legislation HAMP and HAFA has determined that if the loan belongs to Fannie Mae or Freddie mac the Commission shouldn't be reduced. Why should we reduce our commission when we need to wait 4 to 12 months for the short sale to be approved??? We should reduce their salaries instead, they are the ones that are incompetent, bureaucratic and ineficient.

AGENt is required to know the first 5 digits of the Buyer's Social Security; phone number; address and Birthdate. Who gives that information??, the buyer is not the negotiating agent's client, tell me if you would give a stranger these numbers? doesn't it scream like identity theft?

AGENT is asked to upload photo and MLS# and in the same window is asked to upload the MLS Sheet that includes photo and MLS#. (Just for the sake of making agents work a little more, who cares)

When a message is sent to us through equator, and we try to reply, we get the e-mail back undelivered = GENERIC.BACI@BANKOFAMERICA.COM. Meaning: This system does not work yet, or nobody is looking at your answers!

The assigned tasks are supposed to triger an e-mail to the Agent to login to equator, but it doesn't, we need to check it every day, to see when someone decided to give us a break.

Equator sells registration to each zipcode so if an agent wants his client to be able to pick him out of the agents that are "suggested" or authorized by Equator, he HAS to pay for that zipcode, then better pay extra to get your photo in there, or even more if you want to be certified so the banks pick you, and even more if you want the banks to see your resume and be in a "prime" position..... and this is just the beginning of what will be the way banks work, doesn't this look unfair for the agents?, where is our Department of Real Estate, or our Boards of Realtors to protect us from this huge plan to extract money from us, in order to be able to work?