IMHO. We are in the 5th year of at least a 10 year process.

I also anticipate that the banks will continue to try and encourage defaulting occupants to short sale instead of foreclose due to the net return on asset value being higher on a short sale than the average REO.

We will start to see a higher quality homes as REO. We will also see a continuation of time required to complete a foreclosure. We are in a judicial state and are about 700+ days from NOD to foreclosure. Currently the average person foreclosed on has not made a payment in over 2 years.

Since we have had fewer REOs we have done more premarketing of the ones we get and have increased the number of buyer conversions that we actually do. We used to refer out 90+% of buyer leads to others.

We also never stopped doing conventional resales and try to do at least 30% of our business as conventional resale. Getting more difficult to find sellers who will listen to reality but they are still out there. Our goal is to do at least 1 transaction per year that is over $1 million.

Personally I still prefer to work with banks and AMCs than humans. Fits better with my personality (or lack thereof) but, my wife is still a people person and likes the humans being.

But, I am just guessing like everyone else. Hope it is better than this year.

funny and i agree--even though i now have my wife trained NOT to bring people around.
ok here is goes..
good news--Bpos will be here all year next year. the trend will the same-work harder for less money but you can easily survive.
many agents will leave and few new ones will come on board leaving the rest of us with enough to survive. I still have not been able to get Plan B in action-I will blame God for that. But i plant to spend the next year working on a better business plan.
Right now it is in everyone’s interests, politically and economically, of all ideologies and philosophies, to get things going. There will be enough low paying jobs to give the low level agents a way out. So for those who do 100 plus bpos a month, you should be fine. You may have to work for $40 instead of $50..but it is better than a real job. I figure I would have to sale 1-2 houses a month to compete with my current income—no thanks~
Good luck and Happy Holidays..
Diversify, be grateful and be nice to children, old folks and idiots..