You’ve documented the hardship, marketed the home, and the bank has finally said yes. Now what? In this video, Keith Jones walks through the last stage — closing the deal out — and explains a costly mistake that can force you to start the entire process over. “Now that you have had the short sale approved,” he begins, “and we’re going to assume you got it approved after the appraisal happened — how do you go ahead and close that out?”
Closing is like a normal sale, with two big asterisks
The good news first: once approved, “you want to close that out like a normal real estate transaction,” Keith says. You’ll sign at a title company, the lender gets paid from the proceeds, and ownership transfers. But two things make a short-sale closing different from an ordinary one, and both come down to the buyer.
First, financing. “Your buyer needs to have, most times, a conventional loan,” Keith notes. Short-sale homes are often in as-is condition, and some loan programs (certain FHA or VA loans) impose property-condition requirements that a distressed home can’t meet without repairs — repairs that, in a short sale, no one is going to make. A conventional buyer, or better yet a cash buyer, sidesteps that problem.
Second, and this is the heart of the video, expectations about repairs.
The as-is reality the buyer must accept up front
Keith is emphatic on this point: “The buyer needs to understand that the seller is not doing any work to that property. So anything that they find on the inspection, the seller is not responsible for doing any of that work in a short sale.” In a short sale, the seller is already losing the home and walking away with nothing; there’s no money and no incentive to fix anything. The bank isn’t paying for repairs either. The home transfers exactly as it sits.
That has to be crystal clear before you ever submit the file. “This needs to be disclosed to that buyer, and that buyer’s agent needs to understand that,” Keith says — prior to all the work of getting the short sale approved. A buyer who only realizes at inspection that the seller won’t fix the roof or the AC is a buyer who may walk. And in a short sale, a buyer walking is far more painful than in a normal deal.
Why a buyer falling through is so costly
Here’s the trap Keith wants you to avoid. Picture the sequence: you do “all the work to get the short sale approved,” then spend weeks “waiting on that buyer to get approved” for their loan — and then the buyer backs out over condition. Now, in his words, “you’ve got to go find another buyer, and then you have to go present the short sale back over to the bank again and get reapproved and go through the process again.”
That’s the real cost of the wrong buyer: not just a lost sale, but a near-total reset. Short-sale approvals are tied to a specific buyer and offer, so a new buyer usually means resubmitting and re-negotiating with the bank — another round of review, another approval letter, more weeks on the clock. If a foreclosure date is looming, that delay can be the difference between saving the situation and losing the home. “That’s why,” Keith concludes, “you need an experienced agent who works on short sales” — and a buyer who won’t flinch at as-is condition.
Read the approval letter before you sign
One more thing to handle at the closing stage that Keith’s video sets up: the approval letter itself. It states the price the bank will accept, the deadline to close, who pays which costs, and — most importantly — whether the lender waives the deficiency. “Releasing the lien” is not the same as “we won’t pursue you for the shortfall.” You want the deficiency waived in writing, because in Florida a lender can otherwise seek a deficiency judgment for the gap. We compare that risk against foreclosure in our post on short sale vs. foreclosure. Forgiven debt can also carry tax consequences, so check with a CPA.
The cash-buyer advantage at the finish line
Everything Keith warns about — financing limits, repair expectations, buyers walking, and having to start over — points to the same solution: a buyer who is paying cash, taking the home as-is, and isn’t going anywhere. A cash buyer has no loan to fall through, no condition requirements to satisfy, and no surprise at inspection, because as-is is the whole premise. That certainty is exactly what keeps a hard-won approval from unraveling at the last step.
A short closing checklist
When your file reaches the closing stage, a few habits keep it on track. Confirm the buyer is truly committed to as-is and has the right financing — conventional or cash — before the bank ever reviews the offer. Read the approval letter the day it arrives and calendar the closing deadline, because short-sale approvals expire and a missed date can mean re-approval. Make sure the title company is comfortable with short-sale closings, since the lender’s payoff and approval terms have to be honored exactly. And keep your hardship documents current; if the review runs long, the bank may ask for updated pay stubs or bank statements before it will fund. None of these steps are hard, but skipping one is how a deal that “should” close ends up back at square one.
Where we fit in
That’s the role we play. We buy houses for cash across Northeast Florida, as-is, with no repairs and no financing contingency — the kind of reliable buyer a short sale needs to actually close. If your short sale is approved or you’re just getting started, request a no-obligation cash offer, watch the complete short sale video guide, or call or text 904-606-9163.
This article is general information, not legal or tax advice. Consult a licensed Florida attorney, a CPA, or a free HUD-approved housing counselor at 800-569-4287 before deciding.