So we talked about 20 million homeowners are upside down on their mortgages, thousands of their homes are being foreclosed on every week, property values may still be declining in some areas. Homeowners are walking away, they are doing foreclosures, there is a deed in lieu that people may not be aware of, loan modifications in many different shapes, forms and fashions and short sales.
These are all things that do have tax implications that a lot of people are not aware of. Each has its own consequences that's why we have asked Mike Patenella, a CPA to be with us.
Mike is a CPA. He has been in public accounting since 1988, with his own tax practice and operates out of Scottsdale, and focuses on tax-preparation, advance planning for high net worth individuals and small businesses throughout the Valley. He moved to the Valley in 1990 back from New York.
You know, I have had the opportunity to work with Mike as a strategic partner as well and I share a number of clients. Each time I have had the honor of providing him a referral for tax work the outcome has exceeded expectations, so I am really pleased to be part of the discussions today and to work with such a great group.
It has been a pleasure, and again if you're talking about that strategic partnership, the financial power team, as our good friend Dan Havey likes to call it, the outcome is important, but when a client calls you up or a homeowner calls you up and says thank you so much for sending me to Brett or Mike, what a great job, wow. That''s the greatest, again Mike that's why you're here with us today
So we should probably dive right in. I know we've been talking a lot the last few weeks about loan modifications and how Velocity Financial can help in that regard. But, help me out, even for my financial planning perspective what are some of the implications of taking this approach. For example how does the IRS look at people who don't pay back their debt?
Well they do have a record of who does not pay back their debt because the banks have to send a form 1099C to anyone who gets any debt forgiven and what that does is it lists how much debt youre able to walk away from. And the reason they want to track that is unless you qualify under certain exclusions that is taxable income to you.
A question for you on that and I honestly don't know for sure the answer to this, so let's use a simple scenario, my favorite one is a guy owes $400,000 on his house and he does a short sale for $300,000. A laymen would think that there is going to be $100,000 he is going to get a 1099C for, a 1099C form from the lender that they didn't pay the moneys back for. What about the other cost the lender incurred? For instance even though they sold it for $300,000 there are still real estate commissions, title, deeds all kinds of closing costs, and things like that, that the lender loses below that 300. Do you know if that's included?
Yes that would be almost like lending you additional money to cover those costs.
So in other words if I owe $400,000 and sell it for $300,000 in a short sale, the bank is going to spend $112,000 I saw in a report today, you're getting a 1099C for that right?
In that example yes. The foreclosure cost, I just read today, the average foreclosure costs $112,000, average cost, that's legal fees, carrying cost, all these different things. That's a lot of 1099C income.
About this Author
D Havey of Velocity Financial is an are expert on all aspects of today's volatile Real Estate Market. Topics covered include the Mortgage and Real Estate Industries as well as Foreclosures, Short Sales, First Time Home Buyers and the Tax Implications of all aspects of owning and selling Real Estate. For more information join us at our YouTube Channel: http://youtube.com/user/REMarketingThisWeek or on our blog http://RealEstateMarketingThisWeek.com
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