My husband and I sold our home in Michigan in October 2010 in a short sale, and were never late on any payments before, during or after the agreement. We did however agree to continue to pay a portion of the debt back (a promissory note) which we are still paying on.

Our credit is in the 690-700 range. The reason we did a short sale was because my husband was relocated in his job from Michigan to Colorado and we couldn’t afford to pay our mortgage on our house in Michigan in addition to our rent in Colorado.

It has been 1 1/2 years since the short sale agreement and we are now making a significant amount more in salary and would like to purchase a new home here in Colorado. We were just informed by our lender that we would have to wait the 3 year waiting period, but we were under the impression that since we were NEVER late on any payments, we would be able to purchase a home before the 3 year waiting period. We were advised to make a claim to our past lender (who did the short sale) and to the Credit agencies, for a “Deletion” or our status of “Paid in Full: settled for less than amount owed” to be changed to “Paid in Full”.

Do you have any advice for us? Does it seem like we have a case or will we still most likely have to wait the 3 year waiting period? We are very frustrated because at the time of doing the short sale we struggled to make sure our payments were never late so that this current situation could be prevented.

Thank you for your advice! We are not getting very solid answers from others out there…

We are in the process of purchasing a home and have run into a last minute problem with our lender. We relocated to a different town in the summer of 2008 for work. We were forced to sell our house on a short sale at that time, as the market tanked and we owed more than the current value at the time. The sale was closed on Oct. 17, 2008. After completeing the short sale, we were sued for deficiency judgment, which forced us into a chapter 7 bankruptcy which was discharged on Nov. 30, 2009. As far as I can tell, we are clear to get an FHA mortgage right now, as it has been more than 3 years since the transfer date of the short sale, and more than 2 years since the bankruptcy. The lenders underwriter is saying that the deficiency judgment qualifies the same as a foreclosure, which means we cannot get the loan until 3 years after the discharge of the bankruptcy, putting us at Nov. of 2012. We are 3 weeks from closing and in a panic! What is your interpretation?

Any advice or input is appreciated. Thank You!