Wells Fargo announced they will provide 2 billion worth of loan modifications to nearly 15,000 homeowners. In addition, Wells Fargo will be paying out nearly 32 million to homeowners who lost their homes to foreclosure. The Loan Mods and 32 million in payouts are directed at homeowners  who had adjustable rate loans that resulted in much higher payments than they could afford.

Nevada and Arizona are set to sue Bank of American over Loan Mods. BofA is accused of providing false assurances to struggling homeowners that they wouldn’t lose their homes while their loan modification request were pending. Bank of America announced today they will begin resuming foreclosures after a holiday suspension.

This trend has been developing for a few weeks now, thus, I wanted to break down the #’s in Las Vegas as they have been reported for today.

As of early afternoon, the Las Vegas MLS is reporting the following:

34 new listings
29 contingent listings
20 pending listings

What this actually means:
Of the 29 properties marked contingent today, approximately 25 were either short sales or pre REO properties. As a result, we can reasonably assume all 29 will not close escrow. Typically about 35%-50% of short sales and pre REO’s actually close escrow once they go under contract. On the flip side, of the 20 pending properties, it is likely that 70%-80# of these properties will close escrow. Properties marked pending are typically resales and do not include short sales or other distressed related sales.

Why this is positive:
Anytime pending and contingent properties out number new active properties on the market, that is a positive trend for sellers. The end results needs to be closed sales. The ultimate goal is for closed sales each day to exceed the number of new active properties listed that  same day. Las Vegas certainly hasn’t reached that point… but they are beginning to trend in the right direction.