While negotiating a short sale is not overly complicated, you should complete the following steps with the help of your real estate agent to insure a successful transaction.

Get in touch with your mortgage lender directly and speak to someone face to face who has the authority to accept a Short Sale Request.

Lenders will be sympathetic to you situation but they are not usually over eager to accept these requests.

You can always ask your real estate agent or a lawyer to complete this step for you if you feel uncomfortable with the situation.

Give your mortgage lender written permission in the form of a letter so that your loan information can be disclosed to real estate agents, lawyers, title companies and other interested parties.

Without your authorization your mortgage lender is prevented by law from releasing this information to anyone since the data is protected by privacy laws.

Ask your real estate agent to compile an evaluation statement for you mortgage lender.

It should include your current income, a list of all your assets including bank accounts, stocks or other investments, additional real estate and anything else of value.

It should be apparent from the statement that you do not have the income or assets required to repay your mortgage loan in full.

You may be required to provide your bank statements from the last 3 to 6 months so please insure that you have these at your disposal.

Your mortgage lender will check these to see if there have been large withdrawals or high number of checks clearing your accounts in the recent past.

They will do this to make sure you are not hiding or diverting any funds that should go to them.

Ask your real estate agent to assemble preliminary financial information about your property.

Make sure the expected sales price and all other costs associated with the short sale are included in the calculations.

Do not forget to include your unpaid loan balance, payments due, real estate commissions, and or other loans payable.

Also ask your real estate agent to conduct a comparable market analysis of real estate sales in your local area to further push the importance of a short sale in your situation.

The analysis should include the selling prices in your local area for the last 3 to 6 months as well as a list of homes that are currently on sale.

This is necessary because when the value of real estate drops, short sale becomes more common, and this analysis will show your mortgage lender, that such a transaction is necessary for you as well.

After you reach an agreement with a potential buyer ask your real estate agent to submit a copy of the purposed sell and purchase document to your mortgage lender.