Short sales are a pain! You're going to hear that from any real estate agent you talk to, or more likely, even stronger language.

The relationship between banks and real estate agents on short sales has gotten to the point where you could call it adversarial. And, it shouldn't be that way. We should be working together towards a common goal, finding a deal that works for everyone and getting it closed before the house goes into foreclosure.

The thing is, I don't think it needed to be this way. Both banks and real estate agents should have sat down at the beginning of this wave of short sales and worked out some things. Here are some ways the outcomes and the working relationships could have been improved.

• Each bank should have a package of it's procedures in working with real estate agents and owners on short sales.
• Banks should have a link on their main web site that provides real estate agents with everything they need to process a short sale.
• Lending institutions and real estate companies and/or associations should have set up joint seminars where agents and lenders could meet and develop working relationships.
• Banks should have easy access on their web sites to information for their customers who are contemplating going through the short sale process.

No one item here would have completely fixed the problems with the current system. But any and all of them would have helped tremendously. And, this list is just a starting point. There are lots more possibilities.

This is a broken system. A little planning up front might have saved us all a lot of grief!