“If you don’t have cash and you are looking to buy a condo, the chances of closing are less than 50 percent. If you do need financing and are willing to roll the dice, then you are going to go through a lot of time and effort just to get to the point where you might have a chance for financing. If you don’t have your file in place, if you don’t have your documentation, there will be no chance to get financing. The earnest has really shifted from the lender to do the underwriting to the buyer to produce all the documentation necessary for the bank to even give the borrower serious consideration.”
– Peter Zalewski, a principal with Condo Vultures LLC in Bal Harbour, Fla., in an Inman News story about the financing challenges facing condo buyers in today’s market. According to the article, lenders have turned against the condo product to the point that “a blackball environment has emerged, with lenders compiling a list of buildings that won’t get loans.” Supposedly the majority of these blacklisted developments are in South Florida — is anyone seeing this trend in Chicago?