My Beautiful Sacramento

Danek's Crestview Pastry, with their home made butter cream and special line of sugar free cookies, cakes, brownies and desserts is one special place to give yourself a treat. Danek's also specializes in wedding cakes, birthday cakes, pastries, delicious sugar free desserts. You can buy loaves of fresh bread too.

We tried their sugar free brownies and the sugar free vanilla bundt cake with the raspberry center dipped in sugar free chocolate.  Heaven!!!  This is an ideal place for a diabetic to find a good dessert.

Located in the heart of Carmichael, California, Danek's Crestview Pastry can be found in the Crestview shopping center on Manzanita Ave. 

For more than 30 years this family owned and operated bakery has offered the folks who live in the Carmichael community a friendly place to pick up fresh baked delicacies.  When you walk in the door you can smell the aroma of home made bread and cookies. 

It is a very friendly atmosphere.  The ownership goes back several generations and began with a family bakery in Maryland.  Many recipes were developed and handed down through the generations and perfected to bring you the yummy goodness today.  They will take the time to talk with you and discuss how they make their products but the recipes are theirs alone. They take great pride in their business.

"You can't build a business if it's not good.  They won't come back."  Says the owner.  "When it comes to the ingredients, we use the best of the best.  We experiment with recipes.  It doesn't come out to the front unless, we'll eat it ourselves."

One of the things that shows success in customer satisfaction is that Danek's is now proudly providing wedding cakes for the children of the couples who ordered their wedding cakes from Danek's years ago.   That is the ultimate compliment. 

If you are planning to move to or live in Carmichael, California or the greater Sacramento area, I want you to know about this neighborhood treasure.  It is worth a visit to try out these delicious desserts.  Order a sugar free or regular birthday cake with fresh butter cream made with care and the finest ingredients.

Danek's Crestview Pastry
916-483-7180

This article, Fruad and Legal, Ethical Minefields, explains several ways that buyers and sellers have unknowingly engaged in short sale fraud.  There are a number of scams going around.

One example of short sale fraud are short sale negotiators who are contacting homeowners and offering to negotiate a short sale with their lender.  Once the home owner agrees the negotiator contacts a real estate broker (who is unaware) and offers to give the broker a referral to a short sale listing for a referral fee. 

The broker is assured that the negotiator will handle the negotiation process with the lender while the broker lists and markets the property.  The negotiator also charges the home owner a fee to negotiate with the lender.

Offers on the property are given to the negotiator who is communicating with the homeowner's lender.  The real estate broker and the home owner are not aware that the negotiator is withholding offers that are coming in on the property from the lender in order to set the stage for the lender to think they should agree to lower the price below fair market value.  Once the price is lowered the negotiator then arranges for an investor to buy the property at a cheap price.  Then when escrow closes they turn around and sell it for the fair market value and profit.

Suppose the homeowner owed $480,000 on the house but it only appraised at $410,000.  The lender originally agreed to a short sale price of $410,000 leaving the homeowner to be liable for tax on $70,000.  Now imagine the negotiator getting the lender to agree to come down in price to $380,000.  They sell it to an investor for $380,000 and the investor turns around and sells it for 410,000 making a $30,000 profit and leaving the homeowner owing taxes on the difference between what they owed $480,000 and what it sold for $380,000.

The Lender may still require the seller (the original borrower) to pay off the remaining debt. In this case, there is no debt forgiveness. Even where the holder of the first lien allows for debt forgiveness, the holder of the second or subordinate liens might not forgive that debt. A deficiency judgment may then be pursued and obtained by the lien holder(s) for the deficiency. Moreover, the greater the debt forgiveness, the greater the potential tax liability. While the federal government has imposed a freeze on taxing the forgiven amount, State tax law may not do the same. Thus, if the short sale property is sold for the most amount of money that the market will bear, the potential tax consequence to the seller is diminished. Conversely, by accepting an artificially deflated offer, the seller’s potential tax liability is increased.

All are advised to contact and consult with a qualified attorney or tax professional regarding the potential tax consequences of a short sale transaction.

There are several methods explained in the article, Short Sale Fruad Warning,

if you are considering engaging in short sale transactions, you should fully educate yourself about the mechanics of the process and the related legal and ethical issues, and work only with legitimate professionals.

Short Sale Fruad Warning

Like I already told Lori Kim Polk, who is the author of this article, she spoke directly to my heart.  I have a soft spot for animals, and also here are some great ways we can help people in our local community.  

I wrote an article, titled, "Home loan modification, is it possible?"  It expressed my disappointment about the home loan modification process and it was a little scary to put out there because it was opinionated. I continue to get calls and emails from people looking for help.  I followed that article with a series of resources to get help for home loan modifications in Sacramento, CA. 

Yesterday, I recieved a phone call from Walt Gray, of KCRA channel 3 News station here in Sacramento, CA. 

It was a complete shock and surprise.  As soon as he said, "Hi Chrystina, this is Walt Gray and I'd like to ask you some questions about home loan modifications."   He kept talking but I couldn't focus on what he was saying. I went blank.  My mind became distracted and I was thinking, "Is this a joke?" 

I had to stop him and tell him that I didn't really hear anything after he said his name.  He laughed and said, "Okay, we'll back up."  Then he proceeded to tell me that he was on his way to interview the Mayor of Loomis and wanted to know if he could stop by my office after and interview me for the segment on the six o'clock news that evening.

Wow!  He read my blog!  He said he liked my article and wanted to know if I would be available to meet him at my office in an HOUR.  Well, this was a day that I was working off site at my home office.  It had been a hectic morning and I had just gotten off the phone with a client who is getting ready to buy a home and was about to run direct underwriting and I was not "put together" with make up and hair and dress PLUS I wasn't sure if I wanted to go on camera.  It was all happening so fast and so unexpected. 

Hey!  I'm a woman and it takes me longer to get ready for something like that!  I require make up! 

This was a huge opportunity.  If I couldn't do the interview, I knew someone who could.  I told Walt to plan on being at my office with the news crew and I would have someone there for him to interview.  I immediately called my business partner, Mark Teran, and he was at the office!  Big relief!  So, all of a sudden, Mark was going to be on the news.   He was stunned too.  In fact, at first, he wondered if it was real.  Would they show up? 

Well, they did show up and we made the six o'clock news. Here it is.

Just goes to show the power of writing articles about what we are passionate about.  And, even if it seems like nobody is reading because you may not get a lot of comments, you'd be surprised at who IS reading.