TAMPA (AP) — Nathan Jurewicz calls himself The Short Sale Kid.
    At 27, the brash real estate agent drives a Lamborghini, sports neon hair and boasts of hauling in $100,000 a month in a market where others are fighting to survive.
    His YouTube videos dazzle. They show him signing closing documents in his luxury condo, getting his hair colored in a swanky salon and talking about how he doesn’t have to work hard in a bayarea housing market others say is at rock bottom.
    His secret?
    He buys properties in foreclosure at low-ball prices from banks, then flips them the same day for big profit — as many as 10 a month. Jurewicz said he, and the followers of his system, fill a need in a down market, but others in the industry question his booming business. They say:
    • Banks are losing out on thousands of dollars on each sale at a time when the industry is receiving billions in taxpayer bailouts.
    • Many distressed homeowners are unaware lenders someday could require them to pay the difference between the original mortgage and the selling price. The low-ball offer could leave them on the hook later to pay the lender the higher difference.
    • A large segment of the home-buying market could be excluded. Under Jurewicz’s system, cash is preferred and potential buyers with FHA loans are avoided.
    Jurewicz’s system is a national brand called Short Sales Riches. In June, he teamed up with real estate broker Chris McLaughlin, a lawyer and owner of four Keller Williams’ realty offices in the Tampa Bay region. They developed a program that includes DVDs, a book and mentoring program that is enticing agents and investors nationwide to cash in on the housing bust.
    The team’s Webinars and testimonial videos are becoming an Internet sensation.
    “Every time I see something on the news about the sky falling … my partner and I think, ‘Yes,’ ” Jurewicz says in a YouTube video after closing a deal for a $15,000 profit.
    Although YouTube is full of positive testimonials, the program is attracting the critical eye of real estate professionals and lenders.
    Dozens of experts who looked at the system question whether all parties are getting full disclosure. Of particular concern is whether lenders would allow the short sales if they knew the properties were reselling for tens of thousands of dollars more on the same day.
    Jurewicz said lenders should know because they get a copy of the contract that prohibits the owner from selling to anyone but him.
    Besides, he said, his system helps lenders get rid of distressed properties faster. His contracts have been reviewed by lawyers and are disclosed to everyone involved. Critics, he said, just don’t understand.
    “We get deals done,” he told the Tampa Tribune last week. “People like to jump to conclusions, but I feel good about the work I do. If the banks didn’t make it so hard to get short sales closed, there wouldn’t be a need for me.”
    Here’s how the system works:
    Realtors representing real estate investors, or the investors themselves, identify homeowners in trouble and persuade them to sign the system’s hallmark optioncontract. The contract, which is filed at the courthouse, gives an investor an exclusive right to buy the home for a year at a specific price.
    • The offer then is submitted to the lender as a short sale, which allows owners to avoid foreclosure because the lender agrees to sell the home for less than the mortgage.
    • When the lender sends a professional to estimate the property’s market value, the investor uses what Jurewicz calls “Jedi mind tricks” to persuade the lender’s estimator to accept a lower value. He also provides a hardship letter, indicating the homeowner’s desperation.
    • A real estate agent then looks for a buyer willing to pay a higher price. Once they have a deal, the real estate investor settles with the lender for the low price and sells it on the same day for the higher price, collecting the difference.
    Many title companies refuse to handle the closing, which is why Jurewicz and others in the program mainly use lawyers, which Florida law allows. Jurewicz has a team of more than a dozen real estate professionals and pays them bonuses and part of the profit.
    Short sales are common as more troubled homeowners try to avoid foreclosure, but they often take months to complete. Jurewicz said he has able to find buyers to close quickly because he negotiates a short sale approval from the lender ahead of time.
    Dozens of real estate professionals who have looked at the program, however, say participants could run into serious problems.
    Some say, and Jurewicz acknowledges, lenders are not told a higher offer is available. That makes critics wonder whether lenders, who are supported by taxpayer bailouts, are getting the best deal.
    Then there are worries that homeowners who are less savvy about real estate matters might not fully understand the deal. Others point to first-time buyers and others, such as those with FHA loans, who can be locked out because their lenders won’t fund loans with option contracts.
    “This is cutting out 75 percent of the market because so many buyers are using these kinds of FHA loans,” said Jane Land, a real estate agent with Century 21 in Tampa.
    She also worries sellers mistakenly might assume the agent approaching them also represents them.
    But Jurewicz and McLaughlin said they make homeowners sign a form that discloses that.
    The system is attractive to investors because lenders might never know the house was flipped the same day, said Jennifer Butts, director of operations for Reston, Va.-based Mortgage Asset Research Institute, which tracks problem mortgages for lenders.
    “This raises the question as to how much transparency there should be in the short sale process,” Butts said.
    The program’s free Webinars routinely fill up with wannabe real estate investors.
    The official Short Sales Riches system retails for $497. However, customers are encouraged to also purchase “inner-circle” coaching. It ranges from $197 a month to $997 a month. Jurewicz and his partner declined to disclose the number of programs they have sold.