What you are seeing is the reality of the market as it stands today. SDAR has implemented an additional classification for homes that are on the MLS called Contingent. This classification shall be designated for homes that have an offer accepted by the seller on a short sale but NOT YET accepted by the lender. These homes used to be classified as Actives but that is not the case anymore. Even with homes that are still Actives, many of them indeed are short sales and they also have offers into the lender. However they have not been accepted by the seller. Thus you can still put an offer in on them. You can also still put in an offer on a home that is in the Contingent status as well. Your offer may simply be a backup. Lots of people back out of short sales.
The bottom line is that nothing has changed, it is just advertised in a more representative manner. Third party sites like Zip and others need to figure out if and how they will display contingent listings now.
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