Short sale vs Foreclosure

[randaljon]

How damaging is a short sale to your credit? Is it as bad as a foreclosure? How big a drop in credit score would I see and how long will it be posted on credit reports?

[ShanetheMortgageMan]

Part of it will depend on the mortgage payment history leading up to a short sale.  Someone with no late payments and then all of a suddent a short sale/"settled for less than full" notation appears, then it'd hurt the scores a lot less than if there was several 120 day lates, 90 day, 60 day and a 30 day late leading up to it.