also, in what part of the process does a short sale come into place?

l do not hear the term of pre foreclosure before. You can request a short sale as fast as you think you can not afford the payment. You will need a real estate agent and list the property for sale. There are some other options that it may work if you talk to the bank.

pre is when you have a letter from your lender announcing
your home will be foreclosed on on x date if you do not
cure the arrears.

Foreclosure is the last date of curing the behind payments.

A SS is before F; it is intent is to by-pass F.

If the foreclosure auction is Oct 9th, anything done prior to that is pre-foreclosure. that is when a short sale can still be done by the owner. On the 9th, the house belongs to the bank..

Pre-foreclosure is a period where the homeowner is being warned by the lender that the house is in default (is behind mortgage payments & unable to catch up) & need to do something about it, but at this point, the lender cannot claim back the property & sell it to recover the costs. But at this stage there r many options available for the homeowner to stop foreclosure like Loan Modification, Forbearance Agreement, Deed in Lieu, short sale etc.,

Short sale where the lender agrees to accept less than the full amount of the mortgage. This allows the homeowner to sell the house to an investor or other buyer for a good price, while the lender recovers the bulk of the amount due without having to pursue foreclosure proceedings.

Whereas Foreclosure is a process by which a lender regains a property which they have financed. Typically, this is because the borrower or homeowner is behind on house payments & is unable to catch up.