home sale fell through, advice needed (contingencies, appraisal, clause, dual agency)
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[SIZE=3]I don’t know much about selling a house, which is why I hireda realtor. We listed the house and received an offer very quickly. I acceptedthe offer, they did an inspection and appraisal and everything was going great.They requested a repair to be made, I made it. We had a closing date within amonth of the date of the offer. They were supposed totake possession of the house the day of closing. About three weeks before the closing date, myagent called me saying there was something wrong with my deed (that I had alean against it). I wasn’t aware of that so I called my county clerks officeand title search company and they told me that everything was fine. So I got back to my realtor the same day.Later that week I called the realtor to check on the status because closingdate was approaching and I still had to find a place to live and start movingout so that I can be out by closing. He told me they were still trying to clear everything up with the title,and that was the ONLY hold up. A weeklater, I called again, and again he told me the same thing. He said it shouldbe cleared up soon and everything else is good to go. I asked over and over tomake sure because I didn’t want to move if I wasn’t sure this was happening, hetold me yes everything is going well, everything was good on the buyers side and we were just waiting on my "title issue", so I trusted him. Well in the end and a week AFTER the closingdate I find out that their loan was not approved. So I was already moved out, signed alease, sold a lot of my stuff because I was downsizing to a small apartment,and now I’m screwed. I have learned a huge lesson and I know now that I shouldhave never moved but now it’s too late. I am stuck with rent and a mortgage andI don’t know what to do. I will have to break my lease and it will cost me but Ithink it is unfair that I lose so much and everyone else just moves on? They will not even give me the measly little $500 good faith money even though I have already lost over $2k and that is not including the penalties i will owe for breaking my lease. I cannot aford to pay both rent and mortgae. Any advice? [/SIZE]
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Very confusing post. Your agent said there was an issue with the title and title company said there was no issue. Did your agent say what the issue was? It sounds like your agent was lying to you.
I would definitely contact your agents broker to find out why they were telling you there was a title issue if there was not. I am very concerned about this because it sounds as if you did not get adequate representation from your agent. Was this a "dual agency" situation?
As for the buyer not being approved, this is unfortunate, but they likely had a loan contingency so not much you can do.
Finally, if it turns out that your agent screwed up. I would ask to be released from your listing agreement or at least ask broker to assign another agent that will do a proper job.
Because I can't afford to pay rent and morgage. The main reason the people put in an offer so fast is because they really wanted to live there because they have family in the neighborhood. I'm not sure if it would even sell that fast again. And waiting on another inspection, appraisor, closing date.
Plus I am so tired of them stringing me along i am definitely not going to stay with the same realtor. Everyday all I ever heard was "we should know something soon", " we should close on XXX day" ..... and they kept changing. They knew the entire time that the buyers were having a hard time with the loan but noone told me, they made me believe they were only waiting on my issue to clear up and then we would close.
My realtor said the buyers keep the earnest money because they did not get approved for the loan. I haven't signed off on the release yet.
Very confusing post. Your agent said there was an issue with the title and title company said there was no issue. Did your agent say what the issue was? It sounds like your agent was lying to you.
Yes that is exactly what I said, they had some kind of issue supposedly with a lean on it but there was no lean when i called (there was nothing except my mortgage). What really makes me mad is that they made it seem like the delay was on my end when it really wasn't.
I would definitely contact your agents broker to find out why they were telling you there was a title issue if there was not. I am very concerned about this because it sounds as if you did not get adequate representation from your agent. Was this a "dual agency" situation?
The buyers had an agent from a different agency. I feel like my agent should have been honest with me about the whole situation and I would have never moved. That is my biggest problem because now i'm losing a lot of money over this that could have been prevented. Unless the agent did not know they were having problems? I dont know.
As for the buyer not being approved, this is unfortunate, but they likely had a loan contingency so not much you can do.
I do feel bad for the buyers because they really did want it.
Finally, if it turns out that your agent screwed up. I would ask to be released from your listing agreement or at least ask broker to assign another agent that will do a proper job.
I don't even want to do this anymore. I just want to be released from the listing agreement and wait before listing it again.
Most real estate contracts have a contingency that if the buyer cannot obtain financing that they can get a refund of escrow (at least in my state of Florida).
But if her story is true, the contract did not close by the contract closing date, hence, any financing contingencies would no longer be in play and the buyer defaulted the contract by not closing. In those situations, earnest money goes to the seller. I'm not an attorney, but that's what happens in my area.
See if you can contact the interested buyers about possibly renting the property ... or a lease-option.
Another take-away might be to get a larger deposit. $500 isn't much to take a property off the market and wait for a closing, then, to lose the sale ... for any reason. At $500, folks might be willing to take a bigger risk of not closing, whereas, you are still in a bind even if you get the deposit money.
Additionally, was their inability to qualify for a loan, due to a failure to sell their own property (for which they did not have a contingency clause)?? There is something wrong here, since getting a pre-qualification based on assets, income, etc. can often be done via phone. (In the future, you might request a pre-qual approval letter early, but, for now, there is absolutely no good reason for this thing to get all the way past the closing date, only to 'suddenly' discover that the buyers was unable to qualify for the lawn.
Somebody was stringing you along! It also sounds like your Realtor was 'asleep at the switch.' However, you also should have made a few calls on your own (title company, bank, broker) to make sure you weren't getting too far 'out-on-a-limb' that had a chance of getting sawed-off.
Sorry to hear about your trouble, but, there are a lot of things you can learn from the experience.
I called the title company, county clerks office, and even their loan officer because I felt like I wasn't getting answers from my realtor. Their loan officer said Monday that they were interested in renting the property and I was ok with it because as long as someone covers my mortgage then i'm ok. But the loan officer told me to go through my realtor, which i did as soon as I was off the phone. My realtor was trying to talk me out of that option but I was still considering it. Then later that night I get a text saying loan was not approved and the buyers do not want to rent for that long.
I also found out the reason that they did not get the loan was because they already had a house that they just refinanced, and trying to sell it. All this came out the last day which was two days ago. Original closing was scheduled for 8 July. Since then I already had to pay my mortgage which I was not planning on.
If I wasn't moved out it wouldn't be that big of a deal if the sell did not go through. But it's just that I have lost so much money and I am not well off in that department anyway, I am a single parent with small kids. I need all the savings I have (thank God I had some savings or I would be in trouble now).
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