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Personally I believe more EM says I am not a jerk you off, waste "our" time buyer. I am a serious buyer. I think it also says I have money, so chances are better that any financial contingencies such as mortgage approval might well not be an issue.
If one had to only put a few bucks up (say $100.00), then one might well do it on several homes at once then see what "deal" they can drive on them. If talking $400K homes and a few % then one might well put $1K down on say 3 homes and be prepared to walk away from two of them (as in lose $2K) if they drove a good deal on the 3rd.
In NY it's common to put down half your down payment as earnest money. When we bought our first house we put down $30K in earnest money - we were putting down 20% on a $300K house.
As house prices bubbled in that area, lower down payments became more common, but when we sold our house 2 years ago we also got 10% earnest money - $70K. In NY, real estate attorneys hold the money in escrow.
How did you decide on this # (agent advice?).
Did you provide the EM after all contingencies were cleared or did you put it into escrow at the time the contract was signed?
Is there an ignore button on this forum so that I don't get duped into arguing with internet trolls again? I don't know why I wasted my time typing what I did.
Quote:
Originally Posted by accufitgolf
Personally I believe more EM says I am not a jerk you off, waste "our" time buyer. I am a serious buyer. I think it also says I have money, so chances are better that any financial contingencies such as mortgage approval might well not be an issue.
If one had to only put a few bucks up (say $100.00), then one might well do it on several homes at once then see what "deal" they can drive on them. If talking $400K homes and a few % then one might well put $1K down on say 3 homes and be prepared to walk away from two of them (as in lose $2K) if they drove a good deal on the 3rd.
Money talks...$hit walks.
Old Texas expression....big hat...no cattle.
Exactly! A real buyer doesn't care if exit costs are high because they don't want to exit they want to buy. If you're wasting your time caring about exit costs it's either because you're not serious or you're such a nervous person that the only way you'll ever buy something is if you have serious deposit money at stake.
Is there an ignore button on this forum so that I don't get duped into arguing with internet trolls again? I don't know why I wasted my time typing what I did.
... .
Ahhhh... Yes, there is and it works just as well as you let it work. I highly recommend it!
Click "My Settings" on the left in the bar above the forum.
In the next screen, scroll down the buttons on the left, and click, "Edit Ignore List."
Input the CD username of the troll you want to Ignore, and "Okay" to add someone to Ignore List.
You will still be exposed when other posters quote one trick ponies, unfortunately, and the posts show up in the quote, but at least you have another step to perform to deter you from wasting time in answer to the trolling post.
Is there an ignore button on this forum so that I don't get duped into arguing with internet trolls again? I don't know why I wasted my time typing what I did.
I was simply replying to the OP with my thoughts on the amount of EM he paid. You are the one who chimed in with a personal attack stating: “yet another ridiculous post”
Call me what you want, I am not the one falsely accusing people of posting “grossly irresponsible”, “inaccurate information”, just b/c I don’t agree with their opinion.
You never answered my question:
Quote:
Originally Posted by RE Skeptic
I am sure I have written things that you disagree with, but that does not mean that these posts were "incorrect information". Please provide some examples of FACTUALLY "incorrect information" that I have posted.
Google9, here are some suggestions, not intended to be legal advice. If you need to know in advance if you can cancel before getting a denial from the new bank, then these suggestions may help:
Read your contract financing contingency section.
Read the extension granted by the seller.
Make an appointment with your escrow officer at the title company (if your state uses them)
Take your documents with you
...Contract
...Financing contingency extension letter
...Any addenda
...First bank denial letter
In Arizona, the title company makes the decision from these documents as to who gets the earnest money in the case of a cancellation and EM dispute. It may be the same where you are.
Ask them if you are entitled to the EM return IF you cancel.
However, you state that you do want the house so you apparently will continue working with this new lender until they issue you a denial letter. If they don't approve the loan, then they will have to inform you that they won't process the loan, so eventually you will get that notice.
I agree with the others on the attorney fees, in that the fee was a flat fee for a specific service.
What is covered in that service should have been disclosed to you in the beginning. You should clarify with the attorney what is included in the flat fee so there won't be any surprises.
In the area where I work, the typical earnest money deposit is 1-2%. As a buyer agent I don't suggest that my buyers offer more than 1% because I feel it's sufficient.
If a buyer wanted to make a $100-$500 EM deposit on a $500,000 home, then I would have some concerns about the buyer, and I know the seller and sellers agent would. The buyer would need to know that this would put me in a weak negotiation situation because the seller side would not have any trust in the buyer side. They would negotiate on the basis of not caring if we walk because they don't think we're serious.
The suspicion would be that the buyer may be making other offers while going through escrow on theirs, and would walk away from the EM if they got a better deal somewhere else.
The seller can require a certain amount of EM deposit. It isn't typical, but on occasion I do see a requirement of 2%. Recently on an REO, the bank required $10,000 EM on a $150k home.
I was simply replying to the OP with my thoughts on the amount of EM he paid. You are the one who chimed in with a personal attack stating: “yet another ridiculous post”
Call me what you want, I am not the one falsely accusing people of posting “grossly irresponsible”, “inaccurate information”, just b/c I don’t agree with their opinion.
This will be my last post directed at you as I have better things to do with my time and I'm already mad at myself that I've spent as much time as I have going back and forth with you . . .
I hate to tell you this but opinions can be wrong too. If I said "horizontal stripes look good on fat people." I would be WRONG. If I said "murdering 10 people sounds like a fun way to spend an afternoon." I would be WRONG. If I said "Ishtar was a great movie and deserved an Oscar." I would be WRONG. These are merely opinions (not mine) but opinions.
I'm not going to comb through your posts to find bad advice or factually incorrect information because I'm not going to continue arguing with you nor will I respond to your posts in the future. It's not a productive use of my time. I'm here to help people not to argue with people who only seek to disagree and cause discourse.
If you want to talk about high horses though, it sounds like my horse is a pony compared to yours. I can't believe how you have come on this forum and posted with such frequency your opinion and advice without a shred of qualification. Do you have years of experience transacting real estate? Do you have some sort of education background that might qualify you to issue such opinion or advice? I disagree with Mark all the time but at least he has a law degree and does a lot of real estate investing. Everyone's entitled to their opinion but a wise man knows when to keep it to themselves.
Then to accuse me of treating you differently because you're not an agent is ridiculous. I'm not the forum police here and I can only call out bad advice/incorrect information when I see it. I don't read every thread and I stick to what I know. If someone incorrectly quotes a Texas law, I'm not going to call them out because I don't know squat about Texas law.
Thank you for stating the obvious and honest truth. I stopped arguing with RE Skeptic due to the same frustration. We are all entitled to our opinions, even RE Skeptic, but an occasional reminder that some statements can be incorrect needs to be stated from time to time. We all have the right to our opinion and that is not in question.
Personally I believe more EM says I am not a jerk you off, waste "our" time buyer. I am a serious buyer. I think it also says I have money, so chances are better that any financial contingencies such as mortgage approval might well not be an issue.
If one had to only put a few bucks up (say $100.00), then one might well do it on several homes at once then see what "deal" they can drive on them. If talking $400K homes and a few % then one might well put $1K down on say 3 homes and be prepared to walk away from two of them (as in lose $2K) if they drove a good deal on the 3rd.
Money talks...$hit walks.
Old Texas expression....big hat...no cattle.
A "few" % of 400k is at least 8k per house, in your scenario, the buyer would be losing at least 16k (not 2k) to get the 3rd house. I think most buyers would look at a any loss >1K as substantial and unpalatable.
I am not proposing that people put a dollar down (as I have been quoted saying) or even a few hundred dollars.
Agree that EM can help convey a level of sincerity to the seller. But so can other things like the offer price. That being said, people don't usually offer asking price out of the gate, just to prove that they are serious and the same negotiating strategy holds for EM, contingencies, etc. Its all about hoping for the best and preparing for the worst...keeping your options open.
I still think, all things equal, that within a reasonable range, it is in the buyers interest to keep EM low and in the agents (both of them) and sellers to keep it high.
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