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Location: Mokelumne Hill, CA & El Pescadero, BCS MX.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by artking09
I am in the attorney review stage. Sellers's attorney sent my attorney a letter requesting they (sellers and sellers' attorney) do the closing thru FedEx, ie. sellers will pre-sign all the closing documents in front of seller attorney, then sellers' attorney will FedEx all closing documents to my attorney during closing date. The reason is that they think my attorney's office is too far away. In fact, it is 35 miles, mainly on highway, so they can get there within 40 min if not in rush hour.
This is weird. So why do they want to do this?? Buyers, sellers and attorneys should all sit around one table to sign off at the same time. I am worried that if they make a mistake or something happens, the deal may not close on time. Have anyone finished closing like this before? Thanks.
By all means make sure you use 1980's technology when closing. If notaries signature wasnt required for deeds, we might be able to use electronic signatures on everything.
In an ideal world, such closings might be fine. However, if there are small issues that arise at closing (and they almost always do, at least at mine), it would be very difficult to resolve those by FedEx and, in fact, it could seriously disrupt the closing schedule for both parties. I also feel that, unless one or both parties are totally unreasonable, some things can be better settled face-to-face. It's a lot easier to say no if you can hide behind a FedEx letter and a lot harder not to be conciliatory if your buyer/seller is sitting right there.
Now, I guess the answer is that some of this could be done by telephone, but face-to-face is always better.
In my 14 years, only 2 transactions were done at one table, and it was the most uncomfortable closings I've ever had. Never again will buyers and sellers sit at the same table when I'm involved. It's not natural. There is already too much hostility of someone wanting top dollar and someone wanting rock-bottom price. It's never a win/win in their eyes. Sellers will still think they're selling too low and buyers will still think they're paying too much.
Horrible, horrible to have both parties in the same room. Mail-outs are done all the time when the sellers have already moved, or the buyers are relocating and can't get into town just to sign papers as they're coordinating their move from their current city.
I hate to say this , but you are right. In my case I was the seller and I was moving across country so I signed early and did the Fed Ex thing in order to get to closing on my next home. Secondly , I felt bad over knowing that the buyers probably overpaid for my home. I recall a plumber telling me that my home was nowhere worth what I was selling it for , yet someone bought it and I wanted out from underneath it , but it is Colorado and homes are overpriced anyways. Oddly enough, you would think that sitting at the closing table would be really happy times for both parties but its usually not.
This is weird. So why do they want to do this?? Buyers, sellers and attorneys should all sit around one table to sign off at the same time. I am worried that if they make a mistake or something happens, the deal may not close on time. Have anyone finished closing like this before? Thanks.
Actually, everyone gathered around the closing table is becoming less and less a "thing". Sellers may have already moved across the country to start a new job, or they may have jury duty, or they may have family emergencies, such as funerals or sickness in the family. Or their office/business may have something come up that is a direct conflict. It happens. Personally, I don't think 35 miles is a big deal, but that's just me. The seller usually has far fewer forms to sign, and sitting there for 45 minutes to an hour watching you sign mortgage papers is pretty boring. When you think about it, you are asking them to drive 90 minutes round trip to spend 10-15 minutes signing papers. Waste of time.
If you are using a mortgage, you will have an opportunity to review your closing numbers 3 days prior to closing. There's usually a little form that is signed where everyone agrees to cooperate with correcting any errors (i.e., a typo on the legal description, etc.). Mistakes can happen, certainly, but they are almost always quickly corrected.
I hate to say this , but you are right. In my case I was the seller and I was moving across country so I signed early and did the Fed Ex thing in order to get to closing on my next home. Secondly , I felt bad over knowing that the buyers probably overpaid for my home. I recall a plumber telling me that my home was nowhere worth what I was selling it for , yet someone bought it and I wanted out from underneath it , but it is Colorado and homes are overpriced anyways. Oddly enough, you would think that sitting at the closing table would be really happy times for both parties but its usually not.
Don't hate to say it, as my husband never tells me I'm right, though I'm always right!!
We have both parties at the table the majority of the time in our area. I've had a few that were a bit contentious, but overall they have gone very well. Sometimes we just put the buyer and seller in separate rooms.
in most cases, once you're face to face and sitting down, and the end is in sight ... MOST cases but not all ... they get along just fine. I've had some opposing parties that you would have thought were the world's biggest jerks suddenly become pleasant enough. Never had them turn hard for the bad on closing day.
In some ways, I think it's reflective on being so impersonal up until that point.
I know this is an old thread, but thought I'd add this to it.
Only once did I do the sit around the table closing. It was in PA. It was scheduled at 8 am as the buyer needed to move in my old/her new house that day. So I asked for a 1/2 day off work, knowing I could be there by lunch.
As each paper was passed around the table my attorney would whisper to me what it was and then hers would do the same to her, or they would tell us that was not for us and pass it on. In the end she was missing a note from her sister saying she had gifted her less than $500 towards the purchase of the house. No one could find that paper. Without it, no loan, no selling the house.
So, she called her sister at her workplace. She could handwrite the note and FAX it to the escrow company where we were meeting...but NOT until her lunch as she had to leave her work to do the FAX. We waited and the FAX came at lunchtime. BUT it was not notarized. So the mortgage company rejected it. The buyer kept calling and calling her sister at work. Way before there were cell phones, land line only.
Finally her sister returned from lunch and was told of the need for a notary on the note. The sister could not do it until after she got off work. There we sat, around the table.
I called my work and said I would not be in that day.
The escrow company sent a notary to the sister's work to notarize the note once she got off work and then the escrow agent FAXED it back to the office. But this was after 4:30.
The buyer was stressed, apologized over and over. But it was not her fault. The paper was there--I saw it when we passed everything around, just then it went missing. EVERYBODY saw it...
So the house closed that day right before 5, and it was not recorded with the county until the next day as it was too late. But she got the keys and I got the money that day.
After that, I do not do table settlements. I can only handle so much small talk when I am waiting for money
And I always will think that her attorney had it in his pile of 'her copy' papers. I know we got all the papers first and we passed it on. But her attorney did not want to take another look in the stack of papers, just in case, nope we waited and waited.....
Glad the attorney was a flat rate, and not by the hour!
From someone that spent from 1972 till I retired as an investment real estate broker, I can tell you throughout my career we rarely had the buyer and the seller at the same closing table. It is not a good practice to do so.
One closing for the buyer, the selling agent and my wife were there along with the buyer for a closing at an escrow company. My wife was also a broker and a real estate university trained par legal specializing in real estate. She sat down at the table and began to review the closing doctor. She told the escrow closer, the papers were not acceptable and need to be redone correctly. The selling broker had been in the business for 20 years. The escrow officer asked the other broker what he thought, and he did not know what to say, so asked my wife who he thought was just my secretary/receptionist what her credentials were to turn down the papers. My wife explained a licensed broker, a para legal, a member of the county wide closers association and the association trainer for closers. He said he did not have anywhere near her credentials so he could not comment.
My wife told the closer to ask her boss, the manager of that branch of the title company. She took them to the manager, and told her the problem. The manager started reviewing the papers, and said they were badly prepared and would not even allow them to issue a title policy they were so bad. She asked the manger what changes were needed and was told, "Ask my wife as she is the local expert and was the one that trained her to do the closings." My wife redid all the closing papers, and they closed. That escrow close was in my wife's next closer class. The buyer signed all the papers, and the sellers had to come in and sign all the papers a second time. They were real upset over this.
This is an example, of why you don't want the buyer and the seller in the same room when you do the closing. It may have lost the sale, if they had both been in the same room at the time of closing and my wife had rejected the papers.
And as to the importance of if using an attorney, they be a true real estate attorney I give the following example.
I had a retired cop from Chicago that wanted a restaurant in a resort area. I found him a closed restaurant in a great location, and a 75 unit mobile home park attached. Fantastic highway location. It was owned by two cousins that would not even speak to one another, but had to sell the property, to divide up the money due to a court order.
I was sent the closing papers prepared by an attorney (a divorce attorney not a real estate attorney). The papers were so wrong, they had to be redone. The attorney called me and I told him what the problems were, and how he needed to change them. He did. I drove to where the one owner lived, and got him to sign the papers. The next day drove to the office of the selling broker 100 miles away, and the buyers and one seller were at the table. The selling agent, had arranged private money with 3 note holders on one note, as the type of property was too difficult to find a commercial lender, who were real nice old men all about 90 wanting the income to go to their children when they were gone, as they felt the kids would blow the money and not have the additional regular income they needed on their deaths if they got it in cash. I asked the attorney who was really lost at a complicated real estate transaction to let me sort the papers in the order I would like to see them presented. He said OK and when I finished he said that was exactly the way he would have sorted them. The buyers had a question, and the attorney was sitting there looking like he had no idea of how to answer it, so I asked if I could answer it, and the attorney told me to go ahead. After I answered it the attorney said that was exactly what he would have said. The buyer, the seller and the old money men asked questions and every time the attorney would freeze up and after I answered it, he would say that is what I was going to say (lying through his teeth as the old saying goes) as the one asking the question understood my answer but I know the attorney did not. After the first few questions they asked me the questions, I answered and would turn to him and he always said that was what I was going to say. It took an hour to get everything closed up. It soon became the hottest dinner house in town. The income from the mobile home park who was ran by a manager, more than paid the entire mortgage, utilities, and gave my buyer some income in addition. The mortgage would have been large, if just the restaurant was included, so it gave him a real financial advantage with no mortgage payments coming out of his pocket.
It had a long reputation as a road house and kind of wild. He had one space right above the restaurant parking lot, and he had a bulldozer clear a spot overlooking the parking lot, lit up well by the parking lot lights. He had rented it to a highway patrolman working the day shift, and he parked his cruiser in that spot. Everyone entering the parking lot, saw a police vehicle watching the parking lot and restaurant. Twice a month, the owner would invite the officer and his wife for dinner on him. None of the wild crowd would come around the restaurant, which the good dinner crowd appreciated and got him a lot of business, and absolutely no problems. Seeing that car when they came in, eliminated the need for a bouncer, etc.
I am telling you about this case, to demonstrate if you are going to have an attorney do the closing, get a real estate specialist, as others that do not practice real estate law, can sure mess up the closing and even cost a sale, or leave you with future problems.
I did my first Fed-Ex closing almost thirty years ago. I bought a raw lot from a seller that had moved from PA. to OK. Currently, if there is a closing scheduled with both parties in the same office at the same time, my broker won't allow both parties to be in the same room. He has a new office complex set up with two conference rooms at opposite corners of the building. The respective agents are alone with their clients and walk them through signing all the necessary docs. The title insurance and doc. filing person stops by both rooms to see if everything is complete and correct, keys and garage door openers are handed out, and it's a wrap.
I've built and sold many spec. homes. There are times when the buyers are really great people, some who have gone on to be long term friends of mine. In other rare cases, it only takes a few interactions in the first year of ownership to realize that they are the kind of people I want nothing to do with, since they are difficult clients who are either totally unreasonable, or generally unpleasant to be around. I could easily see a deal collapsing at a face to face closing with some of these folks, when the pressure of the moment reveals their true nature. I once had a client who turned out to be a pretty good person overall, but nearly killed a closing. She insisted on reading every page of everything, which was brutal. She then wanted me to agree to a "performance bond" basically a $800 escrow deposit, to be held until a missing dishwasher was installed. I allowed her to pick the appliances in a new home. She picked an obscure dishwasher that was not in stock and not easily available. I agreed to deal with all the problems this created, INCLUDING paying nearly twice as much as I usually do for the unit, and coming back after the closing to install the thing, just to make her happy. The whole pressure of the closing brought out a bit of paranoia, and she decided that she needed to protect herself from the fact that I might disappear without giving her the fancy dishwasher she picked. It was a closing that both parties were at, and taught me why it's not a good idea to have both sides there at the same time. I was so pissed at the time that I told he that I would be happy to give her deposit back, and we could all go our separate ways.
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