Seller is refusing to sign Earnest money release form

[Bhanu P.]

I am in State of Texas and we signed TREC Contract.

In Section 7.B.2, we checked the box and the contract is executed, earnest money was left with title company. the text in that contract is below.

Buyer has not received the notice. Within 5 days after the effective date of the contract, Seller shall deliver the notice to the Buyer.If Buyer does not receive the Notice, Buyer many terminate this contract. if Seller delivers the notice, Buyer may terminate this contract for any reason within 7 days after the Buyer receives the Notice or prior to the closing, whichever first occurs, and the earnest money will be refunded by the Buyer.

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I am a Buyer in the contract and within 7 days after I receive the Seller's Disclosures, I provided the signed 'Notice to Terminate Contract' to Seller's agent through my agent;  requested them to sign the 'Release of Earnest Money' form.

After a week of postponing the signatures, we heard from the Seller's agent today stating that they need a portion of the Earnest money to sign the release form or else they state that they do not sign.

I believe the first step from my side is to send them a notice to sign through Title company and will wait 15 days for their response. please help me understand what should I do in terms of hiring an attorney or just need to wait for Seller's response after we send the notice through Title company?

First of all do the Title company need such form to be signed by Seller to release Earnest money as I gave the 'Notice to terminate' form?

[Guy Gimenez]

@Jay Hinrichs

Title companies in Texas can hold the disputed amounts up to a two years. Fortunately, Justice of the Peace Courts (the "People's Court") handle amounts up to $10K so it's pretty easy to file an action for less than $150 and it can usually be resolved in less than 60 days. A title company won't release disputed funds without a finding by the JP Court.  Been there, done that.