how can i make the buyer financing quicker/more reliable ?

[Daniel Blau]

As a new-ish investor one of the aspects of the process I've finding the toughest is when i am the seller of a property under contract that requires buyer financing (which are most deals).  Often I am waiting on money from the sale to purchase new investments as cash or as 1031s.  The settlement process is long (can take 2-3 months or more), I feel I am in the dark and don't have much control over it, and then often in the end it's unsuccessful -- the financing falls through.  As the seller, is there anything I can do about this buyer financing phase to make it quicker and more reliable ? 

Some things I can think of are : 

1) specify in the contract who are the allowable lenders or have the right to approve the selected lender  

2) require updates on progress of the loan from the buyer or the lender  

3)  is there any info I can get on the buyer to indicate how likely he/she is to obtain the loan?  Credit, income, assets, criminal history of the buyer would be nice but I don't believe it's legal to obtain any of this info …