Off market triplex. What’s my next step?

[Alex Wells]

I’ve reached a purchase price agreement for an off market triplex. I don’t have enough money for the 20% down payment at the moment. The seller is aware of my situation and is willing to wait for me to get the money together. Should i get a purchase agreement signed? What’s is my next step? Any help will be greatly appreciated.THANKS!

[Erik W.]

@Alex Wells, lock it up in writing. If a deal is not in writing, it never happened. Even then it's sometimes dicey. For example, I had a sale contract signed, but during the title search we found out the Sellers failed to disclose multiple liens on the property. Once those were added up, they were not going to net as much profit as they wanted originally and refused to sell, claiming one of the owners was not mentally capable of signing the contract. This was a smokescreen, because the person who signed it was actually her daughter and POA (power of attorney). But she tried to retreat behind her mother's mental deterioration as an excuse to back out saying I wasn't being "fair". She was 100% fine with the sale, until we found out they owed more than they thought. Anyway, I could have sued them to force performance, but in the end I decided to let it go.

The point of this story is that even when you put something in writing, people will sometimes try to back out of a deal.  So verbal promises are generally very weak.  I do trust verbal promises from people I've dealt with in the past, but I most times I get something on paper to ensure we both have a clear meeting of the minds.  Put it in writing doesn't mean lack of trust: it means we are both dealing honorably and feel confident in our bargain enough to memorialize it.