Wholesale Dilemma

[Jarrell Smith]

Hello BP,

I'm currently in a bit of an unusual situation.

I put a property under contract with intentions to reassign the contract, then started marketing it.  Within a few days a potential buyer contacted me and put down a $1,000 binder.  We both signed the assignment contract and then he was gone and unresponsive.  A few days have passed and the buyer has not returned any calls, texts, e-mail, etc.

What am I to do in a situation like this?  Do I have to let the original purchase contract expire before I can attempt anything with the property?

[Belinda D.]

Before marketing the contract did you submit it to the title company for them to open escrow? If yes, contact them to see if the buyer submitted any payment or informed them of anything. Always keep in touch with the title company until the deal is closed.

Was the binder deposit non-refundable? 

Your assignment contract should have a "non-refundable" deposit clause. I would go a step further and indicate that "Assignor will not accept an offer from assignee until after assignee does their own due diligence (with absolutely no contingencies) and submits the non-refundable deposit immediately upon acceptance of the Assignment. In other words you are letting the buyer know that you will continue to market the contract until he/she does these 2 things.

If your Purchase contract or Assignment contract does not indicate that you cannot reassign, then just continue to market it. However, you are not reassigning at this point. Let the 2nd interested buyer know that you may already have a buyer, but he/she can still see the property and you would like to put him/her  on a waiting list. Do this again for a 3rd buyer.

Just my 2cents.