Legal Help/Advice - Referral Finder's Fee

[Sharon Rodrigues]

I have a signed a Finders Fee Agreement with an Investor who put a bank REO under contract almost one year ago! I brought in a Buyer and, as per the Agreement, I was supposed to be paid the difference in price from seller's asking price and my Buyer's agreed price which made the split at 60:40 where the seller was making $16K and I was making $10K.

With the market the way it is, the deal took almost a year but we are now ready to close. However, the price dropped and seller was very evasive in answering my questions about how we were to share the new deal. Now we do not have the new ASKING price! I wrote him and told him that we would continue to do the 60:40 but he never answered.

As background, I did 100% of the work getting the Buyer and finding financing for him. Buyer only knew me as the Seller contact for the deal. Since deal was delayed, original seller banked the original non-refundable earnest money deposit of $10K without informing anyone and disappeared - left me standing to face the bullets. After many attempts of trying to contact him and to salvage the situation, I suggested that he re-negotiate the price with the Bank and get a lower price as we managed to get financing at a lower appraisal. He did not answer me, but went ahead and by this time he had managed to get the Buyer's direct contact information.

The deal is now closing and I have been trying to get him to confirm how we are splitting the deal, he says to trust him and he will give me my Finder's Fee "after the closing". I do not trust him as I had paid $500 Retainer to the first Attorney and he had banked the Earnest money and never responded when I asked to be reimbursed from that amount. He promised to reimburse me if and when the deal finally closed.

Do I trust that he will do the right thing? Do I have any legal standing in trying to get this negotiated so that I get paid at the closing table?

Please help - if there is anyone out there who has advice for me, let me know. Closing is on Tuesday 10th.

Many many Thanks,
Frustrated Investor