All Forum Posts by: Joseph Janarski

@Russell Brazil @Jay Hinrichs Thanks I think my real estate agent may have been mistaken on the number of days I had as well because there is a clause where i notified the buyers of unacceptable items in the inspection report which tacks on an extra 7 days to the 14 days I have to respond to the inspection report giving me 21 days to back out of the contract and not 14 (which is why i thought i had more time in the first place). If that is the case I'm going to go back and get my earnest money.

@Jay Hinrichs

Hi Jay thanks for that comfort. I went and actually got myself a coffee and it put my mind to ease a bit. 

Unfortunately, I don't think the sellers are thinking rationally about the costs and time associated with suing me for non performance on the property (its been on the market for a long time now) and to your points its a SFR and they may not be looking at it from an investors perspective. They are coming at it with pure emotion at this point which isn't a good thing on my end. I'm going to try and negotiate with them first to make this go away before getting a bunch of lawyers involved.

Thank you and I'll let you know how it goes!

I have an appointment with an in state attorney next week. The agent i used was relatively new but recommended and unfortunately dropped the ball on it. It's as much as my mistake as his for not being on top of everything. I actually thought i had an extra day. It's a learning experience for me, but sadly it is looking like it may be a costly one.

@Russell Brazil

Unfortunately, the seller is very pissed off from what I've heard. The house has been on the market for 150 days. To make matters worse I live out of state and would have been my first purchase in state so the seller would actually have to sue me in my home state (more lawyers/more fees).

@Bob Okenwa

Hi Bob, in  going back through the contract I think i may be up the creek on this one without a paddle. It looks like my real estate agent used a boiler plate template which opens me up to lots of damages. 

Thank you for both of your responses. It's my first time potentially getting sued so while i felt I wasn't on the hook for more than my earnest money it did keep me up at night. 

A good learning experience for the future though. 

*Disclosure I am speaking to an attorney on the matter this week, but wanted to share and see if anyone has had a similar experience or knowledge in this matter?

So unfortunately my contractor was late in getting me a quote on all the work that needed to be done on a property by one day over the inspection clause. Realizing we passed the date and the amount of money to get this property rent-able would be astronomically higher than what I thought it would be I had to back out I told the seller that I would forfeit my earnest money in good faith and not try to reclaim it.  The seller was not happy due to the fact that this house has been on the market for over 90 days (was off market for 11) and is now threatening to sue me for the difference in my offer price vs. whatever they end up getting for the property?  

I've heard of people getting sued for damages if their is financial harm (i.e they are trying to move out of their house and buy a new one, but now can't due to backing out of the sale), but nothing to the extent of backstopping what my offer was vs what they ultimately sell it for? Based on their attorney letter it feels like they are trying to bully me into purchasing this house because they said they "are willing to reconsider suing me if I purchase the property".