All Forum Posts by: Kay March

@Joe Splitrock, thank you. It's especially offputting that the second appraisal gives the buyer until 7 days before closing to back out. He set the closing date for six weeks from the effective date of the contract.

About accepting partial rent, check your state law. At least in Florida "landlords can accept partial rent payments and still move to evict in the same month — provided that the landlords give tenants a receipt for the partial payment, place the partial payments in the court registry if the evictions are filed or post notices informing tenants that they must pay the amount due or vacate within three days."

A potential buyer of a single family house has presented an offer based upon an FHA loan, which, of course, will involve a pretty stringent appraisal. Nevertheless, he has attached an "Appraisal Contingency" which allows him to hire another appraiser and present the appraisal to me, the seller, up to 7 days prior to closing. If the appraisal comes in low, he can walk away at that point. So he appears to be giving himself two chances to present me with a low appraisal. Would any seller who is not desperate to sell accept that? Am I missing something?

@Will Fraser and @Greg Scott, thank you for your suggestions. I should have mentioned that this property is a single family home and the buyer is a young single lady and first time home buyer. I did ask the buyer's agent, and she said that the box was checked to allow the buyer to take title any way she wants to, and she might, for example, want to add someone to the title. 

@Levi T. Thank you for suggesting that I request an adjustment on the commission from the buyer's agent.

In the paragraph on assignability in a purchase agreement the buyer checks the box indicating that she wants to be able to assign the contract while retaining liability under the contract. I don't believe she's a flipper or wholesaler -- just an ordinary buyer. Why would she (or rather her agent) check that box? Should I worry?

The buyer wanted me to pay her closing costs up to a certain percentage. I said no, so her agent said, "OK, we'll roll the closing costs into the buyer's loan." They then presented an offer in which the buyer (1) raised the purchase price by the amount of the closing costs and then (2) required me to pay those closing costs. After paying those closing costs I will net the original purchase price, but the drawback is that the higher purchase price raises the commission I will pay to the buyer's agent. Why did they do this? Why didn't the buyer just add the closing costs to her loan and leave the original purchase price where it was? Was it done in order to raise the buyer's agent's commission?

Thank you very much, Wayne Brooks, but the deed in this case is exempt from doc stamp taxes according to 12 FL ADC 12B-4.013(28)(a), as noted on the deed, because the original owners transferred the property to the trust but remained the sole beneficiaries of the trust. Still, the trust, according to court documents, bought the property from them and paid off the mortgage, thus stopping the foreclosure. Could it be that the purpose of allowing the original owners to remain as sole beneficiaries of the trust was to avoid revealing the price paid by the trust for the property? If not, why was it done that way?

I'm looking at a possible fix and flip. The former owners defaulted on a private mortgage. Foreclosure proceedings were halted when the property was purchased by a land trust which paid off the mortgage. Now the land trust is trying to sell the property for $170,000, but before the land trust purchased the property, the outstanding debt plus charges only came to about $50,000. I don't see a way to find out what the land trust paid for the property. The transfer is not listed in the property records as a sale but rather as a deed correction with a $100 "price," so the transaction doesn't appear in, for example, Zillow's price A history of the property. Is there a way to estimate the price paid by the land trust, given the known outstanding debt? Is there a formula that is typical for this kind of situation? 

I've had two (of two) sales fail in recent months because properties would not appraise at the contract price. In one case my buyer's house wouldn't appraise, so she couldn't buy my house. In the second case a house I'm selling appraised at $10,000 below the contract price of $190,000. Both appraisals seemed unreasonably low, not only because there was a willing buyer in each case, but because other comparable houses had sold at the same price per square foot. Are there timid lenders elsewhere with bad memories of 2008 squashing sales with abandon? Don't they allow room for prices to increase over time? It seems like the only ones making money are the inspectors and appraisers!