Fraud and deceptive practices come to mind.

I believe in practice it does not actually offset the capital gains but reduces my taxable income dollar for dollar with the loss, as long as my Modified Adjusted Gross Income (MAGI) is under $150K.

Educate yourself and practice it.

Even in the 30ish states that did not require an agreement, it is still common practice for many agents to have a buyers agreement in place before showing homes.

Although this is technically inaccurate (I saw a case where a sheriff sale of this sort was challenged and the challenge lawsuit took 11 months, deed recording came after that), that is the typical practical waiting period to get the title insurance for the resale.Whatever the mortgage balance, that’s now your obligation to get paid off; before even bidding on any sheriff sale property you should have a good idea of any remaining mortgage balance(s).

Offering to cover closing costs or agreeing to post-inspection repairs are becoming standard practices.

You need to search for properties near your subject property deal that look like and have the same size as your end result aka a comp aka a comparable.Any quality agent can run your comparable market analysis (CMA), and over time, with practice, you can run your own comps. 

There use depends on the type of trust setup - they can be used to bypass probate; eliminate ownership and control from a person subject to lawsuits; skip a generation on an inheritance and hence skip inheritance taxes, and numerous other uses.  

I would think this is a common practice that lenders perform, but if not....message me.

No control over management.