Earnest money is a form of consideration but not the only form.California Civil Code Section 1605 defines "consideration" to be the following: Any benefit conferred, or agreed to be conferred, upon the promisor, by any other person, to which the promisor is not lawfully entitled, or any prejudice suffered, or agreed to be suffered, by such person, other than such as he is at the time of consent lawfully bound to suffer, as an inducement to the promisor, is a good consideration for a promisor.When the Buyer makes the offer and the Seller accepts the offer the Buyer suffers a prejudice.

However, I have been reading that the option money and renters credit is to ultimately be returned to the potential buyer, in the form of a down payment, if they exercise their option to buy.

Did anyone exercise such option?

Assuming you find a buyer for the price you need, that buyer is buying from you and at the same time, you would exercise your purchase option.

The option could not be exercised until the purchase price was paid in full.

The buyer can chose t exercise or not, but the seller is stuck.

Craig Montesano,I'm aware of the Utica Shale/drilling activity in the area.If Shell decides to exercise the option on the Plant in Monaca, Pa., it should help the entire region.

My first exercise would be to simply find the name, address, and phone number of the current owner.

Having the common public running around trying to cure clouds on title is an exercise in futility, since they don't deal with this stuff everyday.

Hopefully if the deal goes south, the borrower makes good without the lender, whoever he is, having to exercise his rights under the personal guarantee and go after other assets.