Ask Phyllis!

Renegotiating After The Fact

Dear Phyllis,
  I had six bids almost immediately after getting my home on the market. I accepted the highest which I am now regretting. The buyer’s agent is from Orange County and never shows up for inspections, but that’s another story. We extended our 30 day escrow giving the buyer another 14 days. After the 14 days passed, the buyer’s agent notified my agent that the buyers now want me to pay $5,000 in buyer closing costs. I had already made a few repairs after the buyer’s inspector nitpicked the home to death. When do we stop negotiating?   JL

Dear JL,
You have several issues to address. First, why isn’t the buyer closing? If the loan has been approved your Realtor® needs to review a copy of the written loan approval. If the loan hasn’t been approved, you may need to go back to square one. Have your Realtor® contact each agent who wrote an offer.  Fortunately for you it’s a seller’s market and likely most of the buyers may not have yet found a home.

Take a look at the Residential Purchase Agreement that you and the buyer signed. There are contingency periods in this contract. The buyer was allowed a certain number of days typically 5 – 17 to remove their investigative (inspection) contingency and typically 21 days to remove their loan contingency.

Most purchase contracts require that the buyer remove their contingencies in writing. Often buyers and their Realtor do not remove these contingencies in a timely fashion and the sellers’ real estate agent should send the buyer’s Realtor® a Notice to Perform notifying the buyer that the (applicable) contingency needs to be removed in writing. Only after buyer contingences are removed can you make a claim to the buyer’s earnest money deposit.

If contingences have not been removed with your being more than 45 days into this escrow, I suggest you bring this up with your agent and or their manager. As far as the buyer renegotiating your contract six weeks into escrow, that’s your decision. But you are certainly not under any obligation to do so.

  Phyllis Harb