We attempted negotiations since the house appraised under slightly. The seller told her realtor she’d rather go back to market. We said okay, we’ll pay the gap. She then said she doesn’t want to do FHA repairs. We said okay, we switched to conventional. She then said she doesn’t want to pay concessions. Too bad, they’re in the contract.
So today, they re-listed the house and stated it was no longer pending. This is not true, we’re under contract. My realtor is having their broker contact her realtor.
This has been a nightmare. What do I even do now?
The sellers agent is the broker and has been contacted. They are remarking it pending and stated the seller “demanded” it relisted for backup offers. My agent reminded her we’ve performed and she is in breach. Funny enough that got her talking after being impossible to work with this entire time (I.e. utilities weren’t on for inspection, took until final day of option period for them to be turned on, and ignoring contact from my agent until the day before our final day. Ghosting my realtor for days throughout the entire process.)
The agent stated she didn’t know we were moving forward and wasn’t informed we were changing from FHA to make the deal work. My agent sent her a screen shot of all his outgoing calls she ignored and texts she didn’t answer.
Things appear to be back on track with 10 days to close. We’ll see. Thanks for the help everyone.
5 Likes
Hey Brown,Hope your agent’s broker is very seasoned as this comes down to really needing to know the law in your state.
In my state the second you send any form of a formal counter that reopens negotiations then the buyer OR seller can walk away. It doesn’t matter if one side back peddles and agrees to the original contract.
If I’m understanding your post correctly you moved to renegotiate after being under contract due to a low appraisal which is understandable. The seller said you know what I’m no longer interested in your offer at all and walked. In my state it is completely above board to do that if the contract is structured correctly.
2 Likes
What state is this? It seems insane that you could invalidate a signed contract with merely the mention of modifying the signed terms.
We asked them verbally if they’d be open to it and they said no. There was nothing submitted paper wise on either side. The contract has not been altered.
1 Like
If you have not done anything to give the seller an open to cancel the contract, then tell your agent to contact the broker of the listing agent. If that doesn’t un-stick things, contact the local Board of Realtors. They may have some kind of arbitration. If that doesn’t work, time for a lawyer. Let them know if they don’t close you intend to sue for performance.
Now, if you HAVE given the seller any tiny bit of opening to cancel the contract, e.g. you missed a deadline on lifting a contingency or earnest deposit etc. you’re out of luck.
As long as you’re not in breach of contract and there aren’t any contingencies, if they do sign another contract with a different buyer, there are ways for you to effectively “cloud” the property. In my state, a title company would catch this and not be able to issue a clean policy which the buyer’s lender will likely require. So you can kind of block the sale or get paid.
When we bought our house, the selling agent pulled the same bs of disappearing and ghosting to the point where we had to send notice to the title company multiple times to cancel the contract minutes before the deadline. This agent also pretended to be unaware that they were not reachable or responsive.
I find it infuriating that some listing agents think ignoring the buyer and their agent and trying to run out the clock is an appropriate strategy instead of showing up at the negotiating table. For us, they almost torpedoed the deal for their client multiple times.
I feel like these kind of experiences can sour people’s perception of real estate agents. It’s so off-putting and unprofessional.
1 Like
Have the closing attorney file a “memorandum of sale”. This would be on record with the county so you could essentially tie up the property and prevent her selling it to anyone else or any other Monkey Business until this is worked out.
Your next step would be an attorney if they don’t perform