The Housechick Blog

I have clients right now that find themselves in a less than desirable situation - through entirely no fault of their own.  On our part, we’ve acted in good faith and honored the various obligations and promises made in the contract.

I won’t go into details here because everything is still pending, but I’ve been reviewing the whole situation in my head to see if there was some little thing that I could have done to avoid this whole mess.

And quite honestly, there was no way to anticipate or avoid it on our side.  But I have a feeling I know exactly what happened on the other side of this deal, and I can make sure that I don’t make that kind of mistake. 

Here’s what I can take away from this situation, so far:

Whether it’s your first home sale (or purchase) or your fiftieth, you always need to review and read everything.  It sounds so basic, right?  Read what you sign. 

What I’ve learned in 5 years in this business is there is a large segment of people that - if you put a pen in their hand and a form in front of them, they’ll sign it without really reading it.  Those are the folks you’ve got to slow down, refocus, and make sure they understand what they’re getting into.

There’s many times that I’ve sat and had long discussions with my clients, deciding how to negotiate, what to offer or counter, and then at the end, we write it all up.  That’s why I sit there and take notes during our discussion so that we don’t forget some small important item.  And then when I put a form in front of you to sign, we need to review it again and make sure that it is exactly what you want it to say.

Now, if EVERYONE practiced real estate that way, my clients wouldn’t be in this mess.  Nevertheless, here we are.

Oh, and I know a good real estate attorney, should you find yourself in need of one…