Frustrating Real Estate Market

[Pineywoods]

We listed our home for sale back in March. We needed something a little bigger with a home office space and wouldn't mind being by the lake. We had like 5 showings in first 3 days and it went under contract immediately. We found what we thought was the perfect house by the lake. Fast forward without boring you with details, the closing was delayed 3 times due to different issues on the buyers part. On our final closing day, 50+ days later, with our entire house in boxes and movers coming the next morning, our buyers back out hours before closing and breach contract. My wife and kids were crying and it was a messed up ordeal. We were advised to sue them because we had a solid case. I'm not a lawsuit kinda guy so we just moved on and put the house back on the market. The one we were going to buy sold days after returning to the market. Since ours returned to the market, activity has slowed to a crawl and we just don't get it. We are priced very competitively. Houses are flying off the market in our area. We have looked at 2-3 houses a week and the ones we consider making an offer on are gone by the next morning. I know there are people without jobs in these crazy times that are dealing with things way more difficult than the sale of a home, but this is getting extremely frustrating. We feel like we have a nice place in a great neighborhood and can't understand the lack of activity lately. We will be dropping the price slightly today in hopes it will help. If y'all know anyone wanting to get a little further north and away from the hustle and bustle, please share. Prayers appreciated.

https://www.har.com/s/c8E389F7e57

[RiverRat1]

Sounds frustrating!

What would you be suing for? Doesn't the buyer have the right to back out and lose his deposit (or whatever it's called)?

And yes, trying to buy a home or land in a hot market blows. People are dumb and snag properties without researching. That makes it near impossible for someone reasonable to buy. Forces risk on you.

[AggieSportsman]

Nice place!! If it wasn't 1.5 hours to work, I would consider this place. Hope you have better luck with a sale in the near future.

[RutnBuk]

Nice house and that sucks. How much did they put in escrow? When I sell my personal house I make sure I get at least 5% min in escrow. Makes it harder on them to backout and if they do Ive at least got something more than 1k

[WItoTX]

Dang man, that is rough. If your house was closer I would be interested, plenty of room for a shed!

[Pineywoods]

Sounds frustrating!

What would you be suing for? Doesn't the buyer have the right to back out and lose his deposit (or whatever it's called)?

And yes, trying to buy a home or land in a hot market blows. People are dumb and snag properties without researching. That makes it near impossible for someone reasonable to buy. Forces risk on you.

I'm definitely not an expert. But my lender, real-estate agent, and family member who is an attorney, all said because of the specifics of situation and how contract was written, that we could sue and would win. I wasn't interested in that.

A seller may bring a lawsuit against the buyer and ask for money damages when a buyer has not done what was agreed to in the contract. The amount of the damages the court may award will be based on the difference between the contract price and the market value of the property at the time of the breach, less any down payment or other payment already made, plus interest from the date of default.

Seller Sues for Specific Performance
A lawsuit for specific performance involves the person claiming a breach of contract asking the judge to order that the transaction be completed according to the terms of the contract, rather than ordering a payment of money damages.

A seller does not have a contractual right to specific performance; whether or not to grant specific performance is up to a court, and it's rarely granted.

A court may consider granting specific performance if the contract is clear and definite and an award of money will not return the individuals to the positions they were in before signing the sales contract.

If the agreement is definite in all of its essential elements, specific performance can be granted. Essential elements of the contract typically include the purchase price, deposit amount, legal description of the property, financing terms, closing date, and effective time period of the contract.

Nice place!! If it wasn't 1.5 hours to work, I would consider this place. Hope you have better luck with a sale in the near future.

Thanks. I drive about 40 minutes to work. Where we are looking to move will probably make it an hour but I'll trade that all day to be further from Houston and surrounding towns.

Nice house and that sucks. How much did they put in escrow? When I sell my personal house I make sure I get at least 5% min in escrow. Makes it harder on them to backout and if they do Ive at least got something more than 1k

They only had 2k. That didn't even cover what we lost when we couldn't purchase the home we were buying. We had paid for inspections, appraisal, survey, etc... not counting the fact that our entire house was in boxes to be moved.

[150class]

Hope it works out sir!

Me and the wife were looking to buy over the summer and I was banking on the craziness of todays world to lower the rates (check) and lower home prices (nope). Houses still aren't lasting 2-3 days on the market around us and I do not understand. I thought we had lowest employment rates ever and yada yada yada but homes are still flying off the shelves for buyers prices. Then again I know next to nothing about real estate so I am sure thats a huge factor!

I would imagine someone else will be along shortly to help you guys out and get y'all in a new home!

[BLee15]

Pretty surprised your house isn’t selling. Looks like a nice place from the listing. We hated dealing looking for a house and it selling the next day once it hit the market. Just decided to build new. Wouldn’t think it would be bad building new but keeping an eye on these guys has been a pretty big headache. They mess up a lot. I’d just put your situation up as it wasn’t meant to be on the first house. Y’all will get one that was better than the first house. Defiantly understand your situation though, very stressful and tiring. Best of luck on everything.

[Big pig]

Nice house. Can’t imagine being in the market and not buying it.
Luckily, you aren’t in a must sell situation
Hope it happens soon for you.

BP

[RutnBuk]

They only had 2k. That didn't even cover what we lost when we couldn't purchase the home we were buying. We had paid for inspections, appraisal, survey, etc... not counting the fact that our entire house was in boxes to be moved.[/QUOTE]

Dang. Well now you have all that out of the way when you get the next contract. And you will get another contract.

[Easttxbowman]

You definitely could have sued for breach of contract and likely should have, but I understand not getting involved.

[Texastaxi]

Your house looks very nice and if others in the neighborhood are selling, I don't see why yours wouldn't.

This may or may not make a difference, but you might try taking your mounts down and storing them. Seems dumb to us, but you'd be surprised how many people are turned off by mounts; my wife has first hand experience showing beautiful houses and having a potential buyer walk out because there were mounts in the house. I'm surprised your realtor didn't advise that.

[ShockValue]

The pictures of your house look great. My wife does some real estate on the side and is also a stager. I know what her suggestion would be....get rid of the taxidermy. It's distracting from some people even thought "we" on TBH may think of it as normal. Just a suggestion. Good luck.

[Neck]

You definitely could have sued and most likely won.

I think what riverrat and and rutnbuk are referring to is the earnest money contract which you should have at least gotten that money.

[Birddog66]

Sounds frustrating!

What would you be suing for? Doesn't the buyer have the right to back out and lose his deposit (or whatever it's called)?

And yes, trying to buy a home or land in a hot market blows. People are dumb and snag properties without researching. That makes it near impossible for someone reasonable to buy. Forces risk on you.

Neither party has a "right" to breach the contract. Yes, when buyer breaches and defaults on a contract they typically lose their earnest money, but this is not a 100% remedy. The seller can still sue.