Seller breaking contract

Hi, new to the boards -

Does anyone know the answer to this -

we are in a contract to buy a coop in queens and the seller is not agreeing to close. The date on the contract says June 15th - which means we can close as much as 30 days after that.

What happens if he refuses to close? Can we get our money back that is in escrow? Do we have any other legal rights?

Re: Seller breaking contract

It depends. Are they just delaying the closing or are they cancelling the deal entirely?

What did your lawyer say?

If they are just delaying the closing you really have no recourse since the date on the contract is an on or about date. It's not set in stone.

Re: Seller breaking contract

They are being completely shady - they just fired their attorney this week and do not have a new lawyer yet.

They haven't called my lawyer back in 2 days....They have been very difficult through this whole process - we are starting to face the fact that we may not actually be able to close with them.

I know we can close as late as July 15, but my question is what happens if he delays and refuses to set up the appointment and that date passes? Is our contract null and void?

Re: Seller breaking contract

there should be a clause in the contract stating that if you do not close you will be refunded your money.

Double check with your attny asap Good luck. Sellers suuck sometimes!! I've been there

Re: Seller breaking contract

These are questions you need to be asking your attorney...

Re: Seller breaking contract

Re: Seller breaking contract

We had a similar situation so I can tell you how our attorney handled it...

We asked for and got a verbal agreement for on or BEFORE Feb. 28th (I was moving here from out of state and had limited time in the corporate apartment).

At contract, they changed it to on or ABOUT Feb 28 but assured us that was just in case they needed an extra week or so. Come late Feb. and the seller hasn't done squat about finding a place to move to, crying about how hard it was to find somewhere suitable (this was a force sale - trying to settle a divorce 4 years into it).

As we approached March 28, the 30 day mark, our attorney sent notice that if a closing date was not set, we would set the closing date for April 15th and if they did not show, we would commence a lawsuit to force them to honor the contract and sell us the house. The seller flipped out, finally found an apartment and asked to close April 28th since she couldn't move into the new place until then.

As others have suggested, talk to your lawyer, but I don't think you can do much until you approach the extra 30 day deadline. Our lawyer handled it the way it was describe above because she said if we went straight to filing the lawsuit there were filing fees of about $300 and we could probably force the closing just by making the threat of suing. She was right!

We found out later from the neighbors that she was whining about being force out and that she thought she'd be able to stay until her son was out of school in June. Not sure why, when we made it clear from the beginning that we needed to close in Feb. I ended up staying with DH's grandmother 60 miles away from my job for two months while he remained in Boston (6 months apart total). Thank goodness our landlord there was wonderful and let us stay in a month-to-month lease until things were settled. Saved us a fortune in moving and storage fees.

Re: Seller breaking contract

What was in the contract that you signed? You should receive your money that's in escrow back since he is backing out of the deal.

We are closing on your coop next week. If we backed out we had to pay the buyer $10K. If she backed out we kept the money she put in escrow. If the co-op board and the bank did not approve her for a mortgage the money in escrow had to be returned to her, and we were back to square one. It really all depends what you have written in your contract. You are hopefully covered to get your money back since he's backing out of the deal. Good luck

Re: Seller breaking contract

I don't know about the closing date part, but our lawyer told us (when the sellers' attorney was being a prick) that if we backed out, the buyers almost ALWAYS get their money back - even if they are in the wrong - since it's not worth the fight. So if you are not in the wrong (which it sounds like you are not) you will get your money back