I always thought cash in escrow went to the seller if shit went south after under contract, but my agent told me it’s harder than ever for sellers to recoup that money.
I believe if there is a legitimate reason, it's right to give it back. Now in my case where the buyer is ghosting everyone, I don't believe she is entitled to get the money back and I get it. May need to go ask the lawyer thread...
I'm not a real estate expert, but I've never heard of money being put in escrow prior to purchasing a home. Is that a Florida thing? Earnest and Escrow aren't the same I don't believe. Jorts
Earnest money goes in an escrow account with an escrow/title agent. A neutral independent party. Earnest money is the sellers if things go south unless there are specific provisions in the contract. Its typically 1-3% of the purchase price in my area.
Closing on my first house on July 1, and the ongoing Lowe's Fourth of July appliance sale has me wondering whether I should hop on it now or wait until Labor Day to upgrade dishwasher and stove/oven range. Any thoughts as to when would be the better time to purchase? Google gives mixed answer, but scales seem to tip in favor of Labor Day.
Bathroom floor is just about finished and ready for tile. Basically had to remove the entire floor and re-do it. Installed a linear drain for the shower. We have tiles my fiance bought to redo the kitchen that we're going to use for the bathroom instead. They're 12x24 so her dad keeps trying to get us to buy smaller ones. Think we're just going to figure out a design and make the big tiles work. We're finding out nearly everything needs replaced so we're trying to find areas we can skip spending extra money.
I could be wrong, but I can’t imagine the difference in savings (if any) at Labor Day will be significant. I would say, if you’ve already identified a brand/model you want and they are currently available for something sufficiently below their typical price, go for it. If what you’re looking to buy is not on sale or is not appreciably marked down, then maybe it would be worth waiting a couple months if you can. Beware that some higher end brands sold at big box stores are either not discounted ever, or not necessarily in the same rotation as the rest, so keep that in mind.
Thanks, that's helpful. Just making sure I don't miss out on a good dishwasher that has a built in pizza oven controllable over wifi.
Mr. Jello, glad you asked. My DW just happened to take a shit. Story for another time at another date but cliffs. We absolutely needed one before next week. After looking on their shitbag of a website I called into my local store. Lionel was a huge help last night at the store. He told me that Samsung's are rock solid when they are working. I said, "Thanks Lionel, I told you off the bat I want nothing to do with a Samsung DW." He asked me why and I completely ignored him because I am not in the mood for a DW debate at 9PM on a Tuesday. Long story short, found one DW they actually had in stock there and I was like, let's get that fucker in my vehicle now. Lionel said, "Hold up dog, let me check something for you." Steps away. Comes back, "Wallcoq, here you are, you can either buy this now, or come here and pick it up $100 cheaper tomorrow morning at 8AM." So what I can tell you is that they are definitely cheaper than they were yesterday. I know that for 100% certainty, I lived it, it's in my garage right now.
Closing on the 26th. Just signed lock in documents. Rate is over 1% lower than when we started the build process and my monthly is $500 less than what they estimated at the beginning. Feel like I just got a pay raise.
Congrats! I think more important than price live in your house for a minute and make sure you the appliances you get fit what you need. Where did y'all end up buying? July 1 is the two year anniversary of me moving into my current home coincidentally.
Thanks. As much as we tried to look elsewhere, we found a place in Crestline Park that we are both excited about. And yeah that was why I was asking how frequent these appliance sales occur (I've never paid attention to them before) -- I would prefer to give it a few months to figure out what I actually need rather than jumping on them now, but if July 4 is a bargain basement appliance sale extravaganza I didn't want to miss out on all the fun.
I cannot for the life of me find a good place to mount a front door camera outside. Thinking about doing the ring peephole cam, but my door doesn't have a peeper. Am I dumb for thinking about drilling one into my door, or just for other reasons?
Idk if that’s gonna show up. Had to rip up the entire floor. Got tile base ready and linear drain set up. Window will be removed and a new water tight window will be installed. Opaque glass, a little less wide. I should have got a picture of the subfloor we did. Pieced it together like a puzzle.
Think they want a curb less shower IIRC. Hoping he has fall on the shower floor (can't see) and guidance on the waterprooofing/membrane procedures. Apparently those linear drain can be difficult to get tied into a kerdi/noble system.
Correct, it'll be a curbless shower. There will be a tile insert inside of the drain. We did build the floor with a slope, forget the exact measurements he used. I want to say .25in per foot, but I'm not sure. FIL want's to mud under the hardieboard, then use redgard on the entire bathroom, before tiling.
Accepted a back-up offer on the house last night, contingent on release from the ghoster contract. 3rd times the charm, right?
After redgard, before tile, MAKE SURE YOU DO A WATERPROOFING TEST. Plug the drain somehow and fill the shower area up with water for 48 hours and make sure it doesn’t leak out anywhere. If it does, find the area and seal it up to avoid long term headaches.
Thanks for the heads up. He did mention a test like that the other day. It's an old house with plenty of leaks from the tub. Found the original drain had rotted through towards the bottom. Didn't seem there were any protective measures made when it was built. I don't think they did a lot of planning, as there's quite a few studs/beams cut into to make things fit.
Our house has one of those old school intercom systems from the late 90s. Anyone ever try anything to modernize those? Seems like something can be done with the existing wiring, but I'm not sure what beyond a video doorbell
I would look into what type of wiring is behind that thing. Did they use Cat 5? Or just speaker wire? If you know what type of infrastructure you have in the walls I am sure you can figure out an idea. It would be cool if you could replace them with a Google Home Hub or Alexa show type device.
Yeah I think the only useful piece would be the power behind the unit. Could at least put in an outlet. Other than that most of those system were just copper home runs. Late 90's, there's basically a 1% chance that was installed with Cat5. Only other use would be if your modem router is anywhere near one of those units. If it is, you could tape it up and use as a pull string for new cable.
Found a wiring diagram...looks like it's just speaker wire and AC power. The retrofit idea may be the ticket. Good find
If you looked harder, I saw some people talking about installing some type of tablet there in place of the old intercom system, not sure how that would work but might be something to look into.
Correct, ghost still ghosting. They already didn't fulfill the contractual obligations, so my agent is not worried about getting out of it. A backup offer was accepted on Wednesday evening, we signed it, waiting to hear more on that. I'm trying to not think about all this shit too much or I start to stress out more than I need to.
I actually know the loan officer the ghost was using. He gave me more info than he probably should have, but he was like in the 20+ years I have been doing this, I have never seen anything like this! He was like I literally was at their house on Monday night having them sign some papers and they were all excited about your house.
No fucking idea. He was like they were overqualified financially for your house. He literally has no fucking idea what happened to them. Just bizarre.
There's this house we were interested in where the buyer actually closed on the house, then left the keys and some escrow money at the title company. It's been 18 months and no one can get a hold of the guy.