Need Some Legal Advice...Fast!

I'm active duty military displaced between duty stations and was under contract to by a house. My pregnant wife and 3 year old son are living in a cramped hotel room. The seller, one week away from the closing date and after a conference with God has decided to pull out of the contract. What recourse do I have? Does he HAVE to sell because he's under contract? Can I sue for lodging expenses, food and sundry items due to his prolonging of my homelessness? Please Help!! (I'm in Georgia, if that helps you lawyer types)

Find out how to get your money back and then find a different house.

Most parts of the country have thousands on the market at any given time.

Even if you win this and force the sale, the lawyer fees will eat you alive.

Surely there is another suitable house somewhere in the area.

You have a case if you've told the truth. You'll need to get a lawyer...perhaps the VA can send you one? Worth asking. If not, the Realtor cannot bring the suit nor can the RealEstate Commission.

We had an owner try to back out on us, went to the lawyer and the owners decided to sell because we were going to sue and sue for costs incurred. It turned out they had had a better offer from someone else! We got the house..no problems. You'll need a lawyer anyway, so you might as well get one now.

I was just thinking of this from Per Ling's realtor's point of veiw. If I had closed a deal, I would contact the sellers realtor and say "Where's my 3%? He/she got screwed too. Maybe they don't want bad publicity or something, but He/she is covered in the contract also. I can't imagine being sub-contracted out for work and when payday comes they say "we were only kiding". Just giving back the earnest $$ is easy, it wasn't their's anyway, but having to cough up $3-5k might get their attention. If my broker didn't back me up, I didn't know I was expected to work for free. All this has to be covered in the fine print. I'm sure it's there. He still needs a lawyer to go forward unless the realtor/broker wants to write some "1st letters before I sue your pants off" letters.

Don't rely on a real estate agent for legal advice.

I agree. Also, don't necessarily think the agent is in the same boat as you.

I'm suspicious that it wasn't God who told the seller not to sell to you, but perhaps a higher offer from someone else. So the real estate agent knows he or she will be taken care of with a higher commission based upon the higher sales price from the other offeror. So that is why they are not much help in keeping your deal together.

Again, get your own lawyer, and fast. The time to exercise your rights may expire more quickly than you think.

Although I don't practice law in your state, in my state -- New York -- you may have an equitable claim for specific performance because real property is considered unique and therefore, monetary damages will not adequately compensate you for the loss. Your rights and remedies may also depend upon the language in the contract. Many real estate contracts, for example, state that "in the event the seller is unable to deliver marketable title for any reason, the buyer's only remedy is the return of the down payment and a reasonable fee for conducting a survey and reading title." In my state, however, such a clause usually implies good faith on the part of the seller and thus, the reason the seller is unable to convey the realty must have something to do with marketable title as opposed to the seller simply changing her mind. If real estate brokers are involved, then you may also want to ask them to intercede on your behalf by reminding the seller that he still owes the broker a commission as long as the buyer remains ready, willing, and able to buy.

One last thought to everyone out there who likes to bash lawyers: In many states, you are not required nor is it customary to use a lawyer to buy or sell real estate. That's fine unless you are involved in a transaction gone bad (which is about 5% of the transactions my firm handles) and you end up spending many times more in legal fees to fix things than you would have spent if you had hired an attorney to do the closing in the first place. Indeed, I'm still amazed at the number of "sellers" who balk at spending $750 to hire an attorney to represent them in the transaction, but will pay a real estate agent a 6% commission for a couple hours work (that's $18,000 on a $300,000 house); and the number of buyers who will pay upwards of a $1000, as part of the mortgage fees, for the bank's attorney, who only cares about the bank's interests, but won't spend $750 to hire an attorney to represent their interests in what will probably be the largest expenditure and investment in the buyers' life.

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