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April 13, 2008
Lis pendens on house - grounds for negotiation?
After having our offer accepted on a house and entering into contract stage, we were notified last minute of a lis pendens on the property. The contract placed a deadline date by which the owner must have the lis pendens cleared, or else either party may back out. It now looks like it will take the seller longer to resolve the lis pendens, and she will request an extension on the contract with us. So, is it reasonable for us, as buyers, if we agree to extend the contract (and the lis pendens resolution deadline), to negotiate the price downward since the lis pendens effectively prevents us from committing to another home, and means we don't know if this one will work out? This house (like any in our price range) involves significant compromises and we aren't in a huge rush to buy. Of course we'd like this house to work out, but already felt the price was high given market uncertainty. Since the seller it seems cannot sell to anyone else with the lis pendens pending, we think it's fair to give us a discount in exchange for us committing to house despite uncertainty of its legal status. Has anyone been through this?
Comments
yeah, hs, go for as much as you can get, I'm sure you will. If I were the seller, and you were half an annoying as you are here, I'D be the one getting out of the contract.
Are you really so dumb as to think that what people here think is what matters? All that matters is if the seller is willing to pay you to hang in there.
And you have to make your own decision as to whether you want to stick it out, discount or no. I can't figure out how you decide to get out of bed in the morning.
Posted by: guest at April 13, 2008 4:21 PM
Holy moly, 4:21. Are you schizophrenic? I don't see anything in the OP's tone or words like you are hallucinating about. It's just a simple f-ing question.
OP, if the seller has to request an extension on the contract and it's possible the issue won't be resolved at all, then yes of course you can negotiate down the price. Get an attorney to help you - you're using one, right?
Anybody can negotiate anything for any reason. The worst that will happen is the seller says no. At which time you decide whether you really want to buy the place or not.
Posted by: guest at April 13, 2008 5:18 PM
What is a lis pendens? Are these common? And why would the seller not be able to sell to someone else? I'm a first-time buyer and had never heard of this. And why would it be grounds for a lower price?
Posted by: guest at April 13, 2008 8:47 PM
5:18, I'm, not 4:21 but I might as well be. What you don't understand is that 5:18 recognizes this "guest" poster as someone who used to post under the name housesearcher.
She has posted an unending stream of questions for which there is no clear answer. Then when she gets responses she doesn't like she calls those people trolls and mean and various other names. When someone tells her what she wants to read she tells them that "this is the kind of helpful response she's looking for.
She's a nuisance. Her posts eventually end up becoming a string of spam back and forth between people who want her to go away and those who try to defend her. Let me just be clear that at least this one person who wants her to go away has never been "mean" to anyone else on this forum. She is the problem.
Posted by: guest at April 13, 2008 11:49 PM
5:18, to explain further, 4:21 and 11:49 have decided that a woman who used to use the term housesearcher has used up her allotted allowance of forum posts, and any question she posts they feel obligated to inform her that she is annoying, dumb, and a nuisance. In fact, both 4:21 and 11:49 are doing a huge disservice to this forum because people reading their answers assume it's full of people who have nothing better to do than be pointlessly mean to someone asking advice.
The OP has never called people trolls because she she didn't like the opinion offered, but she has responded to trolls like 11:49 and 4:21 who simply tell her to go away and make no attempt to actually answer the question.
It's not spam to try to point out needlessly unkind posts on this forum; neither is it spam to point out an inappropriate advertisement. I simply think that people should be allowed to post as many questions as they want, even if they are annoying, as long as they are real estate related and these are.
Who knows, 4:21 and 11:49, maybe the OP is now purposely posting these simply to annoy you more. But I bet you she is much more likely to stop if you simply fail to respond to these posts -- there are plenty of posts here that no one responds to. So ignore them, and if you are indeed correct that the forum posts are stupid, then no one will answer them and she will stop posting. But if people want to give reasonable answers, how about letting them do so without making them read your "aha, I know it's housesearcher again please go away" comments. Those kind of comments damage this board far more than OP's original posts do.
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 12:28 AM
It seems to me that you signed a contract which gave you a remedy, i.e., the ability to walk away. If the deadline passes without resolution, you could try to negotiate something on price/closing costs, but the seller might also decide to walk away then. You really should speak to your attorney about this; he/she might have a strategy for dealing with this.
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 9:12 AM
In this market, I'd suggest you let the contract lapse, get your deposit back and keep looking. Request the seller call you as soon as the lis pendens is cleared; you can evaluate then what price you are willing to pay and make a new offer if you'd like. These things can drag on forever.
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 9:57 AM
"You really should speak to your attorney about this"
Housesearcher likes to come on this forum and post requesting second opinions from unqualified strangers whenever she doesn't like the advice of the professionals she's hired. This isn't the 1st time she's done this and won't be the last.
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 10:39 AM
Wow, 10:39am if asking a 2nd opinion from unqualified strangers bothers you so much, I can't understand why you even read this board. It's an anonymous forum -- it's supposed to be for asking questions. And all answers should be taken with a grain of salt.
But there are dozens, if not hundreds of posts here where someone answers that the OP should speak to an attorney or other professional. 9:12am, whom you quoted, gave just that advice, in a completely reasonable way. Housesearcher has never called someone a troll who answers like that. But some people, like 4:21 pm, feel they must excoriate the OP for daring to ask such a question of the forum instead of consulting with a professional.
Well, I'm not the OP, but I've also been guilty of posting questions asking for a 2nd opinion on something. As have many of us here. We don't see anything wrong with it. So, again, just ignore questions you feel are "beneath" you. If we all posted nasty comments when we read a question in a forum post we think can be better answered elsewhere, this forum would disintegrate. But clearly, I count at least 4 posts here of people who feel like answering the OP.
By the way, upon re-reading the original post, I'm now thinking it may not be housesearcher at all. If it is a new poster, shouldn't 4:21 be embarrassed at his response to the post?
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 11:03 AM
It must be so irritating to the trolls that people continue to post messages on their personal forum that are not pre-approved by the Council of Trolls. I mean clearly people can't be allowed to freely exchange information unless it conforms to the official Brownstoner Troll guidelines and requirements.
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 11:36 AM
It must be so irritating to the trolls that people continue to post messages on their personal forum that are not pre-approved by the Council of Trolls. I mean clearly people can't be allowed to freely exchange information unless it conforms to the official Brownstoner Troll guidelines and requirements.
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 11:36 AM
See, now, 9:57's advice is perfectly sound, and also perfectly obvious to a normal person in the OP's position. Anyone who wanted to be free to consider other houses to buy would do just that. It isn't rocket science. No doubt her attorney has already advised that (most would.)
But housesearcher doesn't want to do that, because, as 9:12 correctly points out, the seller is free to walk away, too. Someone else could get the house in the end, and perhaps at a lower price if the market goes down, and that would piss her off.
Housesearcher is mad at the seller for the problems with the house (the lis pendens, the flooded basement, etc.) and wants to extract a penalty from the seller. Housesearcher wants it both ways - to be free to buy another house, and to also have this house (at a discount) if it ever becomes freely transferable. Her complaint is with the very fact that real estate is transferred through the use of binding contracts. It's like she's throwing a tantrum here (again).
Any reasonable person would say to the seller "let me know when it free to be transferred" and would let the contract lapse so as to be free look at other houses. (Hell, any person with an ounce of sense would have walked from this house a long time ago...)
Posted by: guest at April 14, 2008 12:11 PM
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