Posted by Cheryl Lopez on July 11, 2004 at 18:50:16:
Correct.
What I was getting at was placing his legal right to occupy property and claim his was “buying” it. That is if he withholds the payments and goes into default on his obligations to the seller.
Then any legal actions become “public record” then that WILL go on a credit report, especially a default judgement. But hope it will not get that far. Just another expensive learning lession in real estate and use complete forms.
As I have said many times … the local real estate boards usually do sell the preprinted forms to the public … rather than “re-invent the wheel” on contracts.
I have a sales contract b/w myself and the seller stating that the seller was to leave a property in move-in condition before i took over “subject to” the mortgage.
However, the seller left the place trashed and I had to have dump truck haul all of his stuff out.
I emailed him about the fact that he didnt live up to his end of the bargain. Unfortunately, this item was not in the original contract (leaving the property in move-in condition). However, the seller acknowledged in the email that he was in the wrong and would pay an extra mortgage payment for the trouble.
I was supposed to take over the mortgage payments after he paid 2 months, with his “agreement” I now got to wait 3 months before I start paying on his mortgage.
This was about 6 months ago and he NEVER made that extra payment like he said. I warned him multiple times that he needed to make it and he said he would, by email.
Now he’s threatening to sue since in the contract it stated that I was to make the payments after 2 months. He’s been 30-days late since I refused to make it up.
I havent hired an atty yet, but his atty is saying that the emails we had were not good enough since all real estate deals need to be in writing and SIGNED by all parties according to NC law.
I’m thinking i’ve lost since our agreements about the place being left in good condition and the payment arrangement were not in the original contract.
Without getting into the specifics of your deal, I’ll say that YES,
emails can be part of a contract if the contract states that further
negotiations of the contract can be done by email.
You are contracted to make the seller’s payments. So make them. Anything else outside of the contract does not extend you the right to breach the contract. You are dealing with two separate issues that will have to be treated separately.
Make the payment. Then if you want to pursue it, take the seller to small claims to get the one month payment back and use the e-mails as proof to show the seller agreed to make a month’s payment to cover your extra cost to clean up his mess.
At this point you might just want to pay it and move on. If the payment has fallen 30 days late you can be subject to being sued for damages to the seller’s credit since you breached the contract you have with the seller. That could cost you more than the one month payment in the end.
Re: can emails be part of RE Contract? - Posted by John Corey
Posted by John Corey on July 11, 2004 at 18:09:23:
Luke,
Call it the price of education.
If you were to hire a lawyer and to win you might break even at best. Otherwise you will find the legal process is not worth 1 months payment. Assume you messed up and you will do better next time. Move on to the next deal rather then trying to get back a little on this one.
He took the payments over subject to the existing mortgage. So witholding payments won’t damage his credit. It will damage the seller’s credit since the financing is in the seller’s name. Not his name.