Q: Breach of contract? contract to sell property was not transferred from deceased preventing closing.
we signed a contract on 8-17-2020 to purchase property. A week before the closing we were informed of a delay due to probate. The day the closing was schduled our attorney learned the estate was never filed. As time is ticking and the sellers are running out of time, our attorney and sellers realtor are pressuring us to rent while we wait to close. We moved from NY, have our stuff with a moving company thinking we would have closed already. Our attorney thinks it is fair we pay rent and get reimbursed for half of this when we close. The sellers broker has been working this angle since we learned of the delay. Is this how things go here in this state. Is this typical practice?
A:
The buyers can not give you a clear title until two years have passed since the death of the prior owner, or the notice to creditors has run in the local paper. How your attorney missed this significant detail, I do not know. I can only guess that you were paying cash and did not ask for title insurance.
Ask for a modification of the contract, and hopefully, everything can be worked out quickly.
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