GOOD LUCK

This was a very interesting topic/column that peaked my interest so much I enjoyed researching some info on the web. I’ve been fortunate that over the years and homes sold we’ve never had a seller back out. Any problems with the properties were always disclosed in the inspection report. If you do decide to keep the money, these buyers may end up deciding to go through with the contract up to the home inspection. If any problems are found on the inspection they may back out at that time and be covered to get their money back. Well, good luck with this situation. Right now I’ve read the whole country is in a real estate slump.

http://ezinearticles.com/?Do-I-Get-to-Keep-the-Real-Estate-Earnest-Money-if-the-Buyer-Backs-Out?&id=374318

Legal recourse? I don’t know the details of that, but if you do have a right to keep their deposit well within the law, and you want to keep it, then do so. If it were me, I’d sign the release, and give them their deposit after I asked myself “did I lose anything here?”. What exactly did this cost you? Did you lose another deal because you chose to contract with them over another buyer? Or were there no other deals on the table, this was your only offer, no other offers came in that were passed up for them? If the latter, I’d consider myself out nothing, except a headache, and return their money.

Are you working with realtors or doing your sale privately? If you and/or they have realtors go through the realtors to try and find out how the misinformation about the basement came about.

I’ve bought and sold more than my share of homes and there have been a lot of headaches and curse words along the way (LOL).

I’ve had way too much stress in my life lately that I just want this to be over.

It’s bad enough that one of your neighbors would sabotage your sale, but even worse that the buyers would resort to asking neighbors about the house after they had made an offer and signed a contract. If they wanted to ask neighbors about your house, it only makes sense to me to do so before signing a contract and putting down earnest money.

They have a signed copy of your disclosure statement regarding your house. If there is gross misrepresentation on your part, they have an avenue of recourse. To reneg on a contract after the fact, based something a neighbor told them is, in my opinion, unconscionable. Or, perhaps they were second-guessing their decision and are simply using this to get out of the contract, and there was no neighbor actually involved. Either way, I would think long and hard before signing anything to allow them to get their earnest money back. Perhaps I would consent if they were to provide the name of the neighbor, but if not, they would be out the money. After all, the stress this has put on you and your husband has to be worth something.