All Forum Posts by: Jerry Kisasonak

Update: Here's a copy of the email that I sent to the attorney's secretary. Let me know your thoughts!

I spoke with Paul yesterday regarding the $600 earnest money deposit. He stated that he incurred a cost of $473 for the title abstract, no lien letters and tax certifications. After reviewing my emails, I recall that I was asked if I wanted to have your firm do the title work, to which I agreed. The cost for the title abstract was $150. Since I agreed to have your firm provide this service I am willing to cover the cost for it. I am requesting the return of the remaining balance of my earnest money deposit which is $450.

The other expenses that were incurred by your firm are not my expenses. It is standard in the State of Pennsylvania for the seller to pay for the no lien letters and tax certifications. These are standard closing costs FOR THE SELLER. If you prefer, you can reference this fact here: http://www.anytimeestimate.com/PA_SELLER/pa-home-seller.htm. Being that this is the case, Mr Toohey needs to look to the sellers to pay for this expense.

Additionally, I did not hire or engage Mr Toohey and I am not his client. Vernon and Barb Colgan contacted him and asked him to handle the disposition of their property. Therefore, Vernon and Barb are his clients and they are responsible to pay for these items. If I signed or accepted any sort of engagement agreement with Mr Toohey I am requesting that a copy be emailed to me. Otherwise, Mr Toohey is simply paying himself at my expense. Because his clients are not responding to phone calls or emails is no reason to pay their bill out of my funds. "They are not paying me so I will just take it out of your money" is totally inappropriate and very unprofessional. Mr Toohey, by law, needs to state the legal reason to take my earnest money out of his trust account and keep it. He has not done this, and his only response has been, "I am not going to eat this cost."

I am requesting the return of my earnest money deposit minus the $150 title abstract fee. If this matter cannot be resolved by way of reason, I will be filing a complaint with the State Disciplinary Board as well as posting attorney reviews on sites such as www.avvo.com. I have been very disappointed with the way Mr Toohey is conducting business.

I do not have Mr Toohey's email address, so if you could please promptly deliver this information to him that would be appreciated.

The reason I don't give the earnest money directly to the sellers is because I don't want them walking off with it. Now I am rethinking putting money into escrow. Doesn't appear to be safe there either. 

Some good advice & comments here. Thanks! I really never thought that the contract would have to state what happened to the earnest money if the seller couldn't close. To me it only seems reasonable that the money would be returned to the buyer. I guess you learn something unreasonable every day. 

The biggest part that gets me on this deal is that the attorney basically said that since he was not able to get the money from the sellers (where he knows it should come from) he is going to take my money because he has it. "They're not paying me so I'll just take it out of your money." That's BS. 

Hand money is earnest money, yes. The agreement states that the seller will retain my earnest money if I don't close. It makes no mention of what happens if it doesn't close due to something on the seller's end.

The attorney's office asked me if I wanted to have them pull the title. I agreed. The title abstract was $150. The other monies is for lien letters and tax certs. These are the sellers expense and, in my opinion, should be items that that attorney needs to take up with the sellers. So in my mind I believe legally I should be refunded $450.

I entered into an owner financed deal. The seller wanted to use their attorney to handle the closing. I sent $600 hand money to their attorney as was required in the sales agreement. After the title search came back I was told that there was a line of credit on the home. That obviously killed the owner financing arrangement. The outstanding loan balance  exceeded the purchase price - the deal is off.

The sellers disappeared. Now the attorney is refusing to refund my hand money stating that they incurred a cost of $473 for title abstract, lien letters, etc. I told him that it was not my fault that the deal didn't close and that he need to take that up with the sellers. He said he has tried to and they aren't returning calls. He kept saying that he was not going to eat that expense. What is my recourse at this time?

We are looking at a 116 unit apartment complex. The asking price is $4,950,000. The NOI is $484,000/yr. The seller will carry a 20% second. With 100% financing we should cashflow about $13,500 a month. That is calculated with a loan at 5% with 30 year amortization.

Here's my question: Are there commercial loans that have a 30 year amortization? We are currently doing single family loans with a portfolio lender and we were told that 20 year amortization was their maximum amortization length for commercial loans (they consider any investment property loan a commercial loan). What are the current standard lending guidelines in the multifamily arena? Thanks in advance!

If a municipality puts a house on a demolition list and there is a newer detached garage on the property, is it standard practice to raze all the structures on the parcel or will they just raze the house itself? Initially they tagged the house as being in violation and not the garage. Thanks in advance!

Hi Kevin. I know most car salesman work crazy long hours. I was curious as to how you'd plan on wholesaling houses when you're at work for most of the day. I don't mean to discourage you, but oftentimes to wholesale deals a flexible schedule is required.

@Account Closed  Thanks for posting the link. You have the right guy!