The beginning of a Palo Alto escrow is like the beginning of a teenage romance, everything is perfect. You have found your soul mate and all promises are meant to be kept. You never dream that your heart will ever be broken. It doesn't matter that one party is a jock and the other an intellectual, one is a Democrat and one a Republican, or one likes to party and the other is a vegan. And then reality sets in. I don't think I have to go into gory detail. Well, sometimes an escrow is like that but hopefully your escrow will have a better track record than a teenage romance.
One way to help things along is to not set yourself up for failure. If you are a buyer or buyer's agent do not expect to get a loan approval in 15 days if you do not have every document into the lender ahead of time. If you are a seller or seller's agent and accepted an FHA loan do not try to make the buyer get approval in 15 days. If the seller does not get inspections ahead of time do not tell the buyer they have 7 days for property contingencies and then start yelling because the property inspector says there is something wrong with the foundation and they need more time for an engineer to look at it.
Bottom line, do not set yourself up for failure by blowing a gasket over unrealistic time frames. Try to make them realistic to begin with so that the parties can succeed rather than fail.
Marcy Moyer
Keller Williams Realty
marcy@marcymoyer.com
650-619-9285
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