Buying and Selling A Home

BUYING AND SELLING A HOME ON THE SAME DAY….IS IT A NIGHTMARE???

Many people are under the impression that buying and selling a home or condo on
the same day is a total nightmare. I am here to tell you that in my experience a potential
nightmare can actually become a smooth and relatively painless process. I’m not telling
you it’s the easiest thing in the world to do, or that problems can’t creep up, but with a
little planning and the right real estate and legal team it can be done, and done well.

THE MOVE:

Can I coordinate movers to do both my move-out and move-in on the same day?

For some reason, the greatest hang-up most people associate with this process is
the logistics of the physical move itself. It seems daunting…you need to get movers over
to the home you are selling to pack up your belongings, but then have them drive over
to your new home to unpack your belongings all in the same day. But in reality, with the
proper scheduling of the closings, the process can work out quite efficiently. The movers
are already packing up one house…so how hard is it to drive the moving truck over to
the new one to unpack? The truck is already loaded up and ready to go. As long a little
prep work and pre-packing is done on the property being sold, the movers should be able
to get the truck loaded up in a few hours. The key is to obtain the services of a flexible
moving company that will accommodate your preferences and schedule during the
moving day. If you are not using a moving company but performing the move yourself
it is even easier since you are not on the clock or paying a moving company hourly for a
process that could take most of the day.

THE MONEY:

Will the proceeds from my sale be available to use for my purchase in the same

day?

The other main problem most people deal with is arranging for the proceeds of the
home they are selling to be available the same day for the home they are buying. It would
be nice and simple if most buyers had plenty of money lying around to buy their new
home without having to use the proceeds of their sale to do so, but the reality is that most
people do not have this luxury. Luckily, most real estate attorneys have the capability to
transfer money electronically from one account to another. Utilizing these wire transfers
cuts out any concerns or possible delays with having to wait for checks to clear. As the
attorney representing the party buying and selling, we would receive the proceeds on
the home sale via wire transfer and then use that money to fund the purchase later that
day. If an attorney does not have the capability to wire the money, the attorney can have
their trust account bank issue the proceeds in the form of a bank check or certified funds,
which is basically as good as cash. This bank check can then be easily processed at the
closing for the home purchase. Moving the money around for the same day sale/purchase
transaction is really quite simple with a little planning.

THE CLOSINGS:

Will I be able to schedule the closings for both the purchase and the sale in the
same day?

This is really the most difficult aspect of the sale/purchase same day transaction.
Ideally, if you can get under contract on both the house you are buying and the house you
are selling around the same time, it should be relatively easy for your attorney to match
up the closing dates during contract negotiation (attorney review). If you are forced to get
under contract on just one end of your sale/purchase transaction, you need to make sure
your attorney puts in the contract the appropriate safeguards so that you will be able to
schedule the second half of the transaction on the same closing date. In terms of the
actually closing day schedule, a morning closing on the sale end and an afternoon closing
on the purchase end usually work out best timing-wise. We typically have our clients pre-
sign the closing documents for their sale a day or two early, so they do not even need to
attend the sale closing. This frees up much needed time on the closing date to coordinate
the move, perform the walkthrough inspection on the purchase home and attend the
closing on the purchase.

PROBLEMS:

How do I troubleshoot problems?

Unfortunately when you are doing the sale/purchase same day transaction there
are some major uncontrollable variables….namely the buyers/sellers on the other sides of
the transactions. You try to plan the best you can but sometimes a monkey wrench gets
thrown in and you find out the day before the closing that someone can’t move out on
time, or needs a couple extra days for the their mortgage company, etc. Not everyone you
deal with on a real estate transaction is accommodating or even professional at times, so
problems do occur, sometimes without any warning. A good real estate and legal team
is the key to help navigate you through the problems and get you back on course to the
simultaneous closing.

In conclusion, don’t let the process scare you…put your team together and trust
them that they will make it work for you. In our experience, the majority of same day
sale/purchase transactions go accordingly to plan and aren’t the nightmare most people
assume they are. Our clients might be tired at the end of the day from all the moving and
unpacking, but there is usually a smile on their faces from sailing through two successful
real estate transactions in the same day.