Buying a Home Without an Agent

The Contract Jargon House

Protecting $$$$'s

By Mark Hasfurter — Remodeling since 1988 · Broker since 2000 · General Contractor

An offer isn't a conversation — it's a contract, and every deadline in it is real. In three decades of closings I've watched more money lost to a misread clause than to any leaky roof. A seller missed an inspection deadline by two days once; the buyer walked, and the earnest money fight ran for months. She didn't lose because the house was bad. She lost because she didn't understand what she'd signed.

Here's the good news for you as an unrepresented buyer: the contract comes to you on standard forms, and the settlement company makes sure everything in it is legal. Your job isn't to draft it — your job is to understand it before you sign it. So we built the second house on this street. Fifteen contract terms on the lawn below. Tap any one and the roof opens — plain English flies out, no legalese. Learn these fifteen and you'll read a purchase contract better than half the agents presenting them. And remember my oldest rule: even a napkin beats a handshake. If it's not in writing, it doesn't exist.

The Contract Jargon House

The financing jargon house A house with a closed gabled roof and smoking brown chimney under a blue sky. Tap a financing term on the green lawn: the roof hinges open, three dollar signs fly out, and the definition appears in a cloud. Buying a home without an agent Protecting $$$$'s $ $ $

Tap or click any term on the lawn to open the roof. Tap the cloud to dismiss it.

The Glossary, In Writing

Everything the house teaches, on paper — because the buyers who write things down beat the buyers who wing it, every single time.

The other houses on this street: The Financing Jargon House — mortgage terms, from pre-approval to PMI; The Home Lifespan House — how long everything in a house really lasts.

Want help with your own sale or purchase? See my flat-fee consulting services — I walk you through it without a traditional agent.