We feel one of the most important things we can do for a buyer or seller is to help them close. Along these lines we do not sweat the small stuff on Purchase Contracts.

I see some agents change 3 days to 5 days, 12 days to 10 days, and they keep making the tiny changes that really mean almost nothing. I am not sure if they just want their client to feel like they are doing something, or they really believe those changes are needed.

We feel changing the inspection from 12 days to 10 days is not important. The goal is not to get the longest inspection period possible, the goal is to close on the home. If you focus on the goal, you can see those small changes are not needed. Plus, once in escrow if you feel an additional inspection is needed, you can always request a small extension, and we pretty much always see sellers grant this small extension as they do not want to fall out of escrow.

Attorneys are notorious for making a ton of changes. I can always tell if the Realtor is also an attorney by the number of changes to the contract they make. Attorneys work with contracts all the time, and they feel their job is to make it as beneficial as possible for their client, so even though they are also a Realtor they still wear their attorney hat and make a ton of changes. Unfortunately, attorneys forget that as a Realtor their goal is to get the client into a new home, not just get them into a favorable contract. I have seen attorneys that make so many changes to the contract, the seller says no thanks, so they actually lost their client’s dream home because of their need to make so many changes to the contract.

So our advice is don’t sweat the small stuff. Focus on the big things like price and how long until closing and if the other terms are within a reasonable range don’t counter them. Focus on getting the home!