Problem:
Surprise Special Assessment and Surprise Repair

Buying a home can be an emotional rollercoaster. Imagine, you’ve accepted an offer and are getting ready to close, when a problem surfaces at the 11th hour. Our client, who was looking to buy a home in Palatine, was faced with two challenges:

• Being responsible for a special assessment

• Last minute repair

During the attorney review period, we discovered that our client would need to take on the liability for a special assessment of up to $5,000 required by the HOA. If that weren’t enough, during the final walkthrough of the property, our client discovered water damage caused by a shower leak. 

Solution:
Get the seller to pay

We addressed the special assessment by obtaining information from the HOA attorney, and combing through the documentation – including meeting minutes, budgets, and conversations with the property management company. To guard against the special assessment burden, we negotiated with the seller to put the money in escrow and transferred the liability to them.

For the repair, we had to move fast because we discovered the problem on the day we wanted to close. We worked with the seller to escrow enough money to pay mutually agreed contractors to make the repairs. All without any additional cost to our client. 

Outcome:
$10,000 in savings

Our client experienced what every buyer fears – the double whammy of a special assessment, and a very last minute repair. We solved both problems by ensuring he was 100% protected and saving him up to $10,000. In the end, he was happy because everything fell into place as originally planned.