Deal on buying an apartment - the procedure for
Continuation. Beginning: Part 2. Saga of choosing an apartment 2. Checking the legal cleanliness of the apartment - insuring ourselves against surprises
Here is a real life event. The seller is a respectable veteran of the Great Patriotic War, a participant, a well-deserved figure, etc., and so on. After the transaction, he does not want to leave the apartment sold. The police invited by you back down to his assurances of deception, backed by a set of regalia, orders, letters. Debriefing is transferred to the courthouse.
Information about the disease, papers from a private clinic with information that traces of drugs have been found in the veteran's blood, assurances of "witnesses" that the seller has taken the decision in an inadequate state under pressure. .. The plaintiff himself is not at the meeting. His interests are tough young guys with a not very well-established diction. The court decides in favor of. .. the plaintiff!
Despite the fact that in a notarized purchase and sale agreement it is indicated in black and white that the contract was signed by the parties after the seller receives money for the apartment, the court accepts the seller's assurances that he did not get any money. .. In short, "Long live our court, the most just court in the world "!
There are several conclusions from this story. First, you need to agree that during the "getting a deposit - the transaction" all the persons registered in the apartment must be discharged from it. Check the implementation of this agreement!
The second. When transferring money, you need to get the keys to the apartment from the seller and( at the very least, with him) to immediately go to your apartment. It is better that by the time the sale of the apartment is completed, the seller left the apartment. If this is not the case, then after arriving with him, make sure that they are sent.
immediately after the transaction you should actually end up in your apartment, change the locks, and better - change them together with the entrance doors, if the latter do not inspire confidence.
Registration of an apartment sale transaction - the accuracy of the
wording. But, sweeping away all sorts of "cheap cheese", you conducted all the necessary checks described above and are ready to deal and transfer money to the seller. However, you need to understand your counterpart. It is not so rare that the seller collects the necessary documents( while spending both time and money), and the buyer changes his mind( no matter what reasons) and refuses the planned purchase.
In addition, there are real situations where money to the seller is really needed to accompany the apartment sale transaction. For example, to pay debts on utility bills - without this, he will not be given part of the documents. This issue is regulated by the seller making a deposit or advance payment. It is necessary to understand the difference between these concepts and clearly prescribe this moment in the preliminary agreement.
deposit is a way of guaranteeing a transaction from both the seller and the buyer. In our case, as a pledge, the buyer takes a certain amount of money. By mutual agreement, a third party may take the money, for example, a real estate agency. If the circumstances still change and:
- the buyer refuses the transaction, the amount of the pledge remains with the seller( it is transferred to the seller by a third party),
- the seller refuses the transaction, the doubled amount of the collateral compensates the buyer for unrealized expectations.
With the participation of a third party as a "security guard", a pledge and an "answer" in equal sizes should be left to both parties - both the buyer and the seller. This interpretation of the concept of "pledge" is prescribed by law. At the final calculation, the payment for an apartment is reduced by the amount of the mortgage.
Advance is a preliminary payment for an apartment. The advance amount is automatically included in the future payment. How parties should behave in the early termination of the transaction is determined solely by the contract between them. It is possible to provide, for example, a 10-fold advance of the advance, or its "non-return" under no circumstances, some payment from the advance payment of the agency's services.
If the preliminary agreement does not reflect this point, it is unlikely that it will be possible to avoid trouble and "showdowns" in case of an uncompleted transaction. A separate point in the preliminary contract should be stipulated by the case when, for any force majeure( fire, landslide or flooding), the apartment loses part or all of its value.
And most importantly: to conclude a preliminary contract is necessary, and it is necessary to conclude it with a carefully checked host of the apartment .With the indication of the passport data of the owner and all requisites of title documents for the apartment. Unfortunately, scammers are often "limited" by collecting collateral / advances and are hiding with them.
Really, 10 times on 1000-2000 $ will not make scoundrels rich people for the rest of their lives, but it is you who lose their "green" for a long time spoil the mood. In this case, you need to beware of both "cheap" and "expensive cheese".Such a scam suggests:
- Overstating the amount of the advance payment. Those.if instead of taking one on the market, a maximum of two thousand $ you are required to two or three times more, remember this "claimant".It is very possible that you will recognize it on the stand "the police are looking for them".
- Substantial understatement of the cost of the apartment.
- Delay in the final settlement period. This is done to collect as much as possible of the company of victims.
The option of a simple "scrolling" of advances is not excluded."Firm" for several months uses the money received as advance payments( in the form of an advance payment), and then, under the pretext of far-fetched force majeures, cancels the deal and returns some money that has lost its "weight" from inflation.
To exclude such possibility( at least legally), preliminary payment should be made in the form of a pledge and it is necessary to duplicate the law by the item on refund( in case of cancellation of the seller's transaction) of the double amount. At the same time, it is required to enumerate the force majeure circumstances under which the money is returned without "doubling".
Scammers inclined to theatrical effects arrange whole performances. In a "rich" office rented for several hours, they take money for the transaction. Of course, without any cash registers. Although in this case the "Accounting" sign above one of the rooms can hang.
Money is passed through a pre-prepared "detector" of banknotes, which is heartily signaling the presence of counterfeit banknotes."Outraged" representatives of the seller call for help. Appears "security service" or "police" and "withdraws evidence" - your( of course, real) money. The likelihood of once again seeing scammers and your money is very close to zero.
Another important point. It's no secret that the real amount often differs from the one specified in the contract - the costs of the parties to the transaction are reduced in proportion to the reduction of its amount. This circumstance is used by unscrupulous sellers, under any pretexts, challenging the transaction and even returning, but significantly less, the amount to the buyer. Therefore, even if the seller decides to indicate in the contract an understated amount, when there is registration of the transaction for the sale of an apartment, he simply has to insure himself - to take from the buyer a receipt for the receipt of a real amount.
It is necessary that the receipt is written by the seller in person. The receipt should include the full name of the seller, his passport data, the transaction amount in words and what exactly this amount will be returned to the buyer upon termination of the transaction.
Knowing that at the hands of the parties the receipt( and its copy) in obtaining real money, no sane citizen( including both the seller and the buyer) will not start a litigation to review the transaction. After all, if such a receipt is "floated", there will not be enough of any of the parties - the state is hard at suppressing attempts to deceive it. And this burden falls on both the seller and the buyer - malicious deceivers.
However, none of us is immune from inadequate behavior of people. Therefore, it is worthwhile to think carefully when the apartment sale transaction is being conducted, the documents with the underestimated figures put you in an unstable position. A very strong argument for the actual transfer of money is the settlement with the buyer through the bank. With an indication of the purpose of payment - payment of an apartment at such and such an address, under contract No. such-and-such from such and such a number. Knowing the real value of the apartment, concluding a detailed preliminary contract and transferring money through the bank, you can avoid many troubles. This is described in more detail below.
The procedure for calculating when buying an apartment - how not to overpay the excess?
It is very important that the buyer is aware of the prevailing prices for real estate, similar to the one that he chose for himself. This is important not to overpay and not fall into the web of scammers. The price must be two-sided. First you just ring up offers similar to yours, and also call the agencies asking if there is an opportunity to purchase with their help what you have already picked up for yourself.
It is possible that the agencies will offer something worthy of consideration. If they do not have specific proposals, they will advise you more objectively, becausein this case they do not need to "push" their goods. The second part of the audit also consists in contacting the agencies, but already with the question of selling "your" apartment.
It is clear that it's better not to call to the agencies that you just called, or you can charge a "ring" to another person. As a result, you get a "fork" of prices. In the middle, the desired value will be found. Now you can clearly trace suspicious cases of understated( or inflated) prices and "profitable" offers.
Of course, scammers know that the understated price causes suspicion. But they also know that there must be a "client" who will be drawn for "cheap cheese" and get into a "mousetrap".And this will happen much faster than the appearance of a buyer for an apartment at an average price. Below are two examples of "profitable" proposals on which a deal can be made to purchase an apartment.
You are offered to contribute part of the money for the apartment, usually half the required amount, and the remaining payment to install at very low interest. The intermediary firm( most often the cooperative) also takes a low payment for its services - 2-3% and undertakes to find housing in a new building according to your requirements.
Sometimes "representatives of the cooperative" immediately offer to sign a contract for one of the presented apartments, most often without showing this apartment. In the case of the "pyramid", the first few participants actually receive loans for the purchase of an apartment( using some of the money from the following "customers"), which is reported to all ready to be deceived by the next contenders.
However, very quickly it turns out that in fact the interest on loans granted to the first participants is several times higher than agreed with the intermediaries. And( here we are talking about scammers of a different type-more modest ones), fraudsters either quietly dissolve or bankrupt their cooperative without fulfilling any obligations.
For some reason none of the deceived:
- does not understand that the payment when buying an apartment at the proposed 5-7-10% per annum for a loan is unrealistic in a bank environment of 15%;
- does not pay attention to the fact that when depositing money, a piece of paper( a receipt) filled by hand is issued to him, but there are no cash registers or bookkeeping in the "office" of the intermediary company;
- is not alarmed by the fact that almost no references and information about yourself, as a future payer of the loan, do not need to be presented.
It is possible and directly opposite, from the point of view of document collection, option. The buyer is offered to buy an apartment in installments, again under unrealistically low interest. In the secondary market - 8-9%, in the case of new construction - even more pleasantly - 6-7% per annum, without insurance and commissions. At the same time they force the applicant to collect a lot of documents, which switches his attention to the very process of collecting the "necessary" papers.
The contract is to provide "legal services" - preparing documents for the bank, checking the "cleanliness" of the apartment, etc. Money in the amount of 20-30% of the value found by the buyer himself( or the apartment offered here) should be paid, as in the previous case, directly to the intermediary firm. The latter "undertakes" to transfer this money to the bank as a down payment.
This moment is missed in the signed contract. The procedure for transferring money from the "buyer" to the company is simplified to the limit. Naturally, the money settles in the company, and it is almost impossible to get them back to the "buyer".After all the contract is concluded on rendering of "legal services", and they, in opinion of "firm", are rendered in full.
Sale of an apartment - the rule of optimal calculation
There is a simple and effective way to make an non-cash settlement when buying an apartment , in which most fraudulent schemes do not work. We use the banking term "irrevocable letter of credit".The calculation is conducted through a trusted bank( a bank trusted by both the seller and the buyer).We reserve money for the transaction in the form of an irrevocable letter of credit for a period sufficient to prepare the documents and conduct the transaction in full. In a tripartite letter of credit, we record as conditions for its disclosure:
- registration of ownership of an apartment in the name of the buyer in the USRD,
- statement of all persons registered by the seller( if any),
- third-party confirmation that the seller has vacated the apartment( as a third partyto act as a real estate agency).
The deposit / advance payment in this case may not be transferred to the seller's hands. If it is necessary to make any expenditure, the seller can take a short-term loan in the same bank on the security of his apartment. If the deal breaks down, the seller at the end of the letter of credit gets his money without unnecessary trouble. It is clear that the "freeze" a considerable amount of money for a couple of months no one wants, but with this method of calculation the seller is guaranteed not to lose the entire amount. By the way, you can reserve money after the seller has prepared all the necessary documents for the transaction.
If the seller simply refuses such a calculation scheme, most likely, he is simply afraid of actions that are not entirely understandable to him. If, however, he begins to convince that this procedure for calculating when buying an apartment is bad, and other options have the advantage - it is very likely that the fraudster is "shattered by a small demon".
Read continuation: Part 4. Saga about apartment choice 4. Making a deal with notary