What Happens When Your Offer Is Accepted? (Video)

What Happens When Your Offer is Accepted? (Video Transcription)

Hi, everyone. It’s George Belleville here. I’m a realtor in Maryland and I’m creating this video to tell you the overview of what happens once your offer to purchase a property is accepted. I’m not going to go into detail of each step, but I’m just going to give you kind of an overview of the process, what happens, what to expect.

So when you submit an offer, the other agent will obviously present it to the sellers. They will. There could be some back and forth, but at some point everybody’s going to sign it. And once it’s all signed, that’s considered the date of contract acceptance. Once you get that back and you’re notified that it’s signed, that means you are actually under contract. So that’s when the congratulations start. But there’s a lot more to go after that.

So the good news is you’re under contract. So what will happen next is if you’re working with us, what we will do is we will send a copy of the signed contract to the lender, a copy of the signed contract to you, and one to the title company that you’ve chosen so that they can kind of start their process. And we will send you an email that details all of the steps that need to happen.

But usually the first and foremost one is any home inspections that need to be done. So we have a list of really good providers that we work with that do all the home inspections. You’re obviously free to choose whoever you want. As I said, we have some that we like, but you’re free to use anybody you want. You can get referrals from friends and family members and things like that.

But that’s usually the first and most urgent step that happens because there’s a time limit on home inspections. So the way the Maryland contract is written, you have to do the home inspection, make your decision, and then tell the seller what you want done by the date in the contract. So if you give yourself seven days, you have to have all that done by the seven days, not just the inspection.

So we’ll send you an email, we’ll refer you to our list. You can call your own people, but what we ask that you do is you contact the vendors and you set up the inspections. We don’t actually want to get involved in that because God forbid we make a mistake or forget or we get busy and miss. It’s too important for that. And it’s important for you to be engaged with that process and to also talk to the providers so that you feel comfortable with them.

And we’ll also tell you to, we aim to do them all on the same day so it doesn’t displace the seller and be an inconvenience to everyone. But we tell you, you pick the day that works for you and the vendor and just schedule it and then let us know. And then that way, if we can’t be there, then we’ll get someone else from our office to be there. If you add our schedule into the matrix, it’s just too confusing and too hard to do.

So that usually happens, say, the next day because like I said, there’s a timeline on that. You really need to get that done. And then the other thing that will happen is the lender will call you and you should have been already pre-approved, but they’ll still need more information from you. And during the 30 to, say, 45 days before closing, they’ll keep asking you for information.

And be honest. Sometimes it can be a little frustrating and people feel like they’ve already done it, but just understand you’re going to keep doing it because they’re going to loan you a lot of money and they have procedures that they ask you to follow, such as pay stubs, all those things. They’re going to want to verify that up to the end.

So you’ll be staying in touch with them. You’ll get a questionnaire from the title company just verifying some of the information. Most of that is more for the seller. The title company issues, you’ll have to get homeowners insurance and you’ll have to do that before closing. And then obviously, depending on what the seller says after the inspections, then you might have to renegotiate some of that.

So those are the things that happen right after the contract is signed. And the other thing that will happen is your lender will order the appraisal of the property. And that’s kind of a weird process because it’s your appraisal. You’re the buyer, but the appraiser calls the listing agent who’s representing the seller to get access to the property.

So they will go to the house, they will look at the house, they will look at the comparable homes in the area, and they will come up with an appraisal value which determines how much your loan will be. So that’s an important thing. That’s a topic for another video. What happens with the appraisal if it’s too low and things like that.

But those are the things that are going on when you go under contract and then with the title company, what they’re doing is they’re checking the sellers to make sure the sellers have clear title. They have legal authority to sell the house and track back the ownership, the deeds a little bit, just to make sure that the people selling the house actually are who they say they are. And it’s not a trust or an estate or something that has other things that need to be done. And they put that all together and we’ll do another video on closing.

But those are the things that happen once your house goes under contract. And I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t add one more thing, which is, and your lender will tell you this. Once you go under contract, talk to them before you buy anything. Don’t open any credit cards, don’t take out any lines of credit, don’t make any big purchases, and don’t move any big amounts of money because the mortgage company will be looking at all that, and the underwriter will be very suspicious if they see money moving around oddly towards the end.

So talk to your loan officer about that. But I just wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t also mention that once we get on this process, don’t change anything. So anyway, hope that helps. Gives you an overview of what happens when your house goes under contract. If you have any questions, please let us know. And have a great day. Bye.