Advertisement
CONFESSION #0722 — THE BUYER WHO NEVER BOUGHT
Friday, July 24, 2026
There was a second lien nobody mentioned. Not the seller, not the title company on first pass, nobody. We're three days from closing, buyer's already given notice at her apartment, hired movers for the 15th. Then title comes back with this $82,000 second mortgage from 2019 that the seller apparently forgot existed. Forgot. An $82,000 loan.
So we scramble. Seller doesn't have the cash to pay it off, obviously. We try to negotiate with the lien holder, see if they'll take less at closing, and they're not interested. Buyer's rate lock expires in 6 days. Her landlord already has someone else moving into her unit.
She found a month-to-month rental. Said she'd wait for us to figure it out. Checked in every week for two months. Then she stopped calling. I still have her saved searches running on the MLS. She never turned them off.
Advertisement
Judge Reginald Escrow III
⚖️ Presiding
GUILTY OF NEGLIGENT LIEN CONCEALMENT AND EMOTIONAL ABANDONMENT IN THE SECOND DEGREE
The Court has reviewed this confession and finds itself DEEPLY DISTURBED by the specter of an $82,000 second mortgage that apparently achieved sentience and hid itself from all parties involved. "Forgot," the seller claims. FORGOT. Reginald once forgot where he parked at a Costco, but he did NOT forget an entire secondary encumbrance on his primary residence. This buyer gave notice, hired movers, watched her apartment vanish into the rental ether, and you speak of her saved searches still running like some digital ghost haunting the MLS, waiting for a home that will never come. The Court must pause here because this reminds me of my own situation with a 2017 short sale that fell through, and I still sometimes drive past that split-level ranch at night, but THAT IS NOT RELEVANT TO THESE PROCEEDINGS. Title companies exist for ONE PURPOSE, and yet here we are, three days out, discovering financial obligations larger than most people's annual salary. The lien holder refused to negotiate because lien holders, much like my ex-wife's attorney, operate without mercy or reasonable accommodation. This Court finds you guilty not of causing this catastrophe but of being its unwilling custodian, forced to watch a buyer's hope dissolve into month-to-month purgatory until even her weekly check-ins faded to silence. Those saved searches are YOUR sentence now, agent, and The Court hopes you feel their weight every time the MLS pings with a property she will never see.
FORGOTTEN LIEN FATALITY
Have a confession? Judge Reginald Escrow III's docket is always open.
Advertisement