Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: option contracts

[Loren Davidson (loren]

At 03:59 PM 4/15/97 -0500, LPManiccia [at] aol.com wrote:
>I am looking for information on option agreements made for purchasing
>property.  I need to know what the standard block of time to tie up the land
>would be - for example - 30  days or 6 months??  Also, what is the amount
>people have used as earnest money - money that they would lose if the option
>is not exercised.  We have found a raw piece of land that may have water
>problems so we may want an out, but need to put down enough money to appear
>serious.  We are involved in a closed bid process with the city.
>Looked in archives... didn't find anything.

How about making the offer contingent on acceptable results of whatever sort
of test on the water you need to make?  It sounds like this is more what
you're trying to do, unless there are other reasons why you might not want
to go through with the deal.

Others on the list can probably better address your other issues, though
I've heard of options that can run up to several years in duration.  A
possibility here is the lease-option:  You pay a certain amount of money per
month to lease the property for a given term, with an option to purchase at
a given price at the end of that term.  An agreed-upon portion of your lease
payment can be credited toward purchase of the property.  In your case, the
option period might be only until completion of tests to determine if the
water situation is what you can live with.

Just one opinion among many here,

Loren
--
Loren Davidson      
loren [at] wombat.net         http://www.batnet.com/beauty/
"If war is the violent resolution of conflict, then peace is not the absence
of conflict, but rather, the ability to resolve conflict without violence."
    -- C.T. Butler, "A Guide to Formal Consensus", http://www.ic.org/pnp/ocac/