Out of the blue last week, Mike at Dominion emailed me asking us to sign an additional addendum that would nullify the financing contingency included in our original sales contract. This contingency stated that if we were unable to acquire financing, we would be released from the contract with no further obligation. The new addendum removes the financing contingency from the contract, meaning that we would forfeit our deposit if we fail to execute the contract for ANY REASON, including not being appoved for our mortgage.
“I’m not sure I understand why this request is being made,” I said to Mike on the phone. “Does this mean we’ve been approved for our mortgage? We haven’t heard anything from them yet.”
“Well, no. Officially you’re still not approved, but ever since Centennial moved to the their new ‘Desktop Underwriting’ software, a buyer is considered approved as long as the computer program doesn’t flag any potential problems.”
“In otherwords,” I asked him, “after plugging all our numbers, the computer says we are approved, even though our financing package hasn’t been reviewed by an actual human underwriter?”
“Exactly,” he confirmed. “Your preliminary review looks 100% solid. There’s no reason to expect any problems with your mortgage approval down the road.”
Wait a minute. Didn’t they know this three weeks ago when we made our mortgage application? Does it really take that long to run the “Desktop Underwriting” program? Seems like more stalling, to me.
When we first went looking at this community, we were told that permits had already been pulled for our lot, and that the house would be finished by mid-September. After signing the contract, we were presented with an alternate timeline. Permitting would actually take an additional two weeks, and the house would not be completed until the end of September, maybe even until the middle of October. After the permits were acquired, we were told that the excavation would not be scheduled until we got our preliminary mortgage approval. So now, more than a month after we signed the contract, we are told that they may finally go ahead and schedule the excavation. Providing of course, that we waive the financing contingency.
So we signed it, scanned it to an email, and sent it back. Four days later, and still no excavation scheduled. Heavy sigh. We are so frustrated with the lack of progress. When we first signed the contract we used to drive by the property every couple of days because we were naive enough to believe they would get started right away. Let me see some stakes driven into the ground. let me see spray-painted lines on the grass indicating the direction and layout of the sewer lines. Let me see a palett of concrete mix sitting in front of our lot. For god’s sake, let me see something!
—Michael