closing date for eight days for the loan not being ready unless the buyer had given the seller some advance no- tice that a loan was now being obtained. For now, the GAR Forms Committee voted to preserve the approach pres- ently set forth in the Purchase and Sale Agreement. The rationale for doing this was that the minor inconvenience to the seller of having an occasional “all cash” buyer ex- tend the closing date for eight days (because the buyer decided to get a loan which was now not ready) was out- weighed by the benefit of allowing buyers to extend the contract and thus not have transactions fall apart.
5 >> Inspection and Due Diligence Section Three changes were made to this section of the GAR
Purchase and Sale Agreement. First, a disclaimer was added to this section of the contract stating that, “Even if the Property is sold “as-is”, Seller is required under Georgia law to disclose to the Buyer latent or hidden de- fects in the Property of which Seller is aware and which could not have been discovered by the Buyer upon a reasonable inspection of the Property”. This disclaimer was added to try to clear up a common misperception on the part of some sellers that they can avoid disclos- ing hidden defects of which they are aware by selling a property in “as-is” condition. The second change was to add to the Purchase and
Sale Agreement the location of the website showing whether a house was used for the production of meth- amphetamine or a dump site for the same. While there are relatively few houses that have this issue, the GAR Forms Committee decided that making this information available to buyers protected both the buyer and the real estate agents involved in the transaction by mak- ing this information easily accessible. The third change was to clarify that the right of buy-
ers to inspect a property is subject to the buyer giving prior notice to the seller and to require that the buyer “promptly restore any portion of the Property damaged or disturbed from testing or other evaluations to a con- dition equal to or better than the condition it was in prior to such testing or evaluation”. These changes were made to: a) ensure that buyers give sellers the courtesy of ad- vance notice before simply showing up at a property; and b) strengthen the buyer’s legal duty to repair prop- erty damaged as part of the inspection process.
6 >>Agency and Brokerage
Several changes were also made to the “Agency and Brokerage” section. The first was to clarify that, “The
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“If Broker has written any special stipulations herein, the party for whom such special stipulations were written: a) confirms that each such stipulation reflects the party’s complete understand- ing as to the substance and form of the special stipulations; b) hereby adopts each special stipulation as the original work of the party; and c) hereby agrees to indemnify and hold Broker who prepared the stipulation harmless from any and all claims, causes of action, suits, and damages arising out of or relating to such special stipulation.”
While there is no guarantee that this provision will protect the REALTOR®
Brokers herein are signing this Agreement to reflect their role in this transaction and consent to act as Holder if either of them are named as such. This Agreement and any amendment thereto shall be enforceable even without the signature of any Broker referenced herein.” REALTORS®
regularly ask if the Purchase and Sale
Agreement is enforceable even without their signatures and this addition to the contract makes it clear that the answer to this question is an unequivocal yes. The second change was to modify the disclaimer sec- tion to try to protect REALTORS®
who write special
stipulations on behalf of their clients. Specifically, the following language was added to this section:
, the GAR Forms Committee de-
cided that trying to offer some protection was better than doing nothing at all. The third change was to clarify that the term “Bro-
ker” in the Purchase and Sale Agreement always in- cludes the Broker’s affiliated licensees unless the context would indicate otherwise. This change replaced the pre- vious language which simply stated that the term “Bro- ker” only included the Broker’s affiliated licensees where the content would indicate. This minor change in empha- sis reflects that the term “Broker” almost always includes the Broker’s affiliated licensees when used in the GAR Purchase and Sale Agreement.
7>>New Attorney’s Fees Provision Added to Default Section
Possibly the most significant change to the GAR Pur- GEORGIA REALTOR®
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