My grandkids had gone home. I had shown houses in the afternoon in the cold drizzle. I sat down at my computer with a cup of coffee to warm me and to relax a little as I read some daily blog posts. I skimmed through one that was telling what some of our responsibilities are as Realtors as we work a deal from start to finish. With all due respect to the author, I laughed out loud at the last item on the list: Make sure there are no surprises at the closing table. I consider myself to be a stellar agent, but my first thought was to ask how we could possibly do that. And then my mind started racing, remembering at least a dozen funny and not so funny circumstances that were totally outside of our control that I would consider SURPRISES on the day of closing:

This was just an off-the-top-of-my-head list that immediately came to mind when I thought of the impossibility of assuring that there would be no surprises at the closing table. I could probably think of a dozen more. OF COURSE we do our best to prevent them, but I’m sure we all have war stories that we enjoy sharing. I would LOVE if some of you would like to share some of YOUR stories-from-the-trenches in the Comments.

• The Buyer lost his job on the day of closing
• One of the parties arrived drunk
• The Police showed up to arrest the other party
• The Seller didn’t want to sell their home
• The Buyer disappeared, never to be found again
• The Seller died the day of closing
• The Lender pulled the funds at the closing table
• The Lender pulled the funds AFTER THEY HAD BEEN DISTRIBUTED
• Scheduled closing on 9/11/2001
• Interest rate was 1.5% higher than told the day prior
• Buyer mentioned the two new cars he had purchased that week
• House destroyed by fire
• House knee deep in water at final walk thru
• Found that Seller was trying to sell his house for the THIRD time that morning