[vreihen16]

I will also ditto the suggestion to use a good closing attorney who specializes in real estate.

We paid $600 for our real estate specialist attorney, and the sellers used a generalist attorney. It was obvious from the start at the closing that their attorney was confused, and our attorney ate him for lunch with over $2,000 in concessions for things that they didn't bring to the closing like how much heating oil was in the tank or a certification that there was a working smoke/CO detector in the property. Our attorney would hand us a paper, explain what it was in detail, and then ask us to sign it. Their attorney would take the paper, hand it to the seller, and try to parrot what our attorney said. After a few times, he just told the sellers to listen to our attorney rather than parrot what he said!

The oil tank contents concession alone (it was 7/8 full!) paid our attorney's fees, and I really felt bad for the seller's attorney because he was the husband of someone that works where I do and our attorney made him look like a bumbling idiot.

FWIW, I recommended our closing attorney to a colleague at work about 5 years ago, and he also had a similar experience at his closing.....