The standard real estate contract in Florida is increasing from four to eleven pages.
What are the new changes in the Florida Real Estate Contracts? What is the difference between a traditional contract and an As-Is contract? What are the most common misconceptions about real estate contracts?
In the mid 1980s Coke came out with the infamous botched marketing of “new coke.” New Coke performed better in its blind taste tests in head-to-head competition with Pepsi. It tasted better than Pepsi or the “old Coke”. The launch performed abysmally. People wanted the old familiar Coke and not the new sweeter and more-like-Pepsi version.
Coke got the message fast and launched “Classic Coke”, giving consumers what they wanted.
As unwelcome as New Coke, comes a new contract form that increases standard Florida real estate contracts from four pages to eleven pages.
Explanations for this nearly triple size increase range from input from real estate attorneys up north using contracts with more binders, to changes in the market conditions and loans needing greater protections. Half of one of the new pages is populated indemnification clauses for realtors. Inspections are now a three part process. Execution of larger contracts increase the complexity of every part of the process such as things like faxing and email attachments.
Contracts that are larger are more intimidating and cause more people to engage attorneys for reviews. Inevitably, more complex contracts create more opportunities for exiting the contract as well.
