I have learned one thing reading this thread, if I was ever placed in this position I would not close on the property until all their junk was removed, including the horses.
But I have always used a real estate attorney to handle a closing as all those piles of papers fly back and forth make nearly zero sense to me
Agree!
They have until the end of today. Friday was our original out date, but when our realtor added an addendum for them to sign (getting it in writing that they must have their stuff out and not come back for it) their realtor requested an extra day because of the car issues.
They are going to leave a ton of junk behind. It would be physically impossible for them to actually get all the stuff off (unless they hired a moving crew… Crazy idea). It’s like an episode of Hoarders, though they have gotten a lot moved. I doubt we will ever see replacement gates, for all their talk.
My main worry now is that they leave the horses behind “until we find a shipper”, since she was still posting on Facebook yesterday looking for someone to haul the horses north for them. O_O
I’m off to go fix a fence hole that the horses could easily escape from, but that she never bothered to mention that the hay ring was covering until telling the boarders (who are fantastic, reasonable women) and I to move the hay ring for her. The horses did escape yesterday. Only made it as far as my goats in the far pasture, thankfully, and were transfixed enough to be caught. My Horseguard order can’t ship fast enough.
Never again! Learn from my mistake. Don’t close until they are GONE.
When we bought our farm the renter said not to worry, the agent was hiring a cleaning crew after he was gone. Well, she decided to save some money and we had to rent a dumpster. The fridge was even full of food! That had been in the fridge for 2 months since we had so many problems closing.
When we sold a house that had a renter in it, there was a clause in the contract that the house had to be empty by close or they would charge us $125 a day. It was a relative of ours that was living there and he apparently thought it was a hotel? and he didn’t have to leave until exactly closing time, which was 10am. So my SO and a bunch of family spent until 2am moving him out the night before close. He’s still made that we “made a big deal” out of it.
Give the sellers a written notice, in front of several witnesses, stating that any property left on your property at the end of today will be removed by a professional junk service company, and the sellers will pay the bill, or you’ll see them in court. No more nice guy about anything for these people. They had since the place was put on the market to start moving, and junking, or selling items. They are definitely trying to dump the horses on you. No one who cares about their animals, and intended to take them would be advertising this week for some unknown person to haul their horses.
And as a veteran of many hoarder episodes, if you move in, and the fridge or freezer has been turned off for a long while, don’t open the door, just have it junked with the door closed.
OP, hope your insurance is in place on your new place.
Sometimes a seller never truly gets their heads around actually moving out of the place they are selling and doesn’t organize or schedule realistically. Sometimes they have accumulated so. much. stuff. that, as in this case, it’s virtually physically impossible to move it all - or even half of it.
I’ll bet that leaving things behind isn’t just about not spending $$ to hire movers, but that there is no room for it where they are going. Further speculation is that when they moved into their new place, they found it a relief to have all that stuff gone. Maybe the horses as well? Interesting that they never faced up to this until now, and only now are making the decision not to try to move everything.
The agent is doing well with the addendum to clear things up legally, and not leave all that stuff in limbo. This is where agents are worth their fee, IMO. But it’s interesting to get signatures on this after the closing has already been completed and the keys and money transferred, and all that.
Making the closing contingent on the seller having already moved will put the problem of their stuff back on them.
But, making the contractual move-out date earlier than the closing date means that the seller has to have a place to go before receiving the funds from the sale of their current home. If the seller is moving several states away it may work out, because the moving company may take days or weeks to deliver their stuff anyway, so they have some time before they close on their new place. However, if they are going across town and it is a one-day move, then the timing of the closing will depend on individual circumstances.
As for finding out the day before closing that the sellers can’t be out on time, postponing at such short notice is fraught with complications. The closing company/attorney prepares reams of financial stuff based on the actual closing date that has to be re-done (taxes, mortgage interest, etc.). (They tend to wait until the day before to prepare it for just this reason!) There is also the cost of the time the closing company/attorney have booked for the closing. And difficulties with the new mortgage including expiring rate locks and such.
That puts pressure on people to try to close on time and work out other arrangements for whatever is causing the delay. The agent’s addendum is a good solution, though. Good agents have ways of saving the day at the closing table. 
actually the closing is contingent upon meeting the contract’s requirements, unless your accepted offer included removal of all junk by owner then your contingency would be supplemental and not enforceable to the actual contract. (at least that is what I was taught in contract law used in business- i am not an attorney but dealt with contracts for decades )
We had one MARATHON of a closing where page by page the seller had to prove to our attorney that this “problem” was cleared … it took nearly eight hours as we waited for releases from lending institutions.
I have a lot of stories about these types of issues, perhaps the most relevant was when we sold our parent’s home after their death. No one in the family lived nearby, two of my sibs lived ~ an hour away in different directions, another sib and I lived several states away.
We cleaned out the house and did minimal repairs, opting to sell quickly rather than trying to get top dollar.
We gave the buyers a key so they could get into the house and paint before closing.
The buyers walked out of the closing; I forgot what specifically they objected to in the closing process but it wasn’t important. What was important was they thought they had leeway/leverage because we all lived out of town.
What they didn’t realize is that we had all grown up in that neighborhood and my parents had lived there for 30 years, and our real estate agent was a neighbor.
When we called the agent to tell them the buyers had walked out of the closing, he responded “What do you mean they didn’t close? They’re moving in; I’m looking at their kids playing in the yard.”
So we had to get law enforcement and both real estate agents involved to literally stop them from putting their furniture in a house they didn’t own yet. And change the locks and not provide a key until they actually, you know, closed and handed over the money.
Fun times.
@Falconfree - so inquiring minds want to know if you are +2 or -2 horses today? Did the sellers show up? Is it all done now? Or did they need another extension? I hope they got everything and you can finally call your new place “all yours”.
Its so exciting to have a new place… I can still remember that feeling, even if it was 17+ years ago for me.
In Colorado you do (or at least did) closing at the Title company, and during a delay (the buyer was caught in traffic from the closing for her previous house), the Title lady, and my realtor told me about closings that were their strangest. In the 1990’s the longest closing was the Title lady, where it was a multi-million dollar property, and the buyer was at the Title company, but the seller was on a yacht in the Caribbean. They had to fax papers back and forth, have notaries on both ends, and it took all day.
My realtor’s strangest was a lady selling her home of quite a few years, and buying another one. She had to sell the current one, to buy the next house. The night before the closing the seller called my agent late at night, saying she wanted to cancel everything. He had to explain to her that she had a signed contract, and had gone to closing, and she had the money from the sale also. She just kept crying and saying she changed her mind, and he had to tell her that her sold house was no longer hers. She came to the closing on the new house the next day, and kept crying all the way through, then moved in to the new house. My realtor said that he had no idea why she was that upset, and what was going on. The funny thing is my realtor said she never even liked the house she was selling, and the one she was moving to was what she had always dreamed of owning.
The sellers actually showed up the day after closing, and have been packing up since then. I have to admit, they’ve done a good job clearing out and cleaning up the house. My expectations were very low walking through, but they’ve clearly been trying. There is one small corner of the yard with boxes and such piled up, but they are really close to being done loading up. Being suckers, we decided to give them one more day, since they are nearly done. It would be lovely to not have to clean it up ourselves. As I’m typing this, I just saw the Uhaul pull up again (I think they are unloading at a friend’s house, whatever gets it off property).
Horses still here… I’ve seen a couple people respond to their request for a truck/trailer, so maybe they will be gone soon. We are charging board until the horses are gone. I suspect they will go quickly, because they aren’t getting a free stay here anymore.
So close! We are all incredibly excited to get started!
Remember the first second they are totally out, you take photos that show the empty spaces, and make sure all windows are securely locked, and you change the locks. Great idea to charge board for the horses, otherwise they would have dragged their feet even more. Before they leave go through all of the spaces, and make sure nothing is left inside. No matter how much they whine, nothing stays inside your buildings.
I’m so happy for you that this is almost over, and you can make the place your own.
Banks usually require proof of insurance at closing. It’s so important to them that they buyer pays the first year up front at closing and then the next year’s premium is collected in the monthly mortgage payments and escrowed until due again.
@Falconfree - that’s so exciting, and you really are dealing with this issue gracefully. Most of us would not have been so kind and patient. Do you have a name for your farm that you care to share? And we expect a blog too!! 
Yes the bank would usually require proof of homeowners insurance which will normally have some liability coverage. However OP mentioned boarders and now she is charging former owners board. Her homeowers insurance may not cover her for liability for her boarders or boarder’s horses as she likely would be considered commercial. She should have care, custody and control type insurance and may need a business liability policy rather than standard homeowner liability. Her mortgage company would not need to see proof of those types of policies as part of closing.
I am hoping that the former owners, their stuff and their horses are gone from the farm.
I read through this entire thread today because I’ve been through the same and was looking for tips to be sure the problems never happen again. We did remove gates, pipe corrals and some fixtures - it was in the escrow contract. Mom did hold over for two weeks after closing - it was in the escrow. I have put in writing that my improvements to a leased property would remain mine at the end of the lease. It’s in writing - in advance. I always change locks whether it’s a purchase or a rental. The first thing we move are the horses and the pets. That’s true if there is an evacuation or a move. I just don’t know what to say about people that take gates and leave horses. The fact that they did it - says it all. Glad it’s all coming about OP. Enjoy your new home.
I feel like I missed something… did they replace the gates?
Spam reported.
UPDATE:
Yep, y’all were right. Give them an inch, they will take a mile. We were allowing them to continue occupying the house until Sunday, thinking that would make it easier for them to get their junk packed, with us living in the rental house on the same property to watch the goings on. That was not close enough. Instead, they had all the excuses, promises that turn out to be lies, etc. The day before yesterday (a full week after closing) we told them to leave, and they texted back that they did. House is locked up and empty. Next morning I went to go feed the horses and when we went inside to cool off, we woke her up from sleeping in the floor (crazy wife half of the sellers is the only one in town, atm). Yeah.
Crazy husband half hooked a horse trailer to the Uhaul and took the last two horses up to their new place (thank goodness!). They laid a single, beat up gate across the place where they had taken a gate. There is a “spare” gate they were planning on taking too, but that’s not going to happen, since they still owe us another gate.
Back to wife still in the house. We told their realtor, and she said they would be gone that day, even if we had to bring in the police. Seller sent a message at noon that the house was empty and locked up. Of course, another lie. I drove over after dinner, and she was walking out the door with the last of her stuff (last of her ‘inside the house, except the garage’ stuff). We were up until the wee hours of the morning changing locks (5 exterior doors), and padlocking the exterior gates. I’m living in the main house now.
Did I mention they stole the front door yesterday? Yeah. They replaced it with a similar(ish) looking door that is both unsafe to use and would not pass reappraisal. She hid the stolen front door in the horse trailer that she supposedly spent yesterday filling with their stuff to haul to their new house (there are 3 boxes and the door). Their realtor has been off and on the phone with them all morning, apparently, and made it clear to them that if anyone in their family or working for them steps foot on this property again without permission, we will call the cops. If they want to get the rest of this junk, they have one day to get it off, and they must be accompanied by their realtor and/or a sheriff’s deputy (and us, obviously). They are not taking the old door off this property unless they give us a new door (the old door has sentimental value to wife).
So, so ready for this to be over with. The horses in the backyard are great therapy though. And walking through the pasture pulling up all the loose baling twine that has been bothering me since we started boarding here is very satisfying.
Lessons learned:
On Eagle’s Wings Acres.
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