That week in March when three buyers backed out on the same house in Strathcona

I had a place near Whyte Avenue get three accepted offers fall through in seven days because each buyer's financing got flagged on the same weird covenant in the title, and now I double check every old property for those buried restrictions before listing.

2 comments

2 Comments

ruby_lane1mo agoOG Member

Right, that bit about "three accepted offers fall through in seven days" is just brutal. I actually read a piece in the local real estate blog last month about older homes in Strathcona having these weird, forgotten easements from the 1920s that banks just can't get past. It's not just you, covenants on land titles from that era can be total landmines, things like "no buildings over one story" or stuff about shared access to a well that doesn't even exist anymore. It's pretty scary how one hidden line can kill a sale that fast, especially when everyone thought the deal was solid. I always tell people to ask their lawyer to search for anything like a prohibition on commercial use or weird shared driveway rights, because those are the silent deal-breakers. It's a real mess when the financing falls apart and you're stuck explaining to sellers why their house is suddenly "unfinanceable" to the next person walking through the door.

nathan8511mo ago

I actually see it a little differently. Sure, those old covenants can be a pain, but a good real estate lawyer should catch them before the offer is even written. If three buyers in a row got their financing flagged on the same thing, that sounds like the listing agent or the seller's lawyer dropped the ball. They should have dug up that title issue upfront and disclosed it. It's not really the buyers' fault or the bank's fault. That kind of problem is fixable too, you can sometimes get a title insurance policy to cover it, or the seller can petition to have the covenant removed. It might take a few weeks, but it doesn't have to kill the deal completely if everyone knows about it from the start.