Purchase agreement
A purchase agreement is the contract that governs the sale of a property. It sets the price, the closing date, what is included and excluded, who pays what, and — most consequentially — the conditions under which the buyer can withdraw.
Everything that happens between offer and closing is governed by this document.
What it fixes#
Price and terms, including the earnest money amount and how the balance is financed.
The closing date, and whether it is firm or subject to extension.
Personal property. Appliances, window treatments, mounted televisions, the shed. Disputes about what conveys are common and entirely avoidable by writing it down.
Possession, which is not automatically the closing date and should be stated. A seller remaining in occupancy after closing needs a written agreement, not an understanding.
The contingencies#
The clauses that decide who bears which risk.
A financing contingency lets the buyer withdraw if the loan does not materialise. An inspection contingency allows withdrawal or renegotiation based on condition. An appraisal contingency covers a valuation below the contract price.
Each has a deadline. Before it, the buyer has an exit. After it, the buyer is committed and the earnest money is at risk.
Waiving contingencies makes an offer more competitive and transfers real risk to the buyer. In a heated market that trade gets made routinely, and the people making it frequently do not understand what they have given up.
The Minnesota disclosure layer#
A Minnesota purchase agreement sits alongside statutory disclosures that must be made before signing, not before closing.
The general seller's disclosure under Minn. Stat. 513.55. The well disclosure under Minn. Stat. 103I.235. The subsurface sewage treatment system disclosure. Plus lead paint, radon, methamphetamine production, airport zoning and predatory offender registry information.
Some of those can be waived by agreement and some cannot, and the distinction matters — it is covered on the seller's disclosure page.
Deadlines are the document#
The single most useful thing a buyer or seller can do with a signed purchase agreement is write every date in it onto a calendar the day it is signed.
Inspection deadline. Financing deadline. Appraisal deadline. Deadline to respond to a repair request. Closing date.
Contract rights expire by the passage of time and nobody sends a reminder. A buyer who discovers a serious defect two days after the inspection contingency lapsed has the defect and no remedy, and the reason is a date nobody wrote down.
Where distressed sales differ#
Foreclosure and estate sales frequently modify or eliminate the standard terms. Properties sell as-is, disclosure exemptions apply, and timelines are shorter and less negotiable.
A buyer using a standard form's assumptions on a bank-owned or probate purchase is working from a document that has been amended in ways that matter, and the amendments are the part to read.