We were concerned about the rising interest rates, as we were able to lock just before the rates started to rise. So pushing the closing out could have cost us more. The sellers are flexible – they are ok staying through May but also can move earlier. We were ok with closing in Dec., but needed to cover our expenses until we move there in June. The sellers leasing back would have covered that.

So after a lot of thinking, we decided the best bet would be to close in Dec as planned & have the sellers lease back for 59 days. Since no one else had a solution, we suggested to our realtor that the 4 parties all equally split the costs for the remaining 3.5 months. We got a lot of push-back from the listing realtor as she had already accepted a reduced commission, but she eventually agreed to contribute. Her portion is significantly smaller than anyone else’s. The seller is basically paying 20% and our realtor is paying about $2000 less than we are. So it’s not ideal as we’re having to contribute about $2000 more than we’d anticipated, but we didn’t want the deal to fall apart over that. Our realtor is already covering most of it for the listing realtor. When it was down to us paying $4000 more than everyone else, we were ready to walk away. It’s amazing how a $1.2 million dollar deal can fall apart over a few thousand dollars, but it almost happened.

It was a pretty crazy few days trying to put this together. My realtor did come through in the end, but we got the distinct impression that he was advocating for the sellers & even more so, the seller’s agent during these negotiations. We did not feel as though our interests were being represented. It was very frustrating as up until then, he had been doing a good job. Now we are past that & hoping that we can close as planned in Dec.

Thanks all for your suggestions! I have another question but will start a new thread as it’s about a different subject.