S2 E36: Communication With All Sides of the Transaction... Please!!! | Real Estate Lender Fails, FSBO Lessons & How to Protect Your Clients

What happens when a lender stops communicating, the closing date keeps shifting, and your sellers are watching their next chapter get delayed again and again? 

In this episode of Closing Chapters, Brittney walks through a recent transaction that stretched to sixty-six days under contract, and nearly fell apart, not because of the market, not because of the buyers, but because of one lender who couldn't pick up the phone.

Brittney breaks down the anatomy of a transaction communication failure: what it costs sellers when they're being ghosted, what it does to agents who are trying to hold things together, and why a VA buyer ended up switching loan types on closing day when none of it had to happen. She also makes the case for something that should be obvious but often isn't, which is that agents, lenders, and attorneys need to function as a unified team, and the other side of the table deserves honesty and transparency too.

This episode is as much a masterclass in professionalism as it is a real story from the field. If you want to know how to protect your clients, your reputation, and your sanity through a complicated transaction, this one is worth your full attention.

Key Takeaways

• Communication across all parties, agent, lender, and attorney, is not optional. It is how you protect your clients.
• Lenders who go silent do not just inconvenience agents. They derail transactions, cause closings to fall through, and damage relationships they will never repair.
• Sellers deserve real information in real time. Changing stories and delayed updates erode trust fast.
• Every agent on every side of a deal should be in a shared communication chain on any contingency that affects the closing.
• You can advocate hard for your client without being disrespectful to the other side. Being kind is a negotiating advantage.
• When a lender tells a buyer's agent they are considering walking away from a transaction, that is a failure of professional responsibility.
• VA buyers deserve agents and lenders who actually know how to serve them. This loan product matters and it takes expertise.
• Even when things are going wrong, consistent and proactive communication changes the outcome.

🎧If this episode hit close to home, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with an agent or lender who needs the reminder. Your support helps this podcast reach more military families and real estate professionals who are doing the work every day.

Closing Chapters Podcast: Where Every Mission Has A Story

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Disclaimer: This podcast education only & is not legal, tax, or financial advice. Talk with your own pros about your situation. Opinions are my own.

© 2025 Brittney Frye. All rights reserved. Realtor, license # 352197 in NC. Brokerage: REAL Broker l Military Division

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hey there friend, welcome back to the closing chapters podcast where every mission has a story. The reality is more than likely, most of the time, it's one side pushing against the other side, and we're just doing this tug of war back and forth, back and forth. Or there's no communication, and it's like you're knocking, knocking, knocking on a door, and nobody's there. And that is so hard in a transaction. We can all be competitors, we can all want the best for our clients, but communication is so key in this world. Hey, hey, my friends, welcome back. Do you know the those football games where it is super intense and both teams put everything out on the field? They are at it, they are working hard, nobody is giving up, they are playing their best game, and it is neck and knuck, and you really don't know who's gonna win. It's going into overtime, and a field goal is what makes the other team win, and it is amazing. There's a big roar in the crowd, and then at the end of the game, both teams love up on each other, and they're like, man, that was the best game I ever played. You know, do you know what type of game I'm talking about, right? Where it's we are competitors, we are both gonna work hard for our side, we are not giving up. That is not an option, but at the end of the day, man, I know you just worked just as hard as me. And I can appreciate that, and we're gonna love each other through it, right? That's a really awesome feeling, isn't it? That's pretty freaking amazing. That's what I desire in real estate. I want to work with my competitors, and I want to say, man, I'm working so hard for my client, and I know you are too. And yet, here we are, we can come together as a team, and we're going to see this through and make things happen. The reality is, more than likely, most of the time, it's one side pushing against the other side, and we're just doing this tug of war back and forth, back and forth. Or there's no communication, and it's like you're knocking, knocking, knocking on a door, and nobody's there. And that is so hard in a transaction. We can all be competitors, we can all want the best for our clients, but communication is so key in this world, and it's not only just agent to agent, but it's our whole team, right? So when I say team, to me, that is the agent and any other people involved. If you have a transaction coordinator or an assistant or whatever that might look like, so the agent team there, and then the lender and the attorney or title company, however your situation is for your state. I work in an attorney state, so there's a there's an attorney's office involved. The three core here the agent, the lender, and the attorney, we need to be a tight-knit team and we need to all be on the same page and working for our client cohesively. And oh, by the way, the same communication needs to be going to the other side, right? So if there's updates, and when I say same communication, I do not mean giving away personal information, but when we have updates on a file, 100% across the board, everyone needs to know the update on the file. We all have decisions to make and we all have our end-to-keep of this transaction, and we need to be able to do that wisely, and we can't without the information that is necessary. I just recently had a transaction where we extended twice. I had the seller, and we extended twice for the buyer, meaning shifted the closing date to the right. And my clients were under contract with this client for actually it was 64 days by the time we closed. No, yeah, 60 66 days by time we closed. So we waited for over two months for these clients to get to the closing table. And in that time frame, the communication was less than ideal. And scenarios kept coming up that were less than ideal. We were told, yes, we're taking the house as is. Oh no, by the way, the buyer wants to ask for 17 different repairs. What? Literally the next day, I shouldn't have even said anything. I'm so sorry. The the lender got into his head, da-da-da-da-da-da-da. All right, Mr. Linder was a problem and a half all the way through. So we get to the point where we're supposed to be getting ready to close at the end of April. Mr. Linder says, I know just because you have the cash to close doesn't mean I can let it clear. You need to sell this other property to have your lower debt to income ratio, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So we shift and it's okay. We're going to do a double close on this day. We get to a Monday when we are supposed to be closing on a Tuesday, and there's no communication. The attorney does not have final numbers or a packet. I have not received any numbers to review. We're not hearing from the lender that there's a clear to close. The agent can't get a hold of the lender, the buyer's agent. I am emailing the lender, and the lender is not responding. I get a phone call Monday afternoon saying, Oh, by the way, the VA is requesting some documentation and last minute, and they're trying to pull it up online. But if not, they're gonna have to try to reorder it or recreate it, and blah blah, okay, okay. So to me, that means, oh, it was never through underwriting, right? You said we were sitting on close, we're good to go. It's through underwriting, and then now all of a sudden the VA, no. So, and then later on, the agent comes to tell me some story about how, yeah, the building that this the VA docs were in caught on fire, so they couldn't get access to the documents, and they were telling him he was gonna have to go back and try to reconfigure how he could get the document. I was like, that that sounds like anything's possible, but I'm not buying it. Just not. So, anyhow, all of a sudden we're doing a 360. It's hey, we're going to switch from a VA loan to a conventional loan, which means more money down, not a better rate, and can they actually get the loan through by the end of the week? Because now we're on Tuesday, like it's closing day, and we're not closing, we're extending. So we've extended to the end of the week. And they're trying to say that we will close by Friday after they're switching the loan tide. Yet again, this is from the agent, nothing from the lender. The lender's not responding. So I email the lender two days in a row. I call the lender and leave a voicemail. So finally, I called the mortgage company because it was a big box mortgage company. And I said, Hey, your lender's not responding to me at all, and we need to get answers on this file. And this is where education comes in and is a key component. Because Little Chickadee on the phone said, Brittany, you're the listing agent. You just have to talk to the buyer's agent. I can't, nobody's gonna talk to you. I said, Yes, yes, they will. The lender can talk to me, the lender cannot give me confidential information on the client, but the lender can absolutely update me on the status of the file and whether we are on par to close on Friday and if these contingencies have been met. And she was like, Oh, okay. And then scoots me over to somebody else that's also already processing the file. So, once again, of course, they don't answer either. So I leave them a voicemail, and finally I got answers back. And that voicemail that I left was not the nicest. It was not rude, but it was a little bit gruff. It was someone, something along the lines of hey, your buyer is about to lose a transaction, and it is simply because you, as the lender, cannot communicate and let us know what's going on, and we are losing faith in this transaction. Which I'd already put in an email, too, by the way. You would have thought, I want to work really hard for my buyer. I don't want my guy to lose this house. He's already sold his houses, he's on the way from a different state. I need to make sure that he can get into his house, man. No, it was just nothing, nothing. And of course, the agent is out of state at a conference, so she is not responding either in this email chain. And finally, I get a call and it's hey, I don't know what's going on. I don't know why they're not answering, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's just excuse after excuse after excuse. So nobody was communicating this whole entire time. And when I tell you my sellers were perfection, anytime I've communicated with them, they were asking me questions before I could ever respond back to them and ask them. They've been on top of it every step of the way. And they already lost one house during this transition because they could not close fast enough on it. They're under contract on a better house, which is amazing. Sometimes everything happens for a reason, but it's time. It is time for them to get on to their next chapter. And now I'm being told we're shifting closing date again, and then I'm being ghosted. Nobody is answering me or responding to me and letting me know what's going on. What am I supposed to do? So the flip side to that is finally after calling and leaving a voicemail to somebody else, I finally started getting some answers back and we were able to move forward. So that was great. But then the agent calls me on Friday and says, Yeah, there's a couple times where the lender was just telling me, like, we're just not gonna close this transaction. It's just too hard. What are you talking about right now? Like, why are you even saying this to me? So, anyhow, lenders, if you're listening, don't say that. Don't why would you say that to the agent? Like, why would you say, hey, by the way, we're on the same team, but I'm just giving up. This is too hard. I don't care. I'm not gonna help this guy. And oh, by the way, the the buyer's agent wanted her client to use a different lender that she's used to utilizing and knew would handle everything appropriately. And this guy took a chance on his lender, and the lender failed him miserably. And I don't mean that in a mean way by any means, but like he went against the grain of his trusted advisor on one side and then he got burned. And that's a bummer, right? Because at the end of the day, that lender didn't care. That lender just simply said, I'm about to throw my hands up and just walk away. I don't on to the next one. Which once again brings me back to the same point that I make over and over and over again that who we choose as our lender is so valuable in our transactions. Who we work with and alongside is so valuable because we are a team. I don't want to work with a lender that's gonna call me up and be like, hey, Brittany, yeah, I'm not, I'm just not doing that transaction. It's just it's not worth it for me. It's too tough, it's too hard. What? What? No, absolutely not. That is not acceptable. We are here to serve people. And oh, by the way, this is a veteran, right? Not that anybody's more special than another, but this person has served our country and earned this opportunity and has this VA learned to utilize, and you can't figure out how to use it? Okay, okay. So, anyhow, all in all though, all of the frustration could have been avoided by communication. And that that's my key part. That's my key component here is that provided the lender would have actually responded. Because here's the thing is the lender had been sketchy throughout the whole entire process. Therefore, the buyer's agent was not confident when she was talking to me either. So I got to the point where everything she was saying kept changing too. Like, how am I supposed to confidently pass along anything that she is saying at this point? My sellers want to know what's actually going on for a fact. So at this point, the buyer's agent can say anything she wants to say, and it does not resonate with my sellers because it is not the lender, it is not the one that's in control of the loan. And we're just playing telephone. So it was like, I need direct communication from the lender so that I can feel confident in this transaction. So when you start switching things around and say that something's gonna be one way and then all of a sudden it's another way, it's okay, mistakes happen. But when we are doing things over and over again, and and today it's like this, and then tomorrow it's a different story, and then today it's like this, and then tomorrow it's a different story, you are whiplashing people. And that is not something that works well in this industry, right? At all. So when it you are not communicating, lenders, when you are not communicating, you are literally ripping the rug out from underneath of your clients' feet and the agent that they are associated with. We don't realize how much our core components are attached together, right? And nonetheless, the attorney. So I don't know how often this buyer's agent works with a specific attorney, but the attorney was like not happy either that she had not received any communication from the lender. So we finally got to the point where it was like, hey, if you hear something, check in with me. And if I hear something, I'll check in with you. Because we had this recognition of neither one of us were getting any information or communication. That's not cool, right? I didn't even choose the attorney. We allowed the buyer to choose the attorney and you use the same attorney. It was we were trying to keep it easy. So, anyhow, when you're working in this world, even if you're on two sides of the table, you have to have some sort of cohesive joint communication. It is so imperative to making these transactions go well. Because let's rewrite this story, okay? So we get to the point where we have extended once. We, okay, it's April 30th. We're not meeting that deadline because the lender has said, all right, you have to sell this other property first to have your debt-to-income ratio lower. All right. Understandable. Okay, we get that. There's a mortgage on that property, it's adding to the DTI that has to be wiped clean in order for you to be able to afford this mortgage and have it be within your DTI levels. Okay, good. So whenever we are extending, and then all of a sudden things aren't happening, right? When we're 72 hours out and we have heard nothing, simply uh yes, the preliminary numbers have been sent out to the buyer and they've been approved. Yes, the buyer's property is scheduled to close on X date. We didn't even get that. And but that would have eliminated so much thing. So, to our knowledge, that property was supposed to close on that Tuesday that we were supposed to close, right? So come Friday, it's still marked pending online, and the attorney was waiting for funds still. Why? If it closed on Tuesday, why don't you have funds on Friday? So I I asked the agent and I said, Hey, that property that was supposed to close that's contingent to our contract. Has it closed? She was like, I I don't really know. She said it has to have. The lender wasn't gonna let him sign unless it was closed and the Ulta was sent over, so it had to have, but I don't know what day it closed. It's contingent upon your buyer getting this house. Why do you not know what's going on with it? Okay, back up. Don't you think you should have been proactive and been like, hey agent, I need to know exactly when this property is closed. By the way, you need to send me a copy of the Ulta confirming that it has closed and finalized so that I know that my buyer is ready to move on to the next step. Why are we not taking any accountability at all? Versus, okay, the agent that I had the pleasure of actually getting to introduce my clients to their agent in Florida. So finally, when things started getting squirrely, I was like, hey, I'm just gonna put us all in one text message. That way, like when I'm sending an update, you can see exactly what I'm sending to your agent too. Because I know she needs to have the information so that you guys can make wise decisions moving forward. Because we're at a point where every time we have a delay or something is happening, it's now impacting them because they are having to push their closing or figure out when they can close on this next property. So we all need to know exactly what's going on. It would have been just that simple. So why aren't you, even if you had the three realtors, right? The the agent that was selling the houses in the different state, the buyer's agent and me, why weren't we in a chain? Why weren't we being able to say, hey, right, the contingent property is under contract, contingent property is due to close, contingent property has closed. Here's a copy of the Ulta. How hard would that be? How hard would that be? And then we all are receiving the same information at the same time. I just think it can be just that simple. And there is not like I don't know, I I'm not quite sure where everybody gets so caught up on this, right? You're not on my side, I don't have to tell you anything. If you want to work together and get the transaction to the closing table, yeah, you actually do. And there's also like all of these deadlines in the contract that you should be meeting and communicating to the other side that you have met, right? And a lot of that has to do with the loan contingencies and actually applying for the loan and having the contingent approval for the loan, and then having the final approval for the loan and then going to the clear to close, right? There's steps along the way and making sure that they've actually filed for their title insurance and for their homeowner's insurance, like all of those things are very easy mile markers to be like, hey, we've checked the box, we've checked the box, we've checked the box. So, anyhow, don't do that. If you if you are one of the ones that just thinks, hey, I'm supposed to protect my people, yes, yes, you absolutely are, but you protect them by honesty, transparency, and communication. Okay. Now, I don't mean giving away their personal information, I don't mean giving away their negotiation tactics, honesty, transparency, and communication. Throw respect in there too, and that'd be awesome. So, what does that look like in a transaction? Okay, honesty, transparency, and communication. We're under contract, and there's due diligence money to be sent. Okay, that due diligence money is gonna go straight from the buyer to the seller. So when that goes straight from the buyer to the seller, who knows about it? Unless somebody tells us. So I have the buyer's agent. So I say, buyer, it's your job to send $500 to the seller via Venmo. I need you to send me a copy of it in the receipt once you have sent it, right? And then I have a copy of that receipt or the screenshot of the Venmo, and then I fill it out on our page where everybody signs off on it. And I send that to the buyer's agent or to the listing agent saying, Hey, listing agent, here is a copy of the due diligence money, and please have your seller sign off on this page saying that he has received it. Clear communication across the board. Did I give away their information? No. Did I that impact their negotiations? No. Were we honest, transparent, and communicated? Yes. Okay. So what about the loan? We're gonna apply for the loan and then we'll see from there. We have a pre-qualification letter, but haven't done our full application yet. All right, cool. Once I've received that conditional approval back from the lender, don't you think I should pop a message over to the listing agent and be like, hey, listing agent, just want to let you know we have the conditional approval for the loan. We're waiting on the appraisal to come back at this point. We're past inspections, everything is looking good. We should the lender says we should be able to make meet our closing date. Just those little check-ins. Or let's reverse it. We got a hiccup. Hey, we have a conditional approval, but there is another condition to the loan. There's this student loan that is busting the DTI, and that needs to be paid off at closing. Okay. So then I can come to the listing agent and say, hey, we have a conditional approval, but we have to make sure that the buyer has enough money to pay off a previous debt in order to bring their debt to income ratio down enough at closing. So then that might look like, all right, the appraisal comes back in, right? And the appraisal is a little bit higher than what we're under contract for. So we might go back to the listing agent and say, hey, listing agent, you know how I told you we have to pay off this debt at closing. Our appraisal is in and it's healthy. At this point, can we please raise the list price a little bit, raise the concessions a little bit to help with counter off, like counteracting the fees that the belt the buyer's gonna have to pay at closing? So every step of the way, we can have little tidbits, whether it's good, bad, or not, right? And just be open and transparent and honest. Because when we do that and we all have the same information, good or bad, then we're all able to make good decisions, right? So same thing too. Like we're all going to need to check each other sometimes. If something is missing or doesn't seem right, we need to send it over. For instance, in this scenario, I'm gonna have to email again or call or text. My office requires specific forms in our file. I've sent those forms twice now to finalize the the offer, or not the offer, but the contract for our file, and I'm not getting them back. And it's it's simple things. It's just like whenever in Tennessee, at the end of a contract, the buyer needs to sign that they're accepting the property, like they've done a final walkthrough and that it's good to go. And the seller needs to sign a disclosure update saying, Hey, no changes to my house, or yeah, we've discovered andor changed or updated X, Y, and Z, and make sure that all parties sign off of it, that everybody knows all the same information, right? Transparency, trust, and communication. So, what am I supposed to do when the other side just won't provide those items? It gets really tough. So All the way around, all you have to do is just work together with one another. It doesn't mean you're doing something that you're not supposed to just because you're communicating and being respectful and kind to the other side. Doesn't mean that you're giving something away from your client. You don't have to be mean and crash and disrespectful to in order to represent your client well. I would actually say the reverse. When you can be respectful and have a good relationship with the other side, they tend to be willing to do a lot more for you, right? Because what that conversation might look like to me is if there's an agent that is just being awesome on the other side, then I can come to my seller and be like, listen, this agent has had all the conversations, like she's doing all the right things, and they are they are hitting a hiccup. Can we help them out here? Can we make sure that we can come together as a team and get everything accomplished that both sides need to have happened? That's so much easier to say confidently than every time we turn around, something changes and nobody's communicating, and then now there's another ask, yet again, yet again, right? And it's hard because when that scenario happens, I can't control it. And if you know me, that's hard. I if I don't have control over something, it's it's very difficult for me. So to not have control over the fact that I'm gonna get this phone call and it's gonna be like, hey, we're delayed again, hey, something else has happened, and and then I have to convey to my clients, it automatically it just guts me. I feel like my clients are gonna be so upset with me and they're gonna lose confidence in me and they're gonna think that they cannot trust me because I keep changing the bar. So I promise you that just being kind to the other agent on the other side and having that open transparency and communication, it will go so far because not only will that agent be happy with you, but their clients are gonna be happy with the transaction all the way around, and everybody is going to accomplish good things. And once again, if the sellers, let's say the sellers are happy and your buyer has another ask, then your buyer is more than likely going to get the assistance or help they need if possible, because the transaction has been cordial and smooth and professional the whole entire time. Don't discount those things whenever you're in this world. So, anyhow, if I could just say anything, please communicate. Please communicate. Communication is hard and easy all at the same time. And we all know that. We all have different personalities and we're all mixing and meshing together. But for the for the sake of our clients, you need to have your core team. You need to identify your core team within a transaction. And then you all need to communicate together greatly, greatly. And I'm not saying I'm a saint at this. This is something that I do well when I have to, and then when it's not necessary, I kind of just sit back and chill. I could be more proactive. So when I record messages like this, it is absolutely a reminder to me to have better systems in place that are already the checks and balances, right? So that like when I'm going through the processes of the loan, that I am giving the other side those updates all the way across the board, not waiting for there to be an issue and be like, hey, now we've got to fix something. So I hope you know that I love talking through these scenarios, not only because I hope that it helps you or gives you some insight on what's going on in the back end or what we could be fixing or working towards, but it's a really great reminder to me and uh kind of like an audit of my own business, like what I am or am not doing well. So thank you for letting me talk through these scenarios with you and hopefully giving you something to hold on to. And if you ever have questions or want to synergize about this, like what it looks like, or how you could improve this in your own business, then reach out. Let's have a conversation about it. I love to facilitate conversations, I really do. So, anyhow, get on my calendar, let's have a chat, and we'll go from there. I hope you have a wonderful day. Thank you again for checking in and listening to the podcast, and I cannot wait for you to check in again next week. Hey! I just wanted to say thank you for being here and listening in on this episode of Closing Chapters with me. I truly enjoy putting this content together, and I hope that you enjoy it too. If so, could you like, subscribe, and share this episode with somebody you know that will enjoy it just as much as you did? Thank you so much.