Answers · Buying & Selling Land
What contingencies belong in a land purchase contract?
Five contingencies cover most land deals: clear title, financing, water rights verification, access confirmation, and an inspection or environmental review period. Each needs a specific deadline and a specific remedy — usually the return of earnest money — or it protects nothing.
Title and survey come first: the contract should let you exit if the title commitment shows liens, easements, or exceptions you did not expect, and if a survey reveals boundary or acreage problems. On price-per-acre deals, include an acreage adjustment clause so the price moves with the surveyed acres.
Water deserves its own contingency in the West, not a line inside "inspection." Give yourself time to verify the water right's status with the state, confirm the well permit, and get a pump test. A financing contingency should name a deadline for loan approval; in competitive situations, buyers with a lender's term sheet in hand can shorten or waive it — which is a real edge.
Resist contingency bloat. A contract with ten escape hatches reads as a weak offer, and sellers discount it accordingly. Fewer, sharper contingencies with short deadlines protect you and still compete.
The Turnrow angle
A Turnrow term sheet in 24–48 hours lets you write a short financing contingency — or none — without betting your deposit on a bank's timeline.
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