If buyers and sellers wait until the last Friday at the end of the month to close, they may have to wait for title companies and lenders who are swamped with other homeowner paperwork, increasing the chance that a mistake will be made. Try to pick an odd day of the week, maybe the middle of the week, when everyone is not as rushed

In order to close the transaction, the buyer’s (or seller’s) real estate attorney will likely order a title report and conduct a title analysis and it would have to be cleared before the transaction could close.

Appraised amounts less than the contracted price can create problems that delay or eventually terminate the transaction. To increase the odds of getting an accurate report, hiring an experienced appraiser who is familiar with the neighborhood is the best.

A few days before any scheduled closing, mortgage lenders are likely to recheck the information borrowers provided to qualify for the home loan. Borrowers who have made a recent expensive purchase could alter their financial picture to such a degree that it puts the loan in jeopardy or this could cause a delay in the closing while the borrower tries to come up with extra funds or searches for another mortgage.