Real Estate Attorney?

Yes, Real Estate Attorney's can help you. There are some things the can do and some things they cannot do.

Attorney's can write the contract for you. A Real Estate attorney has experience in writing and negotiating contracts. The contract a Real Estate attorney will prepare will be legally binding. The contract will most probably consider all of the things that a contract on a real estate transaction will require. They will not leave anything out.

The attorney does have to represent one party or the other. That means while you may want to have an attorney prepare a contract to the mutual understanding of the parties, there will be one party, the party who brings the attorney the deal, who may very well benefit from doing so. It may be a slight issue. It might be a major issue disguised as a minor issue. But in either case, the other party beware!

In addition, a Real Estate Attorney has the legal authority to actually close a transaction. While in " title states" (Florida is a "title state") a real estate closing is usually done at a title company.

One thing an attorney cannot help with is valuation. I have seen deals where attorney's put in there opinion of what a property is worth, and end up losing the deal for the buyer client. Also, in preparing a market price, attorneys have no access to MLS, a lockbox key, or other ways to help you with valuation.

In addition, attorney's generally are not known for marketing skills, and usually have had absolutely zero training in marketing.

So, yes, an attorney can be helpful to a FSBO seller. An attorney can be helpful to a For Sale By Owner Buyer. Do yourself a favor and know when it works best, for whom, and what specifically they will do.