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What Happens at My Real Estate Closing?

Mockaitis Law Group LLC Aug. 6, 2019

Now that you have bought your new Illinois home, the only step remaining before you can move in is your closing. If this is the first time you have purchased a home, however, you likely have numerous questions about this event and what takes place at it.

The Home Buying Institute explains that your real estate closing marks the final step in your home buying process. It represents the meeting where you receive legal title to your home from the person who previously owned it.

Steps During Closing

Your real estate closing follows a reasonably structured series of events as follows:

  • First, you likely will be required to sign various legal documents that your escrow agent will give you.

  • Then you will present your escrow agent with a cashier’s check that will pay your closing costs.

  • Following this, your escrow agent will receive a second check, this time from your mortgage lender, representing the amount of your mortgage loan.

  • Thereafter, the seller will receive a check from the escrow agent representing the sale proceeds portion to which (s)he is entitled.

  • Once (s)he receives this check, (s)he will sign the warranty deed to your new home, plus give you a set of keys if you do not already have a set.

  • Finally, the representative from your title insurance company likely will take the warranty deed into his or her possession for the purpose of getting it recorded in the office of the county Recorder of Deeds before mailing or otherwise getting it back to you.

Closing Costs

You may not have realized it, but during your escrow period, the time between your making a purchase offer and the time of your closing, numerous people and/or organizations worked on your behalf to ensure that the sale went through. Most of them charge fees for their services, and this is what your closing costs represent. Closing costs usually run somewhere around 3% of the amount of your mortgage.

If you remember, your mortgage lender probably gave you a Good Faith Estimate of the amount of your closing costs shortly after you made your purchase offer. Later (s)he gave you a HUD-1 Settlement Statement listing each of your closing costs and the amount thereof. The total represents the amount of the cashier’s check you will need to get from your bank so as to give it to your escrow agent during your closing.

This is general educational information and not intended to provide legal advice.