closing time..

Nothing makes you feel more like a used up prostitute than when you close on a house.    Now maybe 5 years ago when people were selling their houses for twice what they paid a few years ago things were different but all I know is that now  the net profit can hardly buy you lunch.   The closing goes something like this.

You sit down in a conference room across from the buyers, both parties have a stack of papers high enough to reach the 2^nd floor of your duplex, you proceed to give yourself the worst carpal tunnel syndrome ever with all the bullshit signing.    I honestly feel like Reggie Jackson at a baseball-card signing.

Say you have a sales price of $200,000 after buying your place for $182,000 and you think you will walk away with $18,000 which would be about 10% of your cost price and you are jumping for joy but then you realize there are closing costs and they are the equivalent of an ass-rape.

First they bang you with a 5% broker's fee   

Then they bang you with a 1% flip-tax for your building 

Then they ream you with a 1% city tax   

They they slam you with a 0.4% state tax 

Then there are a couple of random fees  (filing fee, UC fee, title transfer fee, Bank fee, Lien search fee).


Then the lawyers get a hold of you and mind you there are about 10 of them.. Your attorney, the bank attorney, the building attorney, their attorney, the attorney's attorney.

Then they charge you for the UPS charge, the photocopying, the cup of coffee you had while waiting for everybody to show up and there goes your profit.. just like that it has all disappeared into thin air.

it goes something like this

Gross Profit	$18,000
Broker Fee  5%	$10,000
Flip Tax  1%	$2,000
City Tax  1%	$2,000
State Tax  0.4%	$800
UC Filing Fee	$100
Bank filing Fee	$100
Lien Search Fee	$100
Attorney	$1,500
Bank Attorney	$500
Building Attorney	$500
Some chick to drop off a check	$300
Random crap	$98
	$17,998
Net Profit	$2

So when they give you a check you look down and realize the subway cost $2.25 and you think you might have been better off staying home