Deals Gone Bad are More Interesting

My buddy Alan who is also my competitor sends me a junk house that he was getting on contract for $12.500
I sent the address and a photo to a few of my buyers and holy crap, they were all over it like a pack of termites on a Douglas Fir Support beam. After a few days Alan still hadn't got the thing wrapped up.
My buyers were slobbering all over themselves and the offers were up to 34K
Finally Alan gets the seller pinned down but says now the price is $16,500 and he sends me the contract. I see who the seller is and that's when I freak, I know this guy. He's a wholesaler, a total flake and a liar and a cheat and that's his good points.
I send my assignment to my favorite buyer for 32K and he Immediately starts escrow. I got the 34K offer soon after.
Knowing who the seller was I had doubts this deal would ever happen but still I was blinded by dollar signs.
The ink still hadn't dried on the contract and I get an email from the seller telling me about a property he had for sale for 22K and guess what? It's the same friking address. The idiot didn't know Alan and I were partnering on it.
I asked him "What about the signed legal Binding contract you have with Alan for $16,500? He replies oh we will null that contract. I then asked him so you want me to pay 6K more for this deal and screw my partner?
He was apologizing and saying he intended to go thru with the deal but was just getting back up offers. He went on and on about how he was also sorry about our previous dealings and said once escrow starts he never backs out. I was cautiously re assured.
However, I couldn't shake that feeling in the pit of my gut that this deal was going south.
2 days later the Escrow girl calls and says the seller called and was backing out of the deal cuz he didn't want to sell after all, cuz his family member wanted it.
Holy mother of all real estate deals, we were just getting comfortable and counting the money, my buyer was ****ed, Alan and I met and we were in disbelief. But I had warned him about this guy.
The buyer was having the Title girl file a memorandum and told her to continue with the escrow. He claimed he would force this deal to go thru cuz he had plenty of money and would sue this idiot back into the stone age.
Then after the preliminary Title search comes back we find out that over 30K is owed on back taxes and city liens for clean up etc. Now nobody wants it. We are happy to give it back to this useless sorry ass seller.
We lost a little time, didn't make any money but for the entertainment value, it's priceless.
Someday we might even be able to laugh about it.
On to some real deals.
Let's make some money.....
Rando