IMO if you had not memorialized the agreement on personal property and the repairs, you go back to the original contract. They "sound" like 2 separate issues - but if I had agreed to leave some personal property (outside the sales agreement) and then the buyers acted like asses and "changed their minds" after the repair agreements (verbal), I would likely do the same with the personal property.

Sorry you are going through this. I truly dislike dishonesty - and I'd file their behavior under that category.

If it was only an oral agreement and the addendums hadn't been signed by both parties, it's still a negotiation.

You have a live one. You are pretty far along in the process. Make another attempt to resolve the issue. You may have to give a little to address their concern. If that doesn't work, terminate the agreement and move on.

It's important to separate yourself from any emotions. That's much harder to do than said. Believe me when I say I just went through this process. Emotion is why you hire an agent in the first place.

In the end, it's usually easier to work with the buyer than to try to find another buyer. Of course, there are always exceptions.

I actually don't feel emotionally invested at this point. The buyer and I negotiated. I agreed to all their requests. Then they thought about it over night and decided that they wanted to squeeze some more money out of me. At this point I have rescinded my previous offer and have not heard from them since.

I had agreed to repairs that I had not been able to verify because they decided that even though they had an extra long due diligence period they put off the inspections until the last possible minute. Also, stating that they may possibly have more requests after due diligence because they won't get the reports back in time.

The sticking point, besides them wanting more money - even though I offered them several hundred dollars above and beyond the cost of repair - is that I asked for the repair to be completed after closing. The reason being is they seem to be extremely unreasonable people and I have the feeling that no matter what they would have additional demands/complaints.

At this point I actually hope they back out.

Also, I can't terminate without returning their due diligence fee.

Where is your realtor in all this? She should be there advocating for you and advising you. All these negotiations might have gone more smoothly if done realtor to realtor. No personalities involved and they must continue to work together in the same community.

There's not a lot of "good faith" out there these days! But you have a buyer and you might well sit on this house for a long enough time to lose more than you are giving. People like this are more than annoying, but as others have said, this is a business transaction, not a personal one, and one must not let emotions rule.

To answer your original question... it depends.

Generally, to be enforceable contracts for real property must be in writing. However, if you made an oral agreement for personal property contingent on, but not part of, the home purchase then technically that is a separate contract.

If someone agrees to pay one amount for both things it is part of the consideration for the home, however, if they agree to pay x amount for the furniture if they buy the house, then that is a separate contract and technically doesn't have to be in writing.

Now whether or not they will enforce it is another thing. Generally banks like for you to make any deals for personal property outside of the mortgage but if their is room in the appraisal or you don't need full bank financing then sometimes those things get added in anyway.

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The only way the sale will go through at this point is if the buyers stick to the original contract and force me to go through with the sale.

Since they reneged on a mutual agreement, does that invalidate any agreement previously agreed upon in good faith regarding personal property that wasn't written into the contract.

A counter-offer is a rejection of the offer and you are generally not obligated to accept a previous offer. Having said that, real estate has some special rules and so you need to check with someone familiar with your state's rules. To protect the process inspection contingencies many states consider the negotiation of the inspection contingency to happen inside of the contract and therefore is not a rejection.

One more point to the excellent posts above: you said that some of the inspection reports were late. I assume you mean beyond the stated inspection period in the contract. This part is easy. The inspection period gives the buyer the right to negotiate the repairs or cancel. However, if the reports come after the inspection period, you are under no obligation to renegotiate and they lose their right to cancel without losing their EMD. At least it is that way in the real estate contracts in my state. Not having seen your contract, I don't know for certain. The point is, unless you extended the inspection period in writing with both the buyer and the seller signing off on the change, it doesn't matter if the reports come in late. You are under no obligation to accommodate the buyers' request at this point. Those dates in the contract mean something. Stand firm if you are willing to lose these buyers. IME, some buyers have to have the boundaries drawn with a firm "No" or they keep pushing until they get one.

Interesting that they want you to do the repairs. As buyer in my last contract, I insisted on a credit and doing the repairs myself. While I took some risk in my credit being too small to pay for repairs, I am in control of the repair process. I can be assured that the repairs are to my standard.

Denita is correct when she says "Stand firm if you are willing to lose these buyers.".