Often, the Virginia REALTORS^® Legal Team gets questions about adding additional language to our contract. Sometimes agents or brokers find themselves needing additional language to meet their client’s needs. Perhaps it is an appraisal contingency. Sometimes back-up offer contingencies. Or others, such as escalation clauses, 1031 exchanges, as-is inspection, pass-fail inspections, and many more.

Standard language may, in fact, exist! There is no need to do the dreaded task of writing your own. Or worse, copy a previous one and attempt to modify it to suit the current situation. Where can you find this language?

Look no further than the Standard Clause Booklet. It should be found in your standard forms provider, or at least available for download and use there. If not, it can be found in the Virginia REALTORS^® Standard Forms Library, available for download at any time.

You can copy and paste these clauses to your contract as part of other terms, an amendment, or an addendum.

What if you don’t see the term or clause you need there? Please feel free to submit a suggestion by emailing forms@virginiarealtors.org. The suggestion will be reviewed by the Standard Forms Committee and, if approved, it will find itself in the Standard Clause Booklet for use.