- Attorney review
- A period (typically five business days) after contract signing when each side's attorney can review, modify, or cancel the deal. Standard in Illinois.
- Appraisal
- The lender's independent estimate of a home's value. If it comes in below the contract price, we negotiate, that's an 'appraisal gap.'
- Cap rate
- An investment property's annual net operating income divided by its price. The quickest way to compare income properties.
- Clear to close
- The lender's final sign-off, underwriting is done and the closing can be scheduled.
- Closing costs
- Fees beyond the price: lender charges, title insurance, attorney fees, transfer taxes, prorations. Roughly 2–5% for buyers.
- CMA
- Comparative Market Analysis, how we price a home, using recent sales of similar nearby properties rather than citywide averages.
- Condo questionnaire
- The form a condo association or its manager fills out for a buyer's lender: reserves, insurance, owner-occupancy, litigation, special assessments, deferred maintenance. The answers decide whether the building is warrantable, so order it the day the offer is signed. Associations usually charge a fee and take a few days.
- Condotel
- A condo building that operates like a hotel: front desk, short stays, units in a rental program. The agencies will not buy loans on them, so financing is portfolio-only with more down. A handful of downtown buildings run this way without the word in their name, which is exactly why the questionnaire matters.
- Contingency
- A condition that must be met for the deal to proceed, commonly financing, inspection, and appraisal. Contingencies protect your earnest money.
- Designated agency / dual agency
- How Illinois handles both sides under one roof: the brokerage names a specific designated agent for each client, so two agents at the same company can represent buyer and seller on the same deal, each owing their duties only to their own client. Dual agency, one agent for both sides, is legal in Illinois only with written consent from everyone, and we treat it as a last resort.
- DTI / debt-to-income
- Monthly debt payments divided by gross monthly income, the ratio underwriting cares about most. Roughly 43 to 50 percent is the ceiling depending on the loan type. Paying down a card before applying often moves it more than people expect.
- Earnest money
- The good-faith deposit accompanying an offer, held in escrow and credited at closing.
- Escrow
- Neutral third-party holding of funds or documents until conditions are met, your earnest money lives in escrow.
- Greystone
- Chicago's signature limestone-faced rowhouses and flats, built roughly 1890–1930, the building on our logo.
- Homeowner exemption
- The Cook County deduction that lowers the taxable value of a primary residence. Apply after closing and it renews on its own. Buyers of a former rental should recheck the numbers: the old bill may reflect no exemption, or one that will not apply to them, so the real tax bill can differ from the listing's.
- HOA / assessments
- Monthly fees in condo buildings covering shared expenses. We review the association's budget and minutes before you buy.
- LTV / loan-to-value
- The loan amount as a percentage of the price or appraised value, whichever is lower. It drives the rate and whether mortgage insurance applies; 80 percent is the classic PMI line.
- Net sheet
- A seller's bottom line on one page: sale price minus loan payoff, commissions, transfer taxes, attorney fee, and prorations. We hand sellers one before they list and update it with every offer, so the decision is always about the real number.
- Non-warrantable condo
- Also called unwarrantable: a condo building that fails Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac eligibility rules, so lenders cannot sell its loans to the agencies. Standard conventional financing gets hard, buyers need a portfolio lender, usually with more down and a higher rate, and the pool of possible buyers shrinks. Common triggers: thin reserves, major deferred maintenance or a structural special assessment, certain litigation, hotel-style short-term rentals, one owner holding too many units, heavy assessment delinquency, or too much commercial space. The rules tightened in 2026: the limited review shortcut retired that August, and from January 2027 associations must budget 15 percent of assessment income to reserves, up from 10. The agencies also keep a list of buildings they will not lend in at all. The building answers a condo questionnaire and the lender makes the call, so on any condo deal, have the lender vet the building the same day the offer is written.
- Paid assessment letter
- The association's closing letter confirming the seller is current on assessments and flagging any specials. Required to close a condo sale in Illinois; the attorneys order it alongside the 22.1 disclosure.
- PIN / Property Index Number
- The 14-digit Cook County ID for every parcel of land. Tax bills, exemptions, appeals, and recordings all run on it, and it is the first thing we pull on any property, because the PIN's history tells you things a listing will not.
- PMI
- Private mortgage insurance, required on most conventional loans with under 20% down; drops off once you reach ~20% equity.
- Points / discount points
- Prepaid interest: one point costs 1 percent of the loan amount at closing and buys the rate down. Worth it only if you keep the loan past the break-even month, which is arithmetic we run with the lender rather than guess at.
- Pre-approval
- A lender's conditional commitment based on verified finances, much stronger than a 'pre-qualification,' which is just an estimate.
- Rate lock
- The lender freezing a rate for a set window, usually 30 to 60 days, once you are under contract. Until then the daily rate headlines are noise. Some lenders offer a float-down if rates drop before closing; ask what it costs before you lock.
- Reserves / reserve study
- The association's savings for big repairs, funded as a line in the annual budget, and the reserve study is the engineer's report on what is coming due and when. Lenders check the budget line: 10 percent of assessment income has been the floor, moving to 15 percent in January 2027, and thin reserves are the single most common reason a vintage Chicago building trips warrantability.
- Right of first refusal
- A right some associations keep to step in on a unit sale at the contract price within a set window. Rarely exercised, but it must be cleared in writing before closing, and the attorneys handle the waiver as part of the condo paperwork.
- Special assessment
- A one-time charge on top of regular assessments when a project outruns the reserves: roof, elevators, facade, porches. The 22.1 disclosure shows any passed or contemplated specials, and an active structural special can make a building non-warrantable while it runs, which is a financing problem as much as a cost problem.
- Tax proration
- The closing credit that reconciles Illinois's paid-in-arrears property taxes between buyer and seller.
- Title insurance
- One-time policy protecting your ownership against defects in the property's history, liens, forgeries, missed heirs.
- Triennial reassessment
- Cook County reassesses every property on a three-year rotation: the City of Chicago one year, the north suburbs the next, the south suburbs the third. Reassessment years are when tax bills jump, and they are also the moment to appeal, a deadline we track for clients.
- Two-flat / three-flat
- Chicago's classic small multi-unit buildings, live in one unit, rent the others. A time-honored path to building equity.
- 22.1 disclosure
- The Illinois condo document package sellers provide: budget, reserves, meeting minutes, and any pending special assessments.
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