Real estate guidance where the difference is clear.

Of all the moving parts in a purchase contract, the one that makes buyers most nervous is the earnest money. They agree to a number, they send the funds, and then they spend weeks quietly wondering whether they just handed over money they will never see again. After eighteen years around closing tables in this part of Ohio, I can tell you that worry is understandable and almost always unnecessary, as long as you know what the money is doing.

It is a deposit, not a fee

Earnest money is a good-faith deposit. It tells the seller you are serious enough about the house to put something behind your signature. It does not go to me, and it does not go into the seller's pocket. It sits in an escrow or trust account held by a neutral third party, usually the title company or the listing brokerage, and nobody touches it without authorization.

At closing it comes back to you as a credit toward your down payment and closing costs, right there as a line item on your settlement statement. In a transaction that goes the way it is supposed to, you never lose that money. You simply spend it on the house.

Your contingencies are the protection

The contract gives you specific windows to do your homework: a period to inspect the house, a period to get your loan and appraisal squared away, often a window to review the title work. If something inside one of those windows gives you reason to walk, and you give written notice before the deadline, your deposit is returned. That is the entire purpose of a contingency.

The part people underestimate is that those deadlines are real dates. The most common way I see a buyer get into trouble is not losing an argument with a seller. It is letting an inspection deadline quietly pass while they are still thinking things over. Put the dates on your calendar the day you go under contract, and tell me early if you are waiting on something, because an extension asked for in advance is usually a simple conversation.

When the money is genuinely at risk

A deposit is on the line when a buyer walks away for a reason the contract does not cover, or after the protections have already expired. Cold feet in week four. Deciding you would rather have the other house. Financing a vehicle or opening a new credit line that undoes your loan approval after the financing contingency has run out.

Even then, the funds do not automatically become the seller's. In most cases both parties have to sign a release before escrow can pay anyone, and a disagreement can leave the money sitting in limbo for a long while. That is an unpleasant place to be, and the way to avoid it is to not get there.

One habit worth keeping

Send the funds exactly as the contract specifies, on time, and keep the receipt. Verify wire instructions by calling a number you looked up yourself, never one that arrived in an email. Wire fraud is real, and it tends to find people during the busiest week of their transaction.

If you are getting ready to write an offer in Beavercreek, Centerville, Springboro, Bellbrook, or anywhere else around the valley, I am glad to walk the contract with you line by line before you sign it. No obligation either way. Call or text 937-470-6169, or email tony.jollay@glasshouserealty.com. — Tony Jollay, Glasshouse Realty

Closing is the part of a move people picture least clearly and worry about most. They imagine a long table, a stack of paper taller than it needs to be, and some last-minute surprise that undoes everything. In eighteen years I have sat through a lot of them, and the truth is less dramatic. By the time you get to the title office, the hard work is behind you. Here is what the day looks like and what actually matters.

The week before matters more than the day itself

Most closing-day problems are really the week-before problems nobody caught. Your lender will send final numbers ahead of time, and you should read them, not skim them. If something looks different from what you were told earlier, ask before you are sitting at the table. Your funds need to be wired or brought as a cashier's check, and wiring instructions should be confirmed by phone with a number you looked up yourself, never a number from an email. Wire fraud in real estate is real, and that one phone call is the best protection there is.

You will also do a final walkthrough, usually a day or two before. This is not a second inspection. You are checking that the house is empty, that what was supposed to stay is still there, that agreed repairs were done, and that nothing broke since you last saw it. Turn on the furnace, run a few faucets, flip the lights. Ten minutes well spent.

At the table

Bring your photo ID. If you are buying, you will sign the loan documents and the deed paperwork; if you are selling, your part is shorter, often fifteen or twenty minutes. The closer walks you through each document and tells you what it is. You are allowed to slow down and ask. Nobody at that table is in a rush, and a question you ask out loud is far cheaper than one you swallow.

Sellers, keep every garage door opener, mailbox key, spare house key, and appliance manual together in one spot and hand them over. Buyers, ask who to call about the trash pickup schedule and where the water shutoff is. Small things, but you will want them that first week.

When you actually get the keys

Signing and funding are two different moments. Once the lender releases funds and the deed records, the house is yours and the keys change hands. Sometimes that is within the hour; sometimes a late-afternoon closing means recording happens the next morning. I always tell clients not to schedule the moving truck for the same hour as the signing. Give yourself a cushion so a normal delay does not turn into a bad afternoon.

That is really it. A good closing is a quiet one, and a quiet closing is the product of steady preparation in the weeks leading up to it.

If you have a closing coming up and want someone to look over the numbers with you, or you are just starting to think about buying or selling around Dayton, call me at 937-470-6169 or email tony.jollay@glasshouserealty.com. Happy to talk it through, no obligation. — Tony Jollay, Glasshouse Realty

Every winter I get calls from homeowners dealing with a problem that started as something small in October. A clogged gutter turns into a wet basement. A furnace that was "running a little loud" quits on the coldest night of the year. None of it is dramatic, and almost all of it is avoidable. Here is the short list I walk through on my own house each fall, and the one I suggest to clients whether they plan to sell next spring or stay for twenty years.

Water is the enemy, so start outside

Once the leaves are mostly down, clean the gutters and run a hose through the downspouts to make sure they drain. Check that each downspout empties several feet away from the foundation, not right against it. Walk the perimeter of the house and look at the grading. Soil should slope away from the walls. If water has been pooling near the foundation, fall is the time to fix it, before freeze and thaw cycles go to work on it.

Disconnect garden hoses and shut off the inside valve to outdoor spigots if your house has one. A frozen hose bib is one of the most common and most frustrating repairs I see come up on inspection reports.

Get the furnace looked at before you need it

Change the furnace filter and schedule a service visit while the HVAC companies still have open calendars. Once the first real cold snap hits, everyone calls at once. Test your smoke and carbon monoxide detectors while you are at it, and replace batteries. If your home has a gas furnace, water heater, or fireplace, a working CO detector on every level is not optional in my book.

Seal up the small gaps

Look at the caulk around windows and exterior doors and at the weatherstripping on entry doors. If you can see daylight under a door or feel a draft, that is money leaving the house all winter. These are cheap, weekend-sized fixes. While you are up high, glance at the roof from the ground with a pair of binoculars and note any missing or lifted shingles so a roofer can deal with them before snow sits on them.

If you are thinking about selling in the spring

Keep a simple folder of what you do this fall: the furnace service receipt, the date you replaced the detectors, any roof or gutter work. Buyers and their inspectors notice a house that has clearly been cared for, and having the paperwork ready makes those conversations easy. It also means fewer surprises on the inspection report, which is where deals tend to get tense.

If you want a second set of eyes on anything around your house, or you are starting to think about what it would take to get it ready for market, give me a call at 937-470-6169 or email tony.jollay@glasshouserealty.com. No pressure, just a conversation. — Tony Jollay, Glasshouse Realty

Every few weeks someone asks me some version of the same question: is this a good time to buy, or should I wait? The honest answer usually depends more on your own situation than on the market. But the latest numbers from Dayton REALTORS® are worth walking through, because they describe a market that has quietly become easier to work in than it was a year ago.

Both sides of the market got busier

In July, 1,537 homes sold across the Miami Valley, up 5.85% from the 1,452 that sold in July of last year. Through the first seven months of 2026, sales are running 4.12% ahead of the same stretch in 2025.

What I find more interesting is the inventory number. There were 2,817 active listings at the end of July, compared with 2,357 a year earlier — an increase of roughly 20%. More sellers listed, and more buyers still bought. Both sides showed up.

Prices are rising, but gently

The median sale price came in at $275,000, up 1.85% from a year ago. The average sale price was $312,609, up 2.69%.

Those are modest increases, and I'd argue that's healthy. The frantic double-digit jumps we saw a few years back were hard on buyers and produced a lot of appraisal problems. Low single-digit growth means sellers are still building equity while buyers aren't being asked to stretch beyond what a house will actually appraise for.

What this means if you're buying

Twenty percent more listings is real breathing room. A year ago I was telling buyers to be ready to see a house the day it hit and decide that evening. That's less often true now. You have more to compare, and more room to include an inspection contingency without automatically losing to someone who waived theirs.

But "more inventory" is a regional average, not a promise about your price range. Well-kept three-bedroom homes in the $250,000 to $350,000 range across Beavercreek, Centerville, Bellbrook, and Springboro still move quickly, because that's where the most buyers are competing. The added supply shows up unevenly.

What this means if you're selling

The supply at the end of July represented about a 1.8-month supply at July's sales pace. Anything under roughly six months is generally considered a seller's market, so 1.8 is still firmly in your favor.

What has changed is that buyers have alternatives. A year ago a slightly overpriced house might still draw offers because nothing else was available. Now it sits while a better-priced one down the street sells. Pricing right in the first two weeks matters more than it did.

These are Miami Valley figures overall. If you want to know what's happening on your specific street in Beavercreek, Bellbrook, Centerville, Washington Township, Springboro, Waynesville, or Kettering, call me at 937-470-6169 and I'll pull the comparable sales for your neighborhood. No cost, no obligation.

Source: Dayton REALTORS® Miami Valley housing statistics, July 2026.

Of all the steps in buying a house, the inspection is the one that makes people most nervous. You've found the home, your offer was accepted, and now a stranger is going to spend three hours looking for reasons it might be a mistake. I understand the anxiety. But after eighteen years of standing in basements with clients, I can tell you the inspection is usually the most useful few hours of the whole transaction.

What the inspector is actually doing

A general inspector examines the systems that make a house work: roof, foundation, framing, electrical, plumbing, heating and cooling, water heater, drainage, windows, and the visible structure. They test what they can reach and see. They do not open walls, dig up the yard, or predict the future. It's a snapshot of condition on that day, not a warranty.

You should be there. Not for the whole thing necessarily, but show up for the last hour. A good inspector will walk you through what they found and show you where the shutoffs are, how the furnace filter comes out, which breaker runs what. That tour alone is worth the fee.

The report will be long. That's normal.

Expect forty pages and a lot of photos with red arrows. Every house generates findings, including new construction. The skill is separating the three categories: things that are genuinely expensive or dangerous, things that will need attention in a few years, and things that are simply how houses age.

What I take seriously: structural movement, roof at the end of its life, aluminum wiring or an unsafe panel, water intrusion, a failing sewer line, and anything involving the furnace's heat exchanger. What I don't lose sleep over: a missing outlet cover, a sticky window, a downspout that needs redirecting, or the inspector's standard recommendation that you "consult a qualified professional" about every third item.

What to do with what you find

You generally have three options: ask the seller to repair, ask for a credit toward closing costs, or accept it and move on. In most cases I'd rather negotiate a credit than a repair. When a seller fixes something under time pressure, they hire the cheapest option available. When you take the money, you choose the contractor and you see the work.

The mistake I see most often is treating the inspection as a second round of price negotiation over minor items. Sellers dig in, goodwill evaporates, and buyers occasionally lose a house they loved over eight hundred dollars. Ask for what genuinely matters. Let the small stuff go.

Buying in the Dayton area and want a second opinion on an inspection report? Send it over — happy to look, no obligation.