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For Florida Homeowners · Know Who You Signed With
The person who put your house under contract may not be the person buying it — and may not be buying it at all. This explains how the arrangement works, the tactics to expect, and what you can still do about it.
Someone told you they were a cash buyer and had you sign a purchase agreement. In many cases, they have no money and no intention of buying your house. What they bought is the exclusive right to sell it — and they're now shopping your contract to real investors, hoping to find someone who'll pay more than they promised you. The difference between those two numbers is their paycheck. It's called an assignment fee, and it is often larger than what a licensed real estate agent would have charged you in commission.
You likely have more leverage than you've been led to believe. Their contract may be weaker than they've implied, their deposit may be tiny or nonexistent, and if they've recorded a document against your title to pressure you, Florida law gives you a specific claim against them for doing it — including damages, a $2,500 penalty per document, and your attorney's fees. Before you agree to anything else, get an actual real estate attorney to read your contract. Many will look at it for free.
Liriano Law, PLLC handles these wholesaler situations specifically and does not charge for a consultation. If you're under contract and unsure what you signed, this is a free call worth making before you do anything else.
And the honest answer about whether it's legal.
A real estate wholesaler puts your property under contract at a low price, then finds an actual investor to take over that contract before the closing date arrives. They never own your house. They never fund the purchase. They step out of the middle and collect a fee for having tied the property up.
They will call themselves a cash buyer, an investor, an acquisitions manager, or a "we buy houses" company. Functionally, they are doing the job of a real estate agent — finding a buyer for your property — except they are usually unlicensed, are not required to act in your interest, and get paid substantially more than an agent would have.
It is important to understand this clearly, because overstating it will not help you: wholesaling itself is not automatically illegal in Florida. Assigning a contract you personally signed is lawful, and Florida has not passed a statute specifically regulating wholesalers — unlike Tennessee, Maryland, and Connecticut, which have all adopted wholesaler disclosure laws recently.
What crosses the legal line is how many of them operate. Under Fla. Stat. §475.42, brokering real estate for someone else without a license is a third-degree felony. A wholesaler who markets your property — advertising the address, the condition, photos, a price — rather than marketing only their own contractual position, has arguably stepped over that line. And under Fla. Stat. §475.41, a contract to be paid a commission for brokerage services is invalid if the person wasn't licensed when they performed the service. That statute has real teeth if their fee is functionally a commission.
The assignment fee, and the off-market world your listing is circulating in.
Once you sign, the wholesaler owns something valuable: the exclusive contractual right to buy your house at the price you agreed to. They then go looking for someone who will pay more. When they find that person, they assign the contract — the new buyer steps into their shoes, closes at the higher number, and the wholesaler pockets the difference as an assignment fee.
Reported assignment fees in Florida commonly run $8,000–$20,000 in Jacksonville and inland markets, $10,000–$30,000 in Tampa and Orlando, and $15,000–$50,000 or more in Miami-Dade. Compare that against what a licensed listing agent would have charged, and against the fact that the agent would have owed you a fiduciary duty and put your home in front of every buyer on the open market, not a private list.
Your house is not on the MLS and is not being shown to the general public. It's moving through private investor channels — typically some combination of:
Your home is being marketed to a closed pool of investors who all want a discount, instead of to the open market where owner-occupant buyers compete and drive the price up. That structure is not designed to get you the highest price. It is designed to produce a spread the wholesaler can keep.
These are patterns, not coincidences. Recognizing one usually means the others are coming.
The number has to be low enough that there's room for someone else to buy it and still leave the wholesaler a fee. You may be told this reflects repairs, "market conditions," or the convenience of a fast cash close.
You're sent a "proof of deposit," a receipt, or a screenshot showing earnest money was placed. It arrives from the wholesaler's own email, on their own letterhead — not from a title company or attorney.
A genuine all-cash purchase can close in about two weeks. You're instead given a 30-day inspection window, sometimes longer, and possibly extensions on top of it.
In the final days of the inspection period, problems are suddenly "discovered" — the roof, the foundation, code issues — and you're asked to sign an addendum dropping the price, extending the timeline, or both.
You're asked to allow access for a partner, an inspector, a contractor bidding the repairs, or an appraiser. Sometimes several different groups over several visits.
Urgency about signing. Warnings that you'll lose the deal. Suggestions that you're already legally committed and have no choice. Repeated calls and texts. Sometimes claims that backing out will get you sued.
If you try to cancel, go quiet, or sell to someone else, a document appears in your county's public records: a Memorandum of Contract, an Affidavit of Equitable Interest, or a Notice of Interest. Then you're told it will be removed once you pay them, or once you go through with the deal.
What that filing actually is, and the four routes to clearing it.
A memorandum of contract, affidavit of equitable interest, or notice of interest is a short document stating that the filer has a signed contract giving them rights in your property. Once recorded, it becomes part of your property's public record. It doesn't make them an owner — but it makes your title unmarketable in practice, because buyers, lenders, and title insurers will all want it resolved before they'll proceed.
There are four ways out, roughly in order of cost and difficulty:
If the contract has been terminated or has expired, the filer should record a release removing the memorandum. An attorney's demand letter — particularly one that lays out the statutory exposure described below — resolves a meaningful share of these without litigation, because the downside for the wholesaler is significant once it's spelled out.
This is the provision most homeowners have never heard of, and it is the strongest one. Filing a document against someone's property that contains a materially false statement, with intent to defraud or harass, is a third-degree felony in Florida — and second-degree on a repeat offense.
More importantly for you, the statute contains its own civil remedy. Under subsection (8), a person adversely affected by such a filing has a civil cause of action whether or not anyone is ever criminally charged. If intent to defraud or harass is established, the court:
The attorney's-fee provision matters enormously in practice: it is what makes it economically possible to fight back over a filing that would otherwise cost more to litigate than to simply pay off.
A quiet title suit asks a court to declare who actually holds an interest in the property and to remove clouds from the title. Florida's statute expressly allows this even where the adverse claim is void on its face. It clears the record — but note that quiet title by itself gets you a clean title, not money. It's often paired with one of the damages claims above.
Slander of title is the claim for damages flowing from a wrongfully recorded lien or claim — for example, a sale that collapsed or a refinance you lost because the record was clouded.
FDUTPA, the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act, covers unfair and deceptive practices in trade and commerce, and Florida courts apply it to real estate transactions. It allows recovery of actual damages plus mandatory attorney's fees to the prevailing party. It does not allow punitive damages — which is one reason §817.535 is often the stronger vehicle where a false filing is involved.
Pull your property's records from your county Clerk of Court or Official Records search and see exactly what was filed, when, and by whom. Save a copy. Then get it in front of an attorney — the clock and the evidence both matter, and the statutory claims above depend on establishing what the filer knew and intended.
Several of these are routinely misrepresented to homeowners.
A price reduction, deadline extension, or any other change to your contract requires your signature. Refusing is not a breach. The original contract simply stays as written.
An inspection-period demand is a request, not an entitlement. If you decline, the buyer's choice is to proceed on the original terms or cancel — not to force new ones on you.
You can require names, identification, and a reason for any walkthrough — and you can decline visits that are really buyer showings in disguise.
Ask for the escrow agent's name and contact details, then verify directly with the title company using a number you look up independently.
Their answer — or their refusal to answer — is useful evidence later. Keep it in writing, not on a phone call.
At any point. Nothing in your agreement prevents it, and no legitimate buyer objects to it.
Do not simply stop responding or declare the contract void on your own. Even a contract signed under pressure may carry obligations, and a wrongful cancellation can expose you to a claim for damages or specific performance. The right move is to have an attorney evaluate whether the contract is enforceable at all — there are often real weaknesses, from an unfunded deposit to a fee that may be an invalid unlicensed brokerage commission under §475.41 — and then exit on solid ground rather than improvising.
If you're currently under contract and something feels wrong.
"Please confirm in writing: are you the end purchaser of this property, or do you intend to assign this contract to another buyer? Please also provide the name, address, and phone number of the escrow agent holding the deposit, and the date the deposit was received."
"I am not agreeing to any change in price or timeline. I am not signing an addendum. Any further requests should be directed to my attorney."
Free and low-cost options, plus where to report.
Liriano Law, PLLC works with Florida homeowners in exactly these situations and does not charge for the initial consultation. If a document has been recorded against your property, or you're being pressured to sign an addendum, this is the call to make first.
If you believe someone brokered your property without a license, that conduct is reportable to the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR), Division of Real Estate, which enforces Chapter 475. Deceptive practices can also be reported to the Florida Attorney General's Consumer Protection Division. Reporting does not clear your title on its own — pursue the civil remedies in parallel, not instead.
This is general information, not legal advice. It does not create an attorney-client relationship and it cannot account for the specific language of your contract, which controls your situation. Florida law on wholesaling is unsettled and actively evolving — several other states adopted wholesaler disclosure statutes in 2025 and 2026, and Florida may follow. Whether any statute cited here applies to your facts is a judgment only a licensed Florida attorney reviewing your documents can make.
Statutes referenced: Fla. Stat. §475.01 (definitions), §475.41 (contracts of unlicensed persons for commissions invalid), §475.42 (unlicensed brokerage), §817.535 (unlawful filing of false documents against real property), Ch. 65 §65.021 (removing clouds from title), §501.211 (FDUTPA remedies). Compiled August 2026.
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