Watch out for furlough days at your county recorder’s office

You cannot buy a home in the State of Washington if the county recorder’s office is closed, since your deed needs to be recorded there to make the transaction official. Rhonda Porter reminded me of this in her blog today. If you are looking to close a real estate transaction in King, Snohomish or Pierce county, you need to be aware of both public holidays and furlough dates. Due to budget cuts, these county offices are closed during various days of the year.

If you are planning to close on a home purchase or sale around these dates, you will want to make sure that your mortgage and real estate professionals stay on top of things and get your paperwork completed early. The upcoming July 4 holiday is particularly problematic in King County, since you have July 3 as a holiday and July 6 as a furlough day. Let’s say you are slated to close on your new home on July 2, so you would probably be scheduled to sign your documents on July 1. It is all too common that lenders need a “couple of extra days” at the end of the process, or sometimes your lender happens to miss the wire deadlines because the loan review took too long. A simply delay like this on July 1 would cause your closing to slip until July 7. With your movers scheduled during the extended weekend, you can imagine the hassle that a last minute delay like this will cause.

Here are the furlough and holiday closure dates to watch out for during the remainder of 2009: