Buying from a developer: the questions to ask before you sign

The model apartment is lit exactly right. There's a smell of coffee, a sofa in a colour you'd never choose that somehow looks perfect, and a balcony with a rendered sunset. Then, quietly, almost in passing: "Just so you know, two other couples are interested in this floor. And this price holds until the end of the week."

You walk out equally excited and confused. In the car, you try to reconstruct exactly what was said about the payment schedule, and can't. And the conclusion arrives too fast: "We just don't understand this. We're not property people."

From there, the familiar paths: trust the salesperson, look for "reassurance" in a buyers' Facebook group, or postpone again and again because it all feels too big.

Part of you wants a home and doesn't want to miss this one. Another part is afraid to ask. "If we ask about guarantees, they'll think we're not serious. If we ask about linkage again, we'll sound stupid." Staying quiet in the room protects you from embarrassment, and that is an entirely human wish. Its price is a very large decision made without answers.

The developer's sales office: why that room makes asking hard

A sales office is a place where it is far easier to get excited than to ask. Renderings, lighting, a price with an expiry date and a line about other couples all create a sense of short time and something that might run out. Research on decision-making describes the same pattern again and again: under time pressure and a sense of scarcity, people consider fewer options and lean harder on shortcuts. It happens to everyone, including people who work in property every day. The confusion in the car isn't proof of ignorance. It's what those conditions do to anyone's judgement.

So the answer isn't to become experts. The answer is to ask the same questions any buyer can ask, and to get the answers in writing. A list that walks into the room with you does what is hard to do in the middle of excitement: it remembers for you.

The aim for the next meeting is simple: walk in with a page of questions and walk out with written answers. Without signing that day, without feeling embarrassed to ask, and without giving up the apartment you liked. Excitement is allowed. It just doesn't sign on its own.

Off-plan apartment questions, topic by topic

This article doesn't say whether to buy, from which developer, or when. It gives you the questions. The answers, and the decision, are yours.

Money: the payment schedule and linkage

• What is the full payment schedule: how much, and on what date does each payment leave your account?
• Which part of the price is linked to the construction input index (madad tsumot habniya, מדד תשומות הבנייה), and from which base index? (The full explanation is in the construction input index.)
• If there's a financing deal or a deferred payment: what exactly does the contract say about it? Is it linked? What happens if the mortgage you're approved for differs from the one you planned?
• What else leaves your account around the deal that isn't on the developer's schedule: purchase tax, your lawyer's fee, and a contribution to the developer's legal costs, if one is charged?

Every answer here becomes a line in a plan. A payment with a date is a payment you can save towards.

And there's one question you don't ask in the sales office but at home, at the kitchen table: how do these payments meet your month? A large payment eighteen months from now isn't a problem when you know about it today. It becomes one when you discover it a month before. So next to every date in the schedule, write where the money will come from: existing savings, monthly deposits or a mortgage, and check the mortgage's timing with the bank before you sign. That's how the schedule stops being the developer's document and becomes the household's plan.

In AlphaHome: in the savings plan, enter each payment from the developer's schedule as a one-off future expense with its date. The app works out the monthly deposit required and warns you when the plan won't reach its target.

Specification: what's included and what costs extra

• What does the technical specification include, and can you have it in writing before signing?
• Is there a price list for upgrades and changes, and what does it cover?
• If you give up an item in the spec, what do you get in return?

Security: what protects the money you've paid

• What security do you receive for each payment, and exactly when?
• Who issues it, and how is it handed to you?
• Which account do the payments go to, and are they made with the project's payment vouchers?

A 1974 Israeli law on the sale of new apartments exists to protect the money buyers of a new apartment pay before delivery. How it applies to your contract, and what exactly the security you receive says, is checked by a lawyer acting for you. General information for buyers is published by Kol Zchut and by the Ministry of Construction and Housing.

Time: delivery and delay

• What delivery date does the contract state?
• What does the contract say about late delivery, and what counts as late?

One last question, for yourselves

• Did every answer here come in writing, and did everything that didn't go to the lawyer?

The page that walks into the sales office with you

• The full payment schedule, with a date for every payment
• Which part is linked to the construction input index, and from which base
• What the contract says about the financing deal or deferred payment
• The technical specification in writing, and the upgrades price list
• What security we get for each payment, and when
• The delivery date, and what the contract says about delay
• Anything not answered in writing goes to our lawyer

0 of 7 done

When the room pushes

What to do with that sentence

The salesperson says two other couples are interested and the price holds until Thursday. What do you do?

Pick the answer closest to yours. There is no wrong one.

Sign today so it doesn't slip awayAsk for the offer in writing, with its dateLeave without asking anything

"This price only holds until the end of the week." Today's step is already above: the offer in writing. For next time, a house rule agreed before you walk in: "We don't sign on the same day."

An important question gets "That's standard, everyone signs it." Write "not answered in writing" next to the question, without arguing. It isn't a bad answer; it just isn't an answer yet. It goes to the lawyer, which is their job. Choosing one has an article of its own.

You've fallen for the apartment. That's perfectly fine; it's why you came. Loving the apartment survives a week of checks. What doesn't always survive is your memory of what was said in the room, which is why it gets written down. Today, write one line at the top of the page, before the questions, about what you loved. The excitement gets a place of its own, and the questions don't have to compete with it.

After the meeting, at the table

Walk in without a page and you'll walk out with the same feeling as last time: excitement, confusion, and questions that only surface in the car. That isn't a lack of knowledge. It's what a room full of renderings and good lighting does to anyone.

What changes it is one page, one house rule, and a lawyer who receives everything left open. The questions won't turn you into property people, and they don't need to. They only make sure the big decision is made at a table, against written answers, rather than in a well-lit room. After the purchase, the apartment goes onto the properties page with its purchase price and joins the household's net-worth picture.

And the next time someone mentions two other couples, you can smile, take out the page, and ask the next question.

Before the next meeting: copy the list of questions onto a page or a note on your phone, and in the meeting write down next to each one the answer and the name of whoever gave it.