N.Y. High Court Upholds Rule Permitting Attorneys to Cancel Home Sales

Lawyers may back out of a home purchase agreement on behalf of their clients for any reason, or for no reason at all, under the "attorney approval contingency" clause common to most residential sales contracts written in upstate New York, the New York Court of Appeals has ruled. Judge Susan Phillips Read wrote for a unanimous court that ruling otherwise would inject doubt in an area of contracts -- the sale of real estate -- where "clarity and predictability are particularly important."