What are the pros and cons of selling a house on land contract?

Ms. MD: What are the pros and cons of selling a house on land contract?
I had my house up for sale for a year and I could not sell it. I had several potential buyers but most were unable to get financed to buy. We are moving out of state and can only afford to make the payments on this house for about 3 more months. I have had several people ask about selling on land contract but I don’t know too much about it and I’ve been told that I should avoid selling on land contract. Can anyone please give me some pros and cons to selling on land contract? Thank you!

Answers and Views:

Answer by Mr Placid
Pros: Your house gets sold.

Cons:
1. You don’t get a lump sum payment, but rather a series of monthly payments.
2. The mortgage is still in your name, so you are still legally responsible for the payments. Not an issue as long as your buyer continues making the land contract payments to you, but becomes a problem if the buyer flakes out.
3. If the buyer flakes out on the payments, you will need to sue in court to recover possession of the property and enforce your rights.

Essentially, the cons are the same as for being a landlord — no problems as long as you have reliable tenants, but headaches as soon as you get a flaky tenant.