To fill out the Wisconsin WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase, work through the form section by section: enter the buyers’ and sellers’ full legal names and the property’s legal description, write the price and earnest money in both words and figures, mark what stays with the house and what does not, complete the financing and inspection contingencies with real numbers and deadlines, and set the three dates that control the transaction — binding acceptance, closing, and occupancy. The form is published by the Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services, and once every buyer and seller has signed the same copy and a signed copy is delivered back to the buyer, it becomes a binding contract.1Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase
Where to Get the Form
Download the WB-11 from the Department of Safety and Professional Services forms library, or get a copy through any licensed Wisconsin real estate agent.2Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. Real Estate Contractual Forms Library It’s designed to be filled in by a licensed agent on behalf of the buyer, but a buyer working without an agent can complete it independently. Wisconsin law requires every real estate contract to identify the parties, identify the land, describe the interest being conveyed, and be signed by all parties and delivered, so the WB-11 is built to check each of those boxes.3Wisconsin State Legislature. Wisconsin Code 706.02 – Formal Requisites
Names, Address, and Legal Description
The top of the form asks for the full legal names of every buyer and seller. Use the names exactly as they appear on legal identification. Mismatches between the offer and the deed can delay closing.
Enter the street address, municipality, and county. Below the address, the form requires the property’s legal description. A street address alone is not enough for a Wisconsin real estate contract. The legal description is typically a lot-and-block reference for platted subdivisions or a metes-and-bounds description for rural parcels. Copy it from the most recent deed, county tax records, or the title commitment your lender orders. If you are unsure of the exact wording, pull it from the county register of deeds rather than guessing.
Purchase Price and Earnest Money
Write the total purchase price on the designated lines in both words and numbers. Then specify the earnest money deposit. The amount is negotiable; deposits in most Wisconsin transactions fall between one and five percent of the purchase price depending on local market norms.
The brokerage firm holding the earnest money must deposit it into a real estate trust account within 48 hours of receiving it. If the funds arrive the day before a holiday or bank closure, the firm has until the next two business days. Interest earned on the pooled trust account belongs to the Wisconsin Department of Administration — the firm cannot keep it.4Wisconsin State Legislature. Wisconsin Administrative Code Chapter REEB 18 – Trust Accounts If the deal collapses and the parties cannot agree on how to split the earnest money, the firm may deduct up to $250 in costs and attorney fees before disbursing what remains.1Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase
What Stays With the House and What Doesn’t
The WB-11 draws a firm line between fixtures, which stay with the property, and personal property, which the seller takes. The form defines a fixture as any item physically attached to or closely associated with the land or building. Ceiling fans, garage door openers, built-in appliances, in-ground sprinkler systems, water heaters, and window blinds all qualify. All fixtures present on the date of the offer are automatically included in the sale unless you specifically exclude them on lines 20–23.1Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase
If you want something that isn’t a fixture, such as a freestanding refrigerator, a portable shed, or patio furniture, write it onto lines 12–16 as an additional included item. If the seller plans to remove a fixture, like a family heirloom chandelier, list it as excluded. The form warns that its own terms, not the listing sheet or marketing materials, control what stays and what goes. Skipping this section is where move-day disputes start.
Financing Contingency
If you’re buying with a mortgage, fill in the loan type, the minimum loan amount, the minimum term in years, and the maximum monthly payment of principal and interest you are willing to accept. For a fixed-rate loan, enter the maximum annual interest rate. For an adjustable-rate loan, enter the maximum initial rate, how long the initial rate is fixed, and the caps on rate adjustments. The defaults printed on the form are two percentage points for the first adjustment, one point for each later adjustment, and six points over the life of the loan.1Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase
Fill in a deadline for delivering a written loan commitment to the seller, measured in days after acceptance. If you qualify for the loan described in the offer and accept the commitment, you satisfy the contingency by delivering a signed copy (or a copy accompanied by your written direction for delivery) to the seller. If you miss the deadline, the seller gains the right to terminate the offer by written notice, but only if that notice reaches you before you deliver the commitment. Timing matters here: a seller who waits even a day too long could find the buyer has delivered a commitment in the interim.
Inspection Contingency and the Right to Cure
The inspection section lets you hire a Wisconsin-registered or licensed home inspector to evaluate the property after acceptance. You can list additional components for separate inspection, such as a swimming pool, roof, foundation, or chimney. The buyer pays for all inspections.
The default window for delivering inspection results and a written Notice of Defects to the seller is 15 days after acceptance. If you leave the blank empty, 15 days is what you get. A “defect” under the form means a condition that would significantly hurt the property’s value, impair health or safety, or shorten the normal life of the home if not fixed.5Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase
The form asks you to choose whether the seller has a right to cure defects. If neither option is stricken, the default is that the seller does have that right. When a buyer sends a Notice of Defects and the seller has the right to cure, the seller can elect to cure all listed defects, elect to cure only the items that meet the form’s definition of a defect, or terminate the offer by declining to cure.6Wisconsin REALTORS Association. Inspection Contingency Flowchart Revisited The seller’s default response window is 10 days after receiving the Notice of Defects, and any repairs must be completed in a workmanlike manner with a written report delivered to the buyer at least three days before closing.
If the seller does not have the right to cure and the buyer delivers a valid Notice of Defects, the offer is automatically void. This is a strategic choice. Buyers who want maximum leverage to walk away over any defect should strike the seller’s right to cure. Sellers who want a chance to save the deal should keep it.
Radon
A separate contingency covers radon. Testing must follow EPA and Wisconsin Department of Health Services protocols, and the threshold is an average radon level below 4.0 picoCuries per liter. The buyer has 20 days after acceptance (the default if left blank) to deliver a written copy of results at or above 4.0 pCi/L along with a written objection. The same right-to-cure framework applies. If the seller has the right to cure, the seller can elect to install a mitigation system. If not, a high reading voids the offer.
Appraisal Contingency
If you check the appraisal contingency, the offer is contingent on a Wisconsin-licensed or certified appraiser valuing the property at or above the purchase price. When the appraisal comes in low, deliver a copy of the report and a written objection to the seller within the number of days you filled in on the form.
With a right to cure (again the default if neither option is stricken), the seller can save the deal by agreeing within five days to lower the purchase price to the appraised value. Both parties then sign a WB-40 Amendment to reflect the adjusted price. Without a right to cure, a low appraisal and a timely objection void the offer, and the buyer gets the earnest money back.1Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase
The Three Dates That Control the Timeline
Three fields set the tempo of the transaction:
- Binding acceptance deadline. The offer is binding only if a copy of the accepted offer is delivered to the buyer on or before this date. Until that delivery happens, the buyer can withdraw the offer at any time. If the deadline passes without delivery, the offer expires.1Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-11 Residential Offer to Purchase
- Closing date. When the deed transfers and money changes hands. If it falls on a weekend or state or federal holiday, closing moves automatically to the next business day.
- Occupancy date. When the buyer takes physical possession. It can match closing or come later if the seller needs time to move out.
Every contingency deadline in the form counts forward from “acceptance,” which the WB-11 defines as the moment all buyers and sellers have signed the same copy (or identical copies) of the offer. Binding acceptance is a separate event: it occurs when the signed copy is actually delivered to the buyer. That distinction trips people up. The contract is formed at delivery, not at signing.
The Seller’s Real Estate Condition Report
Wisconsin law requires most residential sellers to provide a Real Estate Condition Report within 10 days after the offer is accepted. The report covers structural issues, environmental hazards, boundary disputes, and roughly two dozen other categories. If the seller does not deliver it within those 10 days, the buyer can rescind the contract within two business days after the deadline passes and recover all deposits.7Wisconsin State Legislature. Wisconsin Code 709.03 – Real Estate Condition Report Not every seller is subject to this requirement: personal representatives, trustees, conservators, and court-appointed fiduciaries who have never lived in the property are exempt, so estate and trust sales commonly arrive without a report.8Wisconsin State Legislature. Wisconsin Code 709.01 – Applicability
Delivering the Signed Offer
The WB-11 specifies five authorized methods for delivering documents and written notices. Unless the offer states otherwise, delivery is effective only through one of these:
- Personal delivery to any named buyer or seller, or their designated recipient.
- Fax to the number listed on the form.
- Commercial delivery service, fees prepaid, addressed to the party or their recipient.
- U.S. Mail, postage prepaid, addressed to the party or their recipient.
- Email to the address listed on the form.
Wisconsin law recognizes electronic signatures and electronic records as legally equivalent to their paper counterparts, so an offer signed and delivered electronically is enforceable.9Wisconsin State Legislature. Wisconsin Code 137.15 – Legal Recognition of Electronic Records, Electronic Signatures, and Electronic Contracts In practice, most agents use electronic signature platforms and email delivery. The moment the signed offer reaches the seller (or the seller’s agent) through an authorized method, the binding acceptance clock starts running.
Counter-Offers and Amendments
A seller who wants to change the terms uses a WB-44 Counter-Offer. Its opening language explicitly rejects the buyer’s original offer and proposes new terms.10Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-44 Counter-Offer The original offer is dead once the counter is issued. The buyer can accept the counter, reject it, or issue a counter of their own. This continues until someone accepts without changes or walks away.
After binding acceptance, any changes require a WB-40 Amendment to Offer to Purchase. Both parties must sign it, and a copy of the accepted amendment must be delivered to the party who proposed it before the deadline stated on the form. Either party can withdraw a proposed amendment before that delivery occurs.11Wisconsin Department of Safety and Professional Services. WB-40 Amendment to Offer to Purchase All other terms of the original offer remain unchanged unless the amendment specifically modifies them.
Why the Contingency Sections Carry the Weight
The WB-11 includes default provisions on both sides. If the buyer backs out without a valid contingency, the seller can either keep the earnest money as liquidated damages or sue for actual damages, but not both. If the seller defaults, the buyer can sue for specific performance (a court order forcing the sale) or terminate the offer, recover the earnest money, and sue for actual damages.
That is why the contingency fields are the most important part of the form to complete carefully. A buyer who waives all contingencies and then gets cold feet has no contractual exit and faces losing the full deposit. A seller who accepts and then tries to back out because a higher offer arrived could be ordered by a court to sell at the original price. Fill in real numbers, real deadlines, and think through the right-to-cure choices before you sign.