Texas's promulgated financing addendum -- TREC No. 40-11, Third Party Financing Addendum (effective 11-04-2024, replacing TREC No. 40-10) -- puts a hard deadline on the buyer's financing contingency in Paragraph 2A. If that deadline passes and the buyer hasn't sent anything, the contract doesn't die. It does the opposite: the financing contingency disappears and the buyer is treated as if the loan came through.
The default is silence = waiver, not silence = termination
Paragraph 2A's exact language: if the buyer doesn't terminate within the negotiated number of days after the Effective Date, the contract shall no longer be subject to the Buyer obtaining Buyer Approval, and Buyer Approval will be deemed to have been obtained when (i) the terms of the loan(s) described above are available and (ii) lender determines that Buyer has satisfied all of lender's requirements related to Buyer's assets, income and credit history. Paragraph 2 also states plainly: Time is of the essence for this paragraph and strict compliance with the time for performance is required.
In plain terms: a missed deadline with no notice from anyone -- buyer, lender, or agent -- locks the buyer into the deal on financing grounds. The lender's silence doesn't extend anything, and nobody is contractually required to remind the buyer the clock is running.
What notice actually requires
To use the financing exit before the deadline, the buyer must deliver two things to the seller, not one: (i) notice of termination, and (ii) a copy of a written statement from the lender setting forth the reason(s) for the lender's determination. A phone call from the loan officer, or an email saying still working on it, doesn't satisfy Paragraph 2A -- the lender has to have actually made a determination and put a reason in writing. If the deadline hits while the loan is still in process, the buyer generally has nothing to attach to a termination notice, which is exactly the trap this question describes.
Same rule applies to Property Approval -- different deadline
Paragraph 2B (Property Approval -- appraisal, insurability, lender-required repairs) works the same way but on its own fixed clock: on or before the 3rd day before the Closing Date, not a negotiated number of days. If the buyer doesn't terminate under 2B by then, Property Approval is deemed to have been obtained. Same structure: silence favors the seller, and the 3-day window doesn't move even if the appraisal hasn't come back yet.
Earnest money exposure once the deadline passes
Once Buyer Approval and/or Property Approval is deemed obtained, the buyer no longer has a financing-based reason to terminate without risking earnest money. If the buyer later can't close because the loan actually falls through, the seller can typically pursue the remedies in the underlying contract (Paragraph 15 of the TREC 1-4 family) for buyer default -- this addendum's protection has already expired. The FHA/VA appraisal protection in Paragraph 4 is a separate, narrower carve-out that survives independently and isn't affected by a missed Paragraph 2A/2B deadline.