I would wait it out a bit. After the first of the year send another message expressing your concerns about wrapping up the deal...

Tell them if they don't respond (After giving them the holiday buffer) that you won't be returning their money. That should light a fire under them. =Þ

If they have already wired you a deposit + some additional, my first thought is that they are in the middle of some unexpected emergency that has become their sole priority at the moment.

Buyers flaking out after making a verbal commitment but before any funds change hands happens all the time, but for someone to go "dark" AFTER parting with some of their money suggests there may be some significant extenuating circumstances. (I know for me, there's no way in hell I'm parting with ANY of my money until I am 100% certain of the purchase!)

If it were me, I think I'd try to tactfully reach out. I would frame my questions in the most nonthreatening way possible, remind the buyer that you are good to go whenever they want to make final arrangements and pay the remaining balance owed, and try to approach the communication from a position of concern that "everything is ok" on their end.

I definitely DON'T think this is one of those situations where you would want to get aggressive, accusatory, or put forth any ultimatums (you might be kicking a man who is already down - the LAST thing I'd want to do to someone, personally). The fact that you have been paid (some) is probably a good indication that this is less likely to be a scam or any other malignant behavior, so (if you can) I'd give the benefit of the doubt on this one and wait a while longer to hear back before declaring the deal "dead" and looking for another buyer.

I had a buyer send me 25% deposit and then ghost me for 2 weeks straight.

It turned out that he was working 16 hour shifts for 7 days per week to rectify some natural disaster that I was totally unaware of. He went to another state and left behind his home cell, so he had zero ways to communicate with me.

Wait it out.

I can't imagine someone can't respond to a text for 5 days even if traveling or he'd have given you a heads up prior to leaving. All that's left is hospital, jail, dead or unimaginably flaky...IDK how else to take it. I'm assuming you have a fairly large sum of his $ already so I'd wait it out, but that's just me.

It's very odd for money to change hands and then have a buyer disappear, but it happens and does happen for any number of reasons. Some people are just not very good at communicating. A simple message saying they're busy and will reach out later would be enough to do something with, but it's hard to work with complete silence since you have nothing to go on.

At some point you may have to consider that you're missing out on other potential buyers while you're waiting on this AWOL buyer. Are you in a hurry to sell?

I'd say give it a few days, send a final message that you're moving along if you don't hear back, then relist or sell to the next person in line a couple days after that.

I can see someone going dark, especially if they live in KY or are in the ICU with Covid
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Perhaps the buyer had a close family member experience a tragedy of some kind.
Covid is everywhere and you really never know when something bad might happen that might not even be related to Covid.

Yeah my point was that something horrible may have happened (it's unlikely that someone couldn't respond to a text just because they are traveling) and to wait it out. Sorry if I didn't convey that

My thoughts exactly. Considering the state of the world at the moment, this would be the least surprising scenario.

You have the game and the money....your good........Joey

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Ugh. Sucks to be an infrastructure worker. That's the kind of hours our techs were pulling after this last hurricane in Louisiana.

I once had a guy 3 states over buy a tractor from me...he sent $5400 as payment in full, right away. Then...he went dark. The tractor sat for weeks and weeks. No reply to emails. I eventually tracked him down on the phone (I had to search his number) and asked what's the deal...? He said he'd been busy and was sorry he'd been putting it off. Said he'd have it picked up the next day...next day, a dedicated hotshot truck showed up and hauled it off. Clearly....money was not an issue for him.