Buying A Home
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Inspection Advice? (for buyers)
You all are insanely helpful and knowledgeable. DH and I have our inspection on the home we're buying (so far as things are okay) on Thursday.
Any tips/hints/things you wish you'd known/asked?
Our inspector comes highly recommended by a number of people in our area, provides a spiral bound document and goes over everything with you. Nonetheless, I thought I'd reach out to fellow Nesties and see what y'all have to say.
Thanks!
"what doesn't bend, breaks" - ani
Re: Inspection Advice? (for buyers)
Be there during the inspection! I was there but my FI was stuck at work, I learned so much, but had a hard time explaining everything to FI. It'd help if both of you are there.
I also went through the house and wrote down a list of my own before the inspector came. I showed the list to the inspector and asked him to also check them out. This may seem annoying, but I like to be on top of things.
Be sure to go outside too, walk around the surrounding. I wish we did that, granted there was snow on the ground, but we missed a mess by the septic tank, lots of exposed pipes, some werent being used anymore and there was a tressel by it that needed to be filled.
Taste the water, run everything (bath, shower, sinks, etc) to see if they all work and see how the pressure is. Try every outlet if possible. We wish we did that, sometimes the inspector can test them with a device, but we discovered an area In the house where none of the outlets work after we moved in!
One more suggestion, look closely for water damage. We overlooked a small spot in the ceiling and discovered a water leak 2 weeks after we moved in from the rain.
Good luck! Inspectors are supposed to find problems, don't freak out!
Yep. Check to see if your inspector has good BBB ratings and if he/she is certified with ASHI.
Also, it's their job to list off every single little problem they find and you will be amazed how detailed they get. Don't freak out. Lots of stuff is pretty minor. What you need to focus on are the big ticket things that are unsafe or very costly.
Your goal, in the end, should be to have the major issues discovered and to have a plan for how to present them to the sellers so the sellers feel amiable in resolving them. If you present a "to-do" laundry list to them with every minor issue an inspector reveals, they will be less likely to acquiesce on your big ticket things.
It's also nice to hire an inspector who provides photos in their report. "Proof" of a problem.
Our first home was new construction. We paid $500 for our inspector and he discovered missing flashing on the roof and a major drainage issue in the backyard. He saved us big bucks. The builder had to make the repairs/changes prior to us accepting the home.
We just went through our second inspection Friday on a home we are under contract on. Paid $420. The inspector discovered that there is probably a crack in the furnace case and that it is about ready to leak carbon monoxide (he is receommending that we have a heating person come out to verify his findings). Plus, a few other pretty decent issues. So, he saved us big bucks AND our lives.
Don't ever let anyone tell you that it isn't worth it to do a home inspection!!!!!
Great post. We are about to go through this with our next house, probably this week sometime.
The only experience I have as a buyer with a home inspection was a disaster. We were young (we bought in 2003) and our realtor was shady and said we didn't even have to be at the inspection, don't worry about it. I wish we would have known better than to just go along with her because within a week of moving in we found out that our central ac unit, fridge, and dishwasher were broken, and within a year our water heater broke and our furnace had a crack in the heat exchanger (and our home warranty did not cover any of it). None of the sinks/toilets had shut off valves and MIL broke a part in the toilet when we were cleaning and moving in and we had to shut our water off for 2 days until someone could come and fix it. None of the outlets were grounded and half of them didn't work. Two of the bathroom sinks were super slow to drain... I could go on and on.
Live and learn! We now know that we are going and examining every miniscule detail of the house, and we plan to go through our home as well with a fine toothed comb to make sure nothing comes up in our own inspection (which is tomorrow).
I agree that you should for sure be at the inspection, and also have the inspector point out any issues. For example, we had a small grading issue that made no sense when he told me about it, but when he took me outside and showed me and drew a diagram for me, I understood what it was.
There will be at least a couple of things wrong with the house, so don't freak out. Our inspector said that the house we are buying was extremely well built, but he still found a couple of things to note. Nothing that was a huge cost thankfully.
If you are considering doing any projects to the house, or have any concerns, speak up. I told our inspector about a project H was wanting to do, and he pointed out a problem we might encounter that neither of us would have thought of. It will save us time and money now, because we know how to do it the right way.
Thank you so much everyone! Great tips! Some stuff I'd thought of, others were totally new to me.
Our inspector said he'd be at the house about a 1/2 hour before we'd get there. But now I am thinking I will leave work early so as to be there when he arrives.
The outlet suggestion is great! I also need to turn the oven on - I checked the cooktop but not the oven.
Thanks again everyone!