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.
Let's talk about inspections!
So..my post from last night apparently disappeared when the format change took place. So here's a recap. We made our first ever offer yesterday, and they called back today with their counter. It was more than reasonable, and everything they said was expected and the counter price was well within our acceptable range.
So..we jumped on it! Now I'm thinking about inspections to have. It's on a private well with a septic tank and we're using VA financing. The septic tank is brand new and was just replaced in January. I have the final county inspection from the construction in hand already.
Here is what I'm thinking for inspections so far. What am I missing?
- General house inspection
- Well inspection
- Pest inspection
- Lot survey
- Potentially separate septic inspection just to confirm counties findings
- Water tests
Anything else? I think this part was more stressful than waiting on the offer to come back!
ETA: We are also obviously doing a Title Search as well.
Re: Let's talk about inspections!
Looks like you have a pretty good list going!
Your General Home Inspector will often include recommendations of other inspections to obtain based on his findings. The average home inspection is usually several hours long, and will include the attic(s), crawlspace(s), etc. Ask your home inspector what he recommends -- they will be able to point you in the right direction.
Congrats on your first offer!
Thanks!
Part of me thinks maybe I'm going overboard, but at the same time I want to make sure we're covered.
I'll second this. We just had a radon inspection, and the radon level came back slightly elevated. The sellers are handling remediation.
Diagnosed with "unexplained infertility" 1/11
IUIs #1
Having an additional septic inspection might be going a little overboard where the tank is new and you have a county inspection, but if it makes you feel better about your decision then go for it.
I'm curious as to why you didn't make your contract subject to these inspections in the first place though?
I mean, you can have whatever inspections you want, but if they weren't put in the contract, then it doesn't give you any legal recourse to back away from the deal if they come back unsatisfactory.
Thanks for your input. I was thinking it may be a little overboard to go do a separate county inspection as well, but wanted to make sure.
As far as putting them into our contract, we did. We wrote in a 10 day due diligence period and we have the ability to terminate the contract for any reason during that period, inspection related or not. That way we had the flexibility to do additional inspections after the initial inspection if we wanted to.
I see.
I don't know that you'll be able to get a survey done in less than 10 days but you can try. You might be able to get a mortgage inspection survey done in that time, it will be a very general survey, and will note deeded easements and obvious encroachments. Many times one will be ordered by either the title insurance company or the mortgage company anyway as a part of their own processes, so you'll want to ask.
FWIW The typical inspections that people ask for are radon, water quality, and general building. Pest inspections are more common in some parts of the country than others. It's always a good idea to ask that the septic tank be pumped prior to closing, but where yours is brand new it's unnecessary.
Thanks!
We had the same thought about the time frame, and our agent assured us we would be fine. Sure enough, once I started calling inspectors they are readily available, and the latest I needed to wait was Friday. Perhaps it's just the way it's done in this part of the country.
We have the general inspection, pest, and water/well lined up and ready to go. The county had a recent survey from when they did the septic so I was able to get all of that easily. I still need to schedule the radon though.
I think the title search is going to take longer, but we have a secondary financial contingency for that.
Thanks! When I called our general inspector, I made it a point to ask him specifically what he could/couldn't do with septic tanks. We were really fortunate when it came to the lot survey. The county had everything on file from when they did the septic so we could copy that.