Home Inspections

We recommend that any home that is purchased go through a home inspection with a professional inspector. The cost is approximately $400 and given the cost of your investment, this is a small sum. There may be extra costs involved for additional inspections that we will discuss at the end.

A professional inspection takes about three hours depending on the size of the home. Multifamilies take longer and cost more because there are at least two "properties" to inspect. The inspector will look at the home from top to bottom, inside and out, and especially focus on the major aspects of the home: structural, mechanical, and electrical. He will also teach you about the workings of the home so you understand how to maintain your future home.

The inspector will tell you how old the roof, the furnace, and the windows are (approximately) and tell you when you might anticipate replacing those items. He will test appliances and flush toilets while running the water in the sink to see if the water pressure diminishes.

The building inspection is not designed to find small issues to use as renegotiation. It is designed to find major defects which the home owner might not know even exist. It is also designed to find safety issues such as ungrounded outlets, no GFCI outlets in the kitchen, bathroom, basement or garage.

At a recent inspection where we were representing the seller, the inspection showed a loose electrical receptacle. We thought this was a loose outlet that was not seated properly in the outlet opening. When the electrician came to repair it, he could not find a problem. The outlet was properly installed. We called the agent only to find out they were referring to the outlet cover. The screws were loose. A butter knife... a screwdriver.. or a long fingernail could have secured the screws in the outlet plate. The inspection is not designed to focus on issues like this.

Have inspections caused deals to fall through? Yes. Sometimes the issues are great and the seller is unwilling to address them or to give a concession on the sales price. We had an inspection where the furnace was at the end of its life and to replace it when it died would cost nearly $8,000. The seller said the furnace was currently in good working condition. The inspector said it could stop working at any time -- and there was only one plumbing company that worked on these particular boilers. The buyers wanted a concession. The seller said no. The contract was terminated and the sellers eventually found another buyer.

More often though, there are small repairs that need to be made and the buyer and seller find a way to make the deal work. Buyers want to buy and sellers want to sell. It is our job to find a way to bring parties together in a win-win arrangement. That is our goal and that is out usual outcome.

What other inspections need to take place? We usually recommend a radon test. Check out this link from the epa site http://www.epa.gov/radon/pubs/hmbyguid.html

If the house is on a well, we recommend water testing for potability. Rural development loans require several water tests. http://healthvermont.gov/enviro/ph_lab/water_test.aspx

If the house is on a septic system, we recommend that the system is pumped and shown to be in satisfactory condition. This is not a test that a home inspector does but can be done separately by a local septic company. http://www.epa.gov/owm/septic/pubs/homeowner_guide_long.pdf