Home Inspections – Cheap Peace of Mind

July 10, 2004 Posted In Buyers Real Estate Agents

Everyone wants a smooth transaction when buying or selling a Las Vegas home. Often as not, sellers and seller’s agents prefer not to have home inspections.

The reasoning behind this is obvious but flawed. The truth is generally speaking the sellers don’t want to know about any “unknown” defects and do not want a record of any defects they are aware of. While the law is clear about disclosing any “know” defects, sellers sometimes hope defects are not noticed by the buyers and the sell goes through without making any additional repairs.

Licensing laws for agents are very clear about full disclosure so many Agents take the position that what they don’t know can’t hurt them and are generally elated when a buyer waives their right to a home inspection.

Unfortunately, this does and has opened the doors for litigation against both seller and their agent by the buyers. Like any other law suit, there is a 50/50 chance that the seller and agent can use the waiver to win in court. However, I feel you never win in court and the best practice is to make all efforts to avoid being there in the first place.

I have a personal policy of strongly encouraging both buyers and sellers to have a Home Inspection prior to closing on a property. I do this for everyone’s protection including my own. It doesn’t matter if I am representing the buyer or the seller, I will urge all parties to get a Home Inspection Report.

Most defects will not stop the sell of a home. The sellers have the option of;
a) Repairing the defect.
b) Paying a portion of the repairs to the defect.
c) Renegotiating or lowering the selling price of the home.
d) Finding another buyer that will accept the seller’s preferred conditions to making the necessary repairs.

The condition of almost any defect will only worsen with time and become more expensive to repair. Defects that might cost a couple of hundred dollars to repair today could cost thousands in a couple of months. Problems such as leaking roofs or plumbing don’t go away, they just get worse and so does the repair bills for the damage to the home.

I have seen sellers that honestly did not know about defects in their homes be put through the ringer months after they thought the sell of their home went well and was final.

A home inspection could have easily missed this defect as well; however, if a home inspection had taken place, there would have been virtually no liability against the seller or their agent.

Often, a Home Owner Warranty policy will NOT pay for some repairs claiming them to be “pre-existing”. Once again, the Home Inspection would have circumvented this, and proved that the condition was NOT “pre-existing”.

With the cost of a Home Inspection report averaging only $300 nationwide, it is one of the cheapest and best ways to avoid trouble down the road for buyers, sellers and real estate agents alike. And the peace of mind a Home Inspection Report offers in a real estate transaction…“Priceless”.

-Mack