Are there homes that you need to avoid? Well… let’s put it this way… there are homes that you need to take extra care with, if you intend to go through with a purchase.
I am referring to homes that have certain deficiencies that have an undetermined cost to fix. In many cases, major challenges are not major after all, once you investigate and see the extent of the issue. That is good news! However, if you see mold, a flipped house, foundation challenges and a particularly old home – these are the four categories of homes that (very generally) you need to take extra care with before finalizing the paperwork. You won’t know the full extent of a given fix until an expert (or perhaps two or three) take a look at the issue. Watch out for water seepage, lead pipes or lead paint, hidden mold, extraordinary settling and unsafe electrical wiring. Any of these may be worse than you’re able to see at first glance.
George Poporad is a real estate agent in Cleveland, Ohio and he has alerted me to these four issues. He is right in that any problem can be corrected and in many, many cases, it’s worth it to you to bring in the fix; however, you need to know if the fix is a $2000 spend, $20,000 or a $2M solution. There are buyers in this town that can easily put their hands on $2M over and above the purchase price to install a fix. If that’s not you, make sure you do your homework when you run into older homes, mold, flipped homes and structural deficiencies. This is why you buy an inspection!
Check out George’s video… it’s worth the few minutes if you are shopping for a new home.
What do you think? Any horror stories or … the opposite.. you were pleasantly surprised that …what may have been a horror was much ado about nothing?
