Buying A Foreclosed Home...Have It Inspected

The other day the Charlotte Observer wrote a front page headline grabbing article about home foreclosures making up almost half of all sales in the Charlotte area. One of the things when you purchase a foreclosure is you are buying the home in " as is" condition. this means what you see is what you get. The bank does not have to disclose any information about the house that is not a material fact. They have never lived in the house. So, chances are they do not know if the electrical system is good, plumbing has leaks, roof has been patched or the house is infested with termites. Some items you may know and see effects of when looking at the house. Others you will not notice with the naked eye. That is why I thoroughly recommend a home inspection on ALL homes.

The general practice is for the banks to give you a 7 to 10 day window from contract acceptance to have the house inspected and decide if you want to follow through on the purchase of the house. This is the time period to have all the inspections and items checked out. I hear a lot of buyers tell me "I am buying the house in the present condition it is in, what does it matter if I have it inspected ro not? It matters. A home si the single largest investment you will make in your lifetime. A good home inspector will notice the little things and things you and I do not notice by going into crawl spaces, into attic and up on roofs.

You will want to know what is wrong with the house before you buy it. Those are added expenses you need to factor in when you purchase a house. Those small repairs are things the bank is not going to fix for you prior to closing on the house. You want to ensure that the cost and the extent of repairs is not so great as to be out of your budget for expected repairs to the house.

I recently had one, where when we looked at the house, it looked to be in good condition. The repairs seemed to be cosmetic in nature. After a home inspection it was discovered through the crawl space that the house had been infested with termites at one time. Though the previous homeowner treated the infestation properly, the band sill throughout the whole house had weakened to the point it needed to be repaired. The cost of that repair was outside of the expected expenses the buyer had anticipated when purchasing the house. Thus, eventhough the home was a good deal on paper; the cost to make the home liveable and safe exceeded the amount of money the buyer had or was willing to spend on the home. Without a home inspection, they would have never knew this to be true. They would have closed on the house and potentially been faced with a large, expensive repair sooner than anticipated that they did not have the money for.

So, bank sales may be sold "as is" but you need to still do your diligence in regards to inspections to ensure you are getting what you see and not what you do not see. That is why banks give you that period of time to have the home inspected....If we do not see it, chances are the eyes for the bank did not either.

Dave diCecco
Realtor/Broker
www.davedicecco.com