March 29, 2008Lynnsy Logue, The Real Estate Lady and CondoCanDo in Charlotte, NCInspections and How Situations Change…Real Estate is like the ocean…probably more volatile because our life forms are humans. So we have the predators, the bottom fish, big fish and really big mammals, and little fish, plankton and seaweed. And the Dolphins. But we are different because we are shape shifters…what looks like a Dolphin person may well be a hungry shark. The test is when we get into unknown waters.The “we” represents the brokers and the buyer and the seller. The unknown waters is sometimes the time for inspections. Because even though the inspectors are licensed and have a governing agency, they are not all alike. Just like “we” are not all alike.Hire three different inspectors and you will have three different reports. 1. They are not all written in the same format. 2. Some are more descriptive than others 3. Some are lacking.4. Some come with color pictures of the troubled spots.5. Inspectors are human,too. Sometimes they miss something.Recently, I had a buyer who liked a house that had been under contract, inspections had been done, repairs were underway. The buyer backed out.We liked the house and wanted to make an offer. The seller said fine, but I am not making anymore repairs. We said, we’ll have it inspected again, have our repair guy look at everything and if all is true, we’ll proceed without further ado. We asked for the previous inspection and for the repair list so our guys could see what had been done.The first inspector was lacking in his report. He reported items that do not require reporting, cosmetic items. He didn’t catch the live hanging wires under the kitchen, he didn’t check the water heater and the list goes on. The sellers repair guy just showed up and did a few things and not well and charged a lot. Our inspector was thorough beyond belief. Comparing the two inspection reports was like day and night. Our repair guy made his list and checked the other’s work. Disparity. And the final straw is in the next podcast because what my handyman and I found in the crawl space was a huge problem that we both “felt” and explored.So what’s my point. If you hire an inspector, look at a sample of their work, check their credentials and make a list of items you and/or your broker have specific questions about and ask him to address them in his report. Give him/her a written list. And for the handyman, even I have been fooled by the smooth talker. The guy I like the best always shows up on time, always sends me a written estimate line by line, always thinks ahead of me and has great ideas, always tries to save money if he can without loosing quality and his prices are always fair. I found him through another broker. Good source.
Coming up…Permits and County Inspections
Lynnsy Logue, The Real Estate Lady and CondoCanDo, Charlotte, NC
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