Is hiding the smell of urine odor a non disclosure issue? (edit/delete)
In today's market the smell of cat urine, dog urine & pet urine is the last thing you want to contend with when selling a home. So, what do you do when you smell pet odor? We all know about the obvious things......carpet cleaning, deodorizers, ozone machines, scented candles, plug-in air fresheners and don't forget the baked cookies and remember to open all the doors & windows before the prospective buyer arrive.
If you really think about it this single act of covering up pet urine odor could be a double edge sword that could come back to bite you, the prospective home buyer and the home seller. I have seen it happen more times than I care to count. I will later provide testimonies from some of my clients personal experiences so they can read about what they felt when they purchased a home that was staged to keep the pet urine odor issues from being noticed at the time they were prospective home buyers. I will also provide some testimony from clients that were home sellers and had to foot the bill for damages that the prospective home buyers demanded to be repaired prior to and after these homes were sold. Here is one example of how effective staging can be and how it could lead to a non disclosure issue down the line.
I had a buyer call me 1 year after he and his wife purchased a hill top home overlooking the ocean in Ventura, CA this home had French doors leading to the deck that wrapped around the house. When he and his wife looked at the home all the carpeting was new and the home was freshly painted. It was during the warmer months when they were interested in buying the home so the listing agent was showing off how the fresh ocean breeze would blow thru-out the home. They had no reason to call me at the time as they did not notice any problems.
2 months before I received the call from the buyer a lady in Northern California called me in regards to a couple that had what she called buyer's remorse and that they were trying to take advantage of her by hitting her with a 250,000 dollar law suit for a home she sold them. She wanted me to inspect the home and give her an estimate to remove the odor stating that there is no way there was that kind of damage and she only had four cats. After explaining my services and how we find urine damage she said we won't be able to because they repainted the interior and replaced all the carpeting. So, after telling her we would have to pull up all the carpeting to inspect the subfloor which was wood in a furnished house and do other testing to find contamination of urine on the walls from the paint being rolled. I never heard from her again.
2 Months later I get a call from a lady describing the same problem I schedule the appointment to look at the home. The basement had been completely gutted all the drywall, carpet & tile flooring removed. The upstairs was still intact so they could live there. The walls had begin to show yellow cat urine stains coming from under the fresh paint, when we pulled the carpet back we could see dark cat urine stains on the hardwood flooring that was covered with new carpet to hide the damaged hardwood floors. We tested and found moisture in the wood flooring, drywall & bottom of cabinets. With our high output UV black light we could see the urine stains in the grout and on the drywall under the fresh coat of paint. The cat urine odor level was about 6.5 on a scale of 10 and 10 being you can smell it from outside when the doors are closed.
When I asked if they smelled any odor before they purchased the home they said NO! I was also told that they found nearly 100 sticker type air fresheners on the underside of the cabinets & inside the kitchen cabinets. They told me it was after they moved in before they begin to notice any odor and it just started getting progressively worse and worse. One thing they did remember is every time they got to the house all the windows were open.
After seeing this type and amount of damage I realized how valuable my services would be to the real estate industry and help to protect prospective buyers, sellers and real estate agents from turning a bad smelling house into big stinking deal!
Having the home inspected by a professional pet odor removal specialist could save you thousands of dollars and getting rid of the headaches PRICLESS!
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