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How Does a Seller Pass a Home Inspection?

I hear this question every so often so I thought I'd address it. Of course here in Southern California, about 90% of the home inspections we perform are vacant houses, usually foreclosures or short sales. However I know there are still sellers out there.

So how does a seller have the house "pass" the home inspection? First of all, a home inspection in California is not a pass/fail process. There is no requirement to have a home inspection and the reports are advisory for the client... nothing has to be repaired from the home inspection, with the exception of earthquake bracing. I have heard of some local cities sending code enforcement officials to do their own inspections, and they have the authority to require items to be repaired, but that's different from the home inspection. Having said that, the home inspection sometimes still can be used to negotiate the price or at least to be prepared for repairs that are needed.

So what can the seller do? There are certain things a seller can do to prepare the home for the buyer's home inspection. One option is to have the home inspected before it goes up for sale, therefore any repairs can be made and the seller will not have deadlines. When there is a time crunch, many times you are forced to settle with the only person who is available to perform the repair and end up spending more money. Or, the seller can at least be aware of repairs that are needed and can adjust the price accordingly if needed. Either way, the seller is aware of the items to be repaired.

The seller can also go through routine maintenance items themselves and take care of those. Painting, caulking in kitchens and bathrooms, cleaning rain gutters, replacing light bulbs, cover plates for light switches and receptacles as needed, running water and checking for leaks under sinks or back ups, changing the air filter and checking GFCI receptacle test buttons are all relatively easy items a seller might be able to do themselves. The better the condition a home is in, the easier the process of selling a home becomes. Take care of what items you can ahead of time.

I hope this gives you a little more information about a professional home inspection and its value. Be safe out there.

Posted by Joseph Lang of Pillar To Post Professional Home Inspection

Posted by Joseph Lang - Southern California Home Inspector on 03/10/2009 09:16 AM

Comments (14)

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14 Comments on How Does a Seller Pass a Home Inspection?

MAR

Way cool! as they say. Nice going Joe.

Joseph,

Nice article, I am a Home Inspector in the Dallas TX area. We have been doing more of the Pre-Listing Inspections for some of the same reasons you discussed. The homeowners who seem to be brave enough to have this type of inspection certainly get the information required to have the house more prepared for sale.

Good job.

I've never been on the seller's side because our office is an exclusive buyer agency. (Company never represents sellers, never has any listings, only works for buyers.)

But, I don't understand why more sellers don't have inspections. It makes a lot of sense and should relieve a lot of stress from the process.

We've never had a buyer waive their inspection because the seller had the home pre-inspected, but I would imagine many buyers might.

More importantly, it gives the seller a reference point in case there are inspection issues.

Thanks for the post!

Hi Joseph - Nice post. Many of the things that get identified during a routine inspection are items that routine maintenance would have avoided. It's those silly little things that we tolerate like the mixer in the shower that doesn't work just right or the stopper in the bathroom sink that doesn't work right. Instead of living with these little annoyances, we need to get them taken care of and enjoy the use of them. Most likely, they'll come up at inspection time and the buyer will request that they are repaired anyway.

Have a super week!

Marlene

Marshall, thanks.

Ricky, I'm glad pre-listing home inspections are catching on in your area, they're very rare here.

Jon, I agree with you. It's better to be prepared.

Marlene, great advice and also the reason these foreclosures take longer to inspect... deferred maintenance to the extreme!

Nice job. I actually recommend that my listing get the home inspection done on the front end.

MAR

especially with higher priced homes where the homeowner is handy, it is great to have pre inspection. Otherwise, new buyers may require a receipt for work done and will assume homeowers are not competent to fix any problems.

I wish more Sellers would see the value of the pre-listing inspection, especially with the inventory of antique homes in our area. Sellers could then make the repairs and remove those barriers to buying. But because of the age of some of our homes, I also think there are sellers who are fearful of what will be found (sonme older house "issues" can cost major dollars that the seller may not have) - and then they are required to disclose. They'd rather roll the dice with the buyers' inspection and hope for the best!

Fortunately the majority of my home inspections are not empty houses that are already in foreclosure as is the case in your area. Pre listing inspections are the exception, not the rule here in New England but they are a growing trend. As Terry Driscoll mentioned many sellers of older homes don't want to find out what's wrong because they would be required to disclose the problems. They prefer to stick their heads in the sand and claim they were ignorant of the issues that the inspector turned up. It's not very smart to do that. A good inspection report is a positive selling feature.If two similar homes might be up for sale, the one with the good inspection report might have that as a tie breaker going for it in a buyer's mind. A bad report can be used effectively too if a seller is willing to work a little. Defered maintenance items on the report can be taken care of by the sellers themselves, and items requiring a contractor to repair can prompt a seller to get multiple estimates for repairs or replacement items. For example: lets say the inspection report indicates that the roof is worn out and is due for replacement, and the furnace & A/C is also due for replacement. A seller's nightmare! A buyer may say they want a $10,000 credit for the roof and $7,000 for the heating system, however you've gotten estimates that the items can both be replaced for $12,000 not $17,000 and you've just made an extra $5000 on the sale. It saves the Realtors a lot of headaches and time wasted on issues that can be defused ahead of time. Knowledge is power, a seller's inspection report is a tool to be used to preemptively address the issues that the buyer's inspector is almost sure to find anyway.

I think it's a great idea but some of these sellers are still stuck in the years 2004-2006 thinking that they don't have to fix anything. Most of the realtors I work with recommend the stuff like cauking, cleaning gutters, painting and receptacles before listing the property.

In our area the norm is any electrical, plumbing , or structural items should be addressed by seller unless the contract previously stipulates otherwise.