I am in California My buyer has found active mold in the kitchen 3 Days after Close of excrow.This is a home under regular sale. Not a short sale nor a REO. Buyer received a clean Mold inspection report before COE. what are the buyers options?
Valuation Solutions - Morristown, NJ
PhD
I would get the home inspector back and at his expense send sample to the lab to determine if it is harmful. If it is, I think the seller and the inspector should pay for the remediation.
Sep 11, 2009 08:31 AM
HomeSmart Realty West - San Diego, CA
Realtor & CDPE, Mission Valley specialist
First and foremost, take pictures. Then clean it up. If the mold infestation is too big to clean up, move out while professionals clean it up. Document everything. Contact the Seller, the home inspector, the mold inspector (and I've never seen a "clean mold inspection report," so I'd love to see that!), and let them know what's going on.
If it's a small mold problem, which most kitchen problems are, especially 3 days after COE, invite everyone out to look at it and discuss appropriate remedies.
Mold can grow in as little as 24 hours, and part of the problem with having an inspection done while people still live in a house is that they then don't have incentive to take care of the place, so they don't
Many listing agents also tell their clients to pour a ton of Draino or Liquid Plummer down the drains, bathtubs, showers, and toilets, so that the home inspector won't note any drainage problems. That usually clease up a problem temporarily, but the problem is highly likely to return.
Knowing the age of the home, the type of sewer pipes noted by the home inspector, and the conditions at the time of the inspection, especially since I presume it was occupied since you said that it was a "regular sale," would help me help you better.
Moshe's comment presumes too much without knowing all the facts, which can be determined if there was a thorough home inspection done on the property with a good report issued afterwards. Absent that, things could get really nasty.
Sep 11, 2009 08:36 AM
San Diego, CA
Ditto what Jim said since he worked for me as a home inspector for four years.
If you'd like me to look over the home inspection report, I could probably give you better guidance. Sometimes the home inspector's verbiage needs to be analyzed.
As Jim said, though, it takes as little as 24 hours for mold to grow, so presuming that your Clients moved in within 3 days of COE since that's when they found it, it sounds like mold resulting from a common sewer or plumbing leak which can often be attributed to "move-out" or "move-in" parties.
Some times it's not even a party since many people cram stuff in their sink cabinets and damage the drain pipe or plumbing and don't know they did that until a few days later when everything smells moldy.
Sellers often move out and pull everything out of the sink cabinets without realizing that they damaged things.
If the mold is limited to less than 10 square feet, which most kitchen cabinets are, clean it up and move on with one's life.
Sep 11, 2009 08:43 AM
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