It is common to hear about Mold in Palm Beach County, Florida, as the climate is tropical, but you hope and keep your fingers crossed that it is not present in the home you about to sell.
My encounter with Mold occured while I was representing the buyer of a multi-million dollar property in Palm Beach, Florida. Here's what happened: My client and I walked into an Oceanfront Condo, as we entered the property I saw my clients face exhibit a glow, she was excited and I knew this had to be the one!
We came in with a low offer that was declined by the seller. Actually, the seller would not even counter. Two months passed as we continued to look at other properties and my buyer decided to give another offer to the property that she feel in love with. The property was still available (as many are in this market), it took 3 weeks to negotiate a price. Finally, we had the property under contract.
Then the sellers agent made a strange remark to me when I phoned her to make an appointment for a home inspection along with a mold inspection. She replied by saying tell your buyer that she does not have to spend the money for the mold testing (which can cost over $1K) as I will give her a letter from an attorney stating that their is no mold present in the condo at closing. Humm, that is strange, why do that? I asked for a property disclosure, which she replied their is no property disclosure. So I just asked her is thier Mold in the condo? She said no. I asked then why would you not want us to do a Mold Test? She just said why spend the $$$.
I presisted with getting an appointment for the Mold Test, when the agent finally confessed that Mold had been present and that it was getting Remediated. Okay now I have to disclose this info to my client. She freaks out and wants out of the contract, which I did for her.
Mold can be entirely taken out of a property by remediation, so why was this not disclosed? Why wasn't the buyer told when we first went to the property?
The good news is that we found an amazing condo without mold and we closed in July.......
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