What Buyers See as Major Problems with A House

Be careful to document your findings and don’t try to hide them, disclosure is important and in many states it’s the law.

Sell Your House Fast – Frederick MD: Buying a house means that due diligence must, and usually will be, done by the interested buyers. It’s a huge purchase that they will be paying for over decades of time and will be the largest monthly expense they have. You can be sure that any problems with your house will be looked at and scrutinized by a discriminating buyer, and rightly so.

If you are selling the house yourself you should go through it and try to find anything that would indicate that you have problems that might be expensive to fix. Sometimes when we live in a home we don’t notice the issues right away as many of them come on gradually. Perhaps they occur in little used areas of the house like the attic or the basement and you are not aware. Doing a quick walk around throughout the house in a preliminary fact finding mission, you can often spot signs of bigger trouble. It’s better to be aware of these kinds of problems before a buyer finds them and may feel that you aren’t being completely honest in your presentation of the house.

“Doing a quick walk around throughout the house in a preliminary fact finding mission, you can often spot signs of bigger trouble.”

Move things off of the floor away from the walls throughout the entire house to look for separations. You’re looking for places where the walls and the floor are separating from each other. This could mean a problem with the integrity of the structure itself. Again, with items moved out from the walls and items removed from under sinks and plumbing areas, look for signs of moisture. You might see stains on the walls or on the floor of the sink cabinet. You may even see mold spores growing in the area. This will indicate that you have plumbing leaks. If the stains and moisture appear to be up high, it is more likely a leak in the roofing.

Look carefully in the corners of the rooms, including the insides of the closets, for sawdust. A pile of sawdust in the woodwork could indicate a termite problem which would need to be addressed before the buyers took possession of the house. Be careful to document your findings and don’t try to hide them. Disclosure is important and in many states it’s the law. Full disclosure in those states means you must tell the buyer of any problem you know about or you can be sued. If you are in doubt, hire a home inspector to come and tell you about any problems that might be present that you can’t see.

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