Im not currently working with a realtor. I have done multiple deals before. This one seemed pretty straightforward. Then we had an inspection and the inspector noted : 1) He thinks the house has structural issues & that one of the beams on top of the post is crooked/twisted and there are cracks on the walls he thinks are from that & that could be a $10k or $100k problem 2) trusses in the attic have cracks and need to be repaired and he’s estimating thats another $10k. Im getting mixed feedback on it though and want to know in situations like these how do you even handle negotiations with seller. Their agent told me they did a clean pre-inspection and everything was clean on their end. So I was surprised to find these major issues on the house and not sure if it is exaggerated or not. I have already reached put to a few engineers. How would you handle this with ?
How would you handle this?
byu/Sabrun21 inrealestateinvesting
Posted by Sabrun21
5 Comments
Believe nothing their agent says.
Get an inspection done by the appropriate professional.
If need be demand an extension to the inspection period to get this done.
Walk if they don’t give it to you.
OR
Just walk now if this deal isn’t worth the headache
Second opinion is definitely the move here. Inspectors can be all over the place with structural stuff – some are way too conservative and others miss obvious problems. Had similar situation couple years back where inspector flagged foundation issues that turned out to be cosmetic settling cracks worth maybe 2k to fix not the 15k nightmare he painted.
Get that structural engineer out there before you do anything else. The seller’s pre-inspection means nothing if they used different inspector or looked at different things. Once you have engineer report you’ll know if you’re dealing with real problems or inspector being overly cautious.
If engineer confirms major issues then you have few options – walk away, negotiate price reduction equal to repair costs, or ask seller to fix before closing. Given the potential 100k repair bill I’d probably walk unless this property has amazing numbers that can absorb that kind of hit. Market has enough deals out there that you don’t need to take on that level of structural risk unless numbers really work in your favor.
Don’t waste too much time on the property, unless you’re in an extremely small market.
You can just tell the seller that you’re going down by however much the repairs cost, if the seller says no, then you must evaluate if it’s still a good buy despite the repair costs.
If it’s not worth it, then you just have to find another property. It’s always good to err on the side of caution.
If you ask a home inspector or reddit, every single house has “structural issues”
If you ask a normal person who knows anything at all, it won’t
Of, big yikes. Get a structural engineer in there ASAP.