When you’re considering waiving your home inspeciton: how to navigate a seller’s market and not end up buying a money pit

​We understand that the housing market is really tight right now. We’ve been hearing about buyers making offers for $20k – $30k over asking, inspection waived, and still being out-bid.

It’s a sellers market, which means that more and more buyers and getting desperate in their attempt to find a home.

We do understand how much of an emotional struggle this is, on top of being the biggest financial investment many folks will ever make. The temptation to get a home by waiving an inspection is high.

The obvious risk is that you might buy a home with serious problems that could cost you tens of thousands of dollars to fix. There have been instances of flippers concealing shoddy, dangerous work behind a beautiful facade. When that facade crumbles, the mounting repair costs can lead to financial hardship or ruin.

When you waive your inspection, you don’t get the benefit of a trained eye looking for defects and faults like load-bearing walls that have been moved, tell-tale signs of water penetration, and other things that a seasoned inspector like Jeff can find.

Even in newly constructed homes, he’s found issues that could cause an immediate financial burden for the buyers.

We ALWAYS recommend a complete, document home inspection before making an offer, but we certainly won’t shame buyers for the choices they make when juggling a financial decision of this size.

What can you do to still safe-guard yourself in this situation?

Invite a home inspector along for your showing!

Jeff will provide a “walk and talk” inspection where he joins you at your showing to look for any major defects or faults in the property. This inspection cost less than a typical inspection because we don’t provide a written report, so be sure to carry a camera and a notebook along with you to take note of what Jeff discovers, so you can make the appropriate repairs should you end up owning the house.

If the walk-and-talk provides you with enough insight that you’d like to make an offer, but you’d like to have it contingent on a full inspection as a way to leverage bargaining, you can roll the cost of the walk-and-talk into the cost of a full inspection.

But what if you’ve already bought a house without having it inspected? Jeff will happily walk through your new property with you and let you know about any serious defects or places of potential trouble. It’s nerve-wracking to have someone look at a home you’ve already bought – what if they do discover something seriously wrong? Well, that defect will be there whether you know about it or not, so it’s best for your pocketbook and long-term peace of mind to find out sooner than later. Additionally, Jeff will point out any small defects that, if left unaddressed, could become serious. In the long-run it’s WAY more expensive to ignore what may be minor problems today until they become catastrophic problems down the line.

How do you book a walk-and-talk inspection? If you’re still looking for your home, call (612-314-3121) or email us and provide us with your real estate agent’s contact information. Then, call your real estate agent with our information and let them know to loop us in when they are booking a showing for you.

If you already own your home, just give us a call and we’ll get that inspection booked!

Again: We would prefer that all of our clients benefit from full, thoroughly documented inspections, but we know sometimes that isn’t feasible. Rather than watch homeowners suffer through the trauma of discovering major faults on their own, we have chosen to provide a service that safe-guards our clients, no matter what their financial situation may be.