Professional House Inspection: A Must for Foreclosed Homes
Foreclosure homes provide price opportunities for buyers, but they can also become pits that swallow buyers’ savings if they are purchased without professional house inspection.
House inspection would show defects undetected by the prospective home buyer and would help determine if the asking price is reasonable.
Bill Richardson, president of the 6,000-member 80-chapter American Society of Home Inspectors, said that a lot of defects discovered during house inspection were caused by neglect and lack of maintenance. Many inspectors are seeing leaking faucets, air conditioners and furnaces without filters and damaged windows and doors.
Kathleen Kuhn, head of the New Jersey-based 380-affiliate franchise organization HeadMaster, said most inspectors doing home inspections on foreclosed homes see many defects due to neglect and vandalism. Kuhn said that some homeowners forced out of houses vent their anger on walls and other parts of the house.
Foreclosed houses that have become vacant for so long have also been seen with molds during house inspection. Molds can be removed with proper cleaning and ventilation, but it will take time, including money to buy strong cleaning solutions and to hire cleaning personnel.
Richardson also added that many house inspection processes conducted in foreclosure homes resulted in findings of leaking valves, defective appliances, damaged gaskets, broken hoses and missing plumbing fixtures.
Kuhn said defects in plumbing can cause floods that would damage many parts of the house and wipe out the homeowners’ savings due to expensive repairs.
Meanwhile, Richardson added that when a sewer trap dries out, it could permit methane gas to enter the house.
Both Richardson and Kuhn also described foreclosed house damages caused by thieves and vandals. Inspectors also come to know during home inspection that many foreclosure properties with a lot of damages were owned by lenders that did not carry out foreclosure proceedings with compassion.
So if you are investing your money in foreclosure properties either for your own use or for investment purposes, hire a professional house inspector to conduct a home inspection.
The fees you are going to spend for house inspection will be returned to you in the form of peace of mind and the assurance that the lower price you paid for the foreclosure property will not double because of expensive repairs.
House inspection will also help you calculate repair costs so you will know how much discount or what repairs you are going to negotiate with the seller.
