Homeowners...I have a question.

After you had your house inspected, did you negotiate the price of the house again to compensate for repairs or did the homeowners fix the problems found on the engineer's report?

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

YES. We got a GREAT deal because we did this. Good Luck!

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

it depends. i advise my buyers that if the findings are extremely costly then they could ask for a credit towards the sale price. but if its just a few things that arent very substantial the homeowner will usually just agree to have everything repaired prior to closing. but you have to remember that the homeowner has the legal right to just say "no, the home is being sold as is" regardless of cost and then you have a decision to make...move forward or back out. but it never hurts to ask!

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

yes, we also got more money off by closing within 30 days after we were already in contract.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

Yes...We got a couple of thousand back. We got a check for this after we closed.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

I knew when we put our offer in on our house that there would be problems with the inspection.

We bought in Summer of 2005, an colonial in an area where most colonials sold in a day but it was horribly neglected by the original owner.

Because the house was so bad we offered almost 10% less (which was unheard of at that time). It was also on the market for over three months at that point, again unheard of.

The inspection came back with the following recommendations:
-new boiler and hot water heater
-replace aluminum wiring throughout house
-properly abandon the electrical running to the abandoned inground pool
-chimey work needed on btoh fireplaces
-termite damage

There were a few other things. the couple was elderly and separated and weren't willing to do the work and they really needed to sell. We asked for a full credit for all work and it was granted. Of course, we wound up doing so much more and essentially gutting the house. We got an additional $23K off of the price.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

we tried with one house we had an accepted offer on, but she wouldn't budge.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

We did. After we got the engineers report we renegotiated

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

Thanks everyone. We had the house inspected yesterday and are waiting for the full report. I know there were some issues (termite damage in the garage, a leak one bathroom etc). This house has been on the market for a few months and the owners are very motivated to sell, but the bid that has been accepted is about 35,000 - 40,000 below there original asking price...I don't know if they would lower the price any more.

Thanks again!

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

We didn't but we lucked out with the Eng report - there were no issues (outside of some termite damage in the detached garage which the executor paid for).

Had there been issues I would not have hesitated to try to renegotiate.

Good Luck!!

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

Our seller fixed everything the engineer recommended. They were items we listed on the contract as conditions of the sale.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

we tried, it didn't work. They were minor things and the seller took care of it.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

We did- they fixed some thinds and showed proof and reduced the sale price for others. Our attny put it in the contract

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

I see this on TV alot- but my husband says he has never seen it happen in his 5 years in the business

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

First home we received a $2,500.00 credit, second home we received a $4,500.00 credit. When we sold our home, the buyers demanded $6,000.00 because the inspection report showed that the furnace was "old" Needless to say, they didn't get what they asked for

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

Yes, but there are a number of solutions. The seller of the house I'm buying doesn't want to go thru the trouble of fixing it so he's giving us a check instead.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

NO, there was nothing major to negotiate, their original asking price was 469k and we negotiated down to 425k
Then we had the Engineer come and he told us he was very impressed with the house and what a great deal we were getting!

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

no b/c we bought new construction and the inspection came back perfect so there was nothing to negotiate

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

We attempted to, but the sellers took our offer, which was $15k below asking. Supposedly there was an offer after ours for $20k more than ours, so they told us to take it or leave it. We spent $2k to upgrade the electrical, and I still feel like we got a good deal, as houses in our neighborhood really went up right after we made our offer.

I am still glad we asked and would do it next time if appropriate. Good luck!

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

We had the seller fix everything in the report rather than taking money off.

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

I wonder if we should have, but the market was SO insane at the time and we found the perfect house for us AT the perfect price....there wasn't anything specific that should have been repaired/replaced asap.....but in a less-insane market we could have negotiated a bit more. I will for my next house

Re: Homeowners...I have a question.

We got both. We bid based on what we were told and after the engineers report found out that some of the things they told us were wrong so we told them that we wanted a reduction. They met us half way between the price we tried to get after and the price we actually bid on the house and had the electric upgraded to 200 amps, so we almost got the entire amount we wanted.