10 Home Inspector Tips for Sellers & Buyers

Home Inspection Tips for Sellers

  1. Have a Pre-Listing inspection completed on your home well ahead of any planned marketing or listing activity. Having a pre-listing inspection completed can help you avoid any surprises before you list your home. You may only have a short window of time to make tough decisions and do necessary repairs to get the most out of your home as possible.
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2. If you are a pet owner please arrange to have them away during an inspection.

While some home inspectors may think that your pets are as cute as possible – having pets moving around under an inspector’s feet makes their job much more difficult and time consuming. During the inspection process itself a home inspector will be moving all through the home as well as opening and closing all exit doors. This fast-paced activity presents too many opportunities for animals to suddenly dart out. When you leave the premises for the inspection—and many inspectors will ask sellers to do so—take your pets with you for their safety. Please.

3. Don’t forget to clean.

Whether you plan on being there for the inspection or not, make sure to give your home a good deep cleaning and straighten up well before inspection time. It doesn’t mean you have to scrub your floors on your hands and knees – but – a clean clutter free home is so much easier to inspect. By standards of practice as well as liability restraints – home inspectors are not allowed to move items around to conduct inspections. If clutter or personal items are blocking areas – a inspector may have to come back to finish and that might result in un-necessary expense for you as a seller.

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4. Let the light in.

Nothing brightens up a home like clean windows with curtains and blinds pulled back to let natural sunlight in. Having a well open presentation often makes a great impression on buyers and can result in a better selling price.

5. Make sure your yard is clean and presentable.

Regardless of the time of year – have your yard cleaned and presentable. A clean well cut and landscaped yard not only speaks volumes about the care you give your home, it also makes a strong first impression to buyers as well.

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Home Inspector Tips for Buyers

1. Your potential dream home is going to have issues.

Despite how much you love your potential “dream home” it will have issues. There is no such thing as the “perfect home.” They simply don’t exist. Know beforehand that any professional home inspector is likely to find a seemingly endless list of issues during the home inspection. Don’t panic! Not everything needs fixing immediately, so don’t let a long list of home issues dampen your love for the home.

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2. Anything found to be deficient can be fixed.

One way to look at your home inspector’s report is that they are really providing you a home maintenance check list for your use up front. In most cases – baring serious critical water intrusion and long-term structural damage – most other issues can simply be remedied by simple repair or regular maintenance. You’re your report you will know what needs to be addressed as well as the priority level of the fix.

3.The one thing that you need to focus on the most is serious water damage.

Water is a home’s worst enemy. It can cause a litany of both short term and long-term issues and damage. Any professional home inspector is going to looking for water intrusion clues and they should be trained, equipped and able to spot them. Even if evidence of water intrusion might be present – in many cases, the evidence may be from old leaks which have been repaired long ago and are not active. Your inspector should be able to tell the difference and will make sure you know firsthand about any serious water issues.

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Crystal ball

4. Home inspectors don’t have magical insight

While home inspectors can provide you much useful information about your dream home, none of them have a magical crystal balls, x-ray vision to see behind walls & they cannot predict the home’s future for you – regardless of how bad you want them too. Questions such as “how long is the HVAC system going to last?” or “how long will the roof last?” are certainly things for a buyer to consider – no home inspector can tell you that. Likewise, a home inspector cannot tell you when a plumbing pipe might burst or when a breaker in the main electrical panel might blow out. The best they can do is let you know the normal life expectancy range of things, which is only a ballpark estimate at best.

5. Use the home inspection to your advantage

Obviously, you must really like the potential home, or you wouldn’t be having a home inspection done. Don’t get “scared away” from your dream home because you are looking at a long list of things that need to be repaired. Use the list to your advantage and go into contingency negotiations with the seller armed with your knowledge about the home. You should actually feel empowered knowing that you have all the knowledge you need to make a sound investment decision. Now separate your heart from your mind and make that best gut decision.

So, if you are buying or selling a home in Albany, Leesburg or the South West Georgia area contact Sentry Home Inspection Services today to schedule your home inspection.

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Sentry Inspection Services provides professional residential, residential commercial and commercial property in Albany, Leesburg and all of Southwest Georgia. We also have a wide variety of ancillary services to meet all of your inspection needs.

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