by Victoria Tiegert

Created on: June 14, 2009

For most people, the purchase of their home will be the single biggest investment they will make during their entire lifetime. For this reason, it is obvious that it should warrant the greatest amount of care and consideration. The last thing you want is to get an unexpected, and unpleasant, surprise once you have closed the transaction and moved in. The cost of unanticipated home repairs can be daunting, to say the least. Avoiding this is very important and is accomplished by exercising your due diligence as a buyer and getting a full home inspection performed.

The time to arrange your inspection is before you have a fully accepted deal. This means, essentially, that you can write the offer and have it presented to the seller, but you will include a clause that states, "This offer is subject to buyer's satisfaction of a full home inspection, to be performed on or before (insert dates)." This is typically written on an addendum that is submitted with the offer. The addendum should, however, be referred to in the offer itself, so that the seller and/or their agent is aware that it should be there and can't later say that they never received it and weren't aware of its existence.

Schedule the home inspection as soon as possible so that you (and your agent, if applicable) have time to go over the results and decide what you want to do from that point, depending on the results. You need to choose a reputable inspector that is licensed with your state. Ask around and see if you can get a referral from someone you know and trust.

Be sure that you know what the inspector is going to do and confirm that there will be a pest and dryrot inspection included. It is also important that every aspect of the home be up to standard, meeting the codes and regulations for your area. If they aren't, you may be looking at problems with the city in the future. There should also be inspections of the electrical, plumbing, and heating/cooling systems. Basically, the home inspector should carefully assess every part of the home, from the basement to the roof and provide a report to you within a reasonable time with photos and verbage included.

When you receive the report of your home inspection, go over everything very carefully. You may want to highlight areas that are of concern to you and begin to make a list of problems. It is rare that a home inspection on anything other than new construction will come back completely free of issues. This will give you a bit of negotiating power since the offer is not fully accepted yet. You can, if the home inspection warrants, write another addendum, asking for either repairs to be made prior to closing or a discount in the selling price so that you can take care of them yourself. Either way, a home inspection ensures that you are getting what you expect when you buy your new dream home.

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