tips for viewing and buying a home: the pre-inspection {part two}

We covered a little bit of what we do a few weeks ago, and you may remember that we’ve expanded to real estate, too! Today we are continuing our new series on viewing and buying a home where we’ll be sharing a few snippets to help! We want to share our experience and knowledge from handling home renovations as designers, and as a licensed Real Estate agent with Benchmark realty here in Nashville. If you’re moving to Nashville, or in and around Nashville/Franklin reach out to Jamin (jamin @ thehandmadehome.net), we’re happy to help you find that perfect home!

The home-buying process is a wonderful experience if you have the right knowledge and game plan. So whether you’re buying something now or in the future {or just want to look extra smart at that next friend gathering} follow along as we cover some things you’ll want to know! And of course, if you have a burning question you’d like answered, shoot it our way and we’ll do our best to help. We’d love to hear from you. Let’s dive in!

Here are a few topics we’ve dealt with:

You may notice that our list is a little different {again!} this week. That’s because we decided to go ahead and tackle part two of the pre-inspection topic. It’s an important one to discuss in the order of things. So stay with us as we veer off the main course to cover this one, too! But be sure you read part one from last week, first.

Pre-inspection before offering

Last week, I mentioned that this is my favorite part of helping clients find good homes. It’s also honestly one that most agents and home buyers don’t engage in simply because they operate with the belief that it’s the home inspector’s job to do this for you. While there is some truth in that, and value in a professional home inspector, why would you, as a buyer, not want to do your due diligence before you offer?

Knowing the state of the home can help you make a more educated and stronger offer to the seller. It can also keep you from making an offer only to wait 7-10 days for the home inspection report to come back to find out things about the home that make you pull the offer. Thus losing 7-10 days of time in your process. Or at the very least, if you know there are issues up front and can cite them in your offer, you can even make a stronger offer with reason.

“But I’m not educated…”

If you don’t have a great deal of experience in home building or renovations, you may not feel equipped to “inspect” a house. That might be the absolute truth. Let me let you in on a secret though: most home inspectors aren’t master builders either. They’ve been trained to follow a checklist, to look at very specific things, and to document them in a way that highlights their findings for you to understand. That’s no knock against them, it’s what you’ve hired them to do: inspect the basics of the home, and detail them. To crawl into or on top of places you might not want to. Or to provide knowledge where you might not have it. They do this every day, so they know what to look for and most are good at finding those major things.

But what if you knew some basic things to look for, and had your own checklist? Most real estate agents aren’t and shouldn’t provide you with this, because they don’t have that kind of knowledge or experience, and the lawyers would be really unhappy if they did. Thus the home inspector’s role.

8 things to look for in a potential home (4 last week + 4 in today’s post)

Today, we want to continue our checklist as we tell you some things to look for. On your home-buying journey, every day is precious and there’s no reason to wait 7-10 days to find out something from someone else that you could have known with a little knowledge. You don’t have to be an expert, you just need a checklist:

Last week we covered what to look for in the water heater, the HVAC, the roof, and the electrical panel. So let’s jump into this week.

• Windows and Doors

These are probably two of the easiest things to identify when looking at a home, but can also be incredibly costly to replace. Unfortunately, windows and doors aren’t often a huge bargaining point, but at the very least, you need to know what you’re getting and how it could affect you moving forward.

There are three main things to look at when evaluating windows and doors:

• Caulk: First, look at the caulk around the doors and windows. does it look fresh and smooth or is it jagged, dirty, and chippy? Are sections missing? If the caulk looks old, this is one thing you can ask them to remedy in your inspection report after you make the offer.

• Seal Strips: Second, look at the seal strips. Are they frayed, jagged, or generally in bad condition? If so, this is something you can ask to be fixed in your inspection report as well.

• Single Pane vs. Double Pane: Third, if buying an older home look at the window panes, are they single-pane windows or double-pane? This probably isn’t anything you can ask the seller to fix, but it is something you might want to keep in mind as something you will replace in the future, but there are several government rebates to help with this.

The reason all three of the above matter is for energy consumption and your power bill. As my grandparents would say, “don’t let the bought air out”. So properly sealed windows and doors will help keep the “bought air” where it should be.

• The Grade

“Never buy a house below street level”. Have you ever heard that saying before? While not entirely true, there is some wisdom in that saying. The idea is simply that if your house is below street level, then water will run off the road into the yard and toward your house. Water running toward your house is never ideal, but it also isn’t the end of the world as long as it doesn’t make it to the house.

So what if you love a house, but it’s below street level? What do you need to know:

The grade is very important here and by grade, I mean how does the yard run? You can have a house that is below street level, but the grade of the yard needs to lead all the water away from the home.

As you look at the house, does it look like it’s built up from the yard? In other words, does the yard slope or fall away from the home? If it does not slope or fall away from the home, this could be a potential problem. If it does, then the next question is where does it run to? Water needs a clear path away from your house for a continued period. So if the yard does slope away from the house but simply valleys in the front yard, you might end up with a pond every time it rains. And if it rains enough, you might end up with a new water feature in your home that you necessarily didn’t want. Ideally, you want to see the grade or slope of the land keep running away from your home for one hundred feet.

The grade isn’t something you can negotiate with the seller, but it is something that you need to pay attention to when looking to buy a new home. Trust us when we say, it’s not an easy or cheap thing to fix.

•Gutter and Downspouts

Gutters and downspouts are the number one cause of water damage to a home and probably one of the simplest things to repair, as you try to control water flow around the home.

Why it matters: This one is similar to the windows and doors. While you probably will not negotiate much in this area, it will tell you a lot about the homeowner and how well they cared for the home. The level of care they have taken with the home will be an indicator of how much you might have to spend to get the home up to par.

Believe it or not, some homes do not have gutters, because they aren’t required by codes and a lot of builders are ~~cheap~~ cost-conscious, and don’t care about problems that arise outside their 1-year warranty. Hear me clearly though when I say every house needs gutters. You need an effective way to move roof water runoff away from the home. Letting water just run off the roof and onto the ground next to the home is never a good idea. If you have a crawl space, it will end up in the crawlspace and if you have a slab, it can potentially weaken it, wash away the earth next to it or even puddle to the point of coming into the home.

What to look for: So when evaluating how water moves off and away from your roof, start with the downspouts. The first thing you want to look for are downspouts extensions.

These extensions attach to the downspouts and should then feed an underground corrugated pipe that leads water away from the home and into the yard somewhere to follow the grade away from your home. Make sure each downspout has one of these and it’s attached to a pipe underground leading away from the home.

Next check the gutters themselves. Ideally, they will have gutter guards to keep leaves and debris out. Unless you have a drone with you or an extension for your camera, you might wonder how you’re supposed to see this. Well here’s a little secret: water likes to stain. So simply look for stain marks on the gutters themselves.

If the gutters look like the above then they’ve been overflowing at some point and if they’re still overflowing, then you need to consider whether they have been causing any damage to the home. (Obviously, you will also want to ask for them to be cleaned out.)

• Crawlspace and Foundation

The above two lead us to the most overlooked area of a home when looking to buy: the crawl space. DUN DUN DUN! {Cue all the creepy music.}

Most people don’t want to get in the crawlspace and that’s understandable. Again, this is something that the inspector can and will do for you, but there are a couple of simple things you can do without having to get on your belly.

• Crawlspace door: First, locate the crawl space door, get down next to it, and open it, what does it smell like? Does it have a damp, musty smell? If so that could indicate there has been water intrusion and mold could be setting in.

• Turn on that light: Next, turn the light on in the crawl space, there should be one by the door, if not, that needs to be fixed. Look around the crawlspace. First look to see if there is a vapor barrier. If not then you will most likely have mold in the crawlspace. If the lowest area of the crawl space is visible, look for water puddling. If there is a vapor barrier, how clean does it look? Does it look like water has run down it before? Is there a lot of dirt on it? All these are indications that there has been water intrusion at some point.

If any of the above is true, then it means you need to pay closer attention to the crawlspace inspection report or as we are going to cover next time, you need to go farther into the crawlspace to have a look around.

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While this group of four in our pre-inspection checklist might not help you negotiate the price a lot, it will help you know what could potentially cost you a lot of money later and how well the current homeowner is taking care of the home.

Next week we’re really going to dive into the crawlspace for those of you who want to know what to look for and don’t mind getting a little dirty. We’ll also look at the foundation and clues that it might be in trouble.

In the meantime, if you have any questions, drop us a comment below. Or if you want to keep it private, shoot us an email! If you want to search homes in the Nashville area with a fun tool click here. I promise you won’t get any spammy emails. And if we can help you renovate a home, we’d be honored to work with you.

Have an inspired day!