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I finally brought my own inspector to a showing and it saved my butt
My realtor kept pushing me to use her preferred inspector, but something felt off. I found a guy named Dave on Google with solid reviews in my area and paid him $350 to come walk through a house I was serious about. He found a mold issue in the crawlspace that the seller's disclosure said nothing about. The fix would have cost me around $5,000 easy. I told the seller and they dropped the price by exactly that much. I learned that paying out of pocket for my own eyes on a property is worth every dollar. Has anyone else had a bad experience trusting the realtor's guy?
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rose_clark814mo ago
Right there with you on this one. I had a realtor push their "guy" on me years ago and he missed a bad sewer line that cost me a fortune later. You did the smart thing bringing in Dave, that five grand savings is real money. The mold in the crawlspace is exactly the kind of thing a seller hopes nobody catches. Good on you for not backing down and making them knock off the cost. How long did it take you to find Dave and get him scheduled before the showing?
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evan_grant704mo ago
That guy Dave sounds like a keeper. Reminds me of the time my buddy hired a septic tank inspector separate from the one his realtor suggested. The realtor's guy gave it a clean bill of health, but the independent guy found the whole system was basically held together with rust and hope. Cost my buddy about eight grand to replace it, but he got the seller to knock off ten after showing them the report. Funny how that works.
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maryr434mo ago
Oh wow, that's a wild story! But I gotta gently correct you on one thing (sorry, I can't help myself). Your buddy's inspector didn't find the system "held together with rust and hope" - that's a great line though. What they probably found was a tank with cracks in the concrete or a failed drain field that looked fine on the outside. Rust is more of a metal pipe thing, and septic tanks are usually concrete or fiberglass these days. But your point still stands - never trust the realtor's guy to be honest about something that could cost you thousands. I had a similar thing happen with a home inspection where the realtor's guy missed a leaky roof that I caught myself three months later. Always get your own people, even if it costs you a few hundred bucks upfront. That eight grand your buddy saved is proof enough.
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