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Elephanthead posted:Got my hands on the inspection report from prior bidder on a foreclosure, you really need better inspectors the home guy found a bunch of minor things, neglected to mention the creek at the bottom of the hill was eroding the yard causing the swimming pool to slowly but surely reach a point of collapse. Only $60k to put in a retaining wall down to creekbed for perm fix, assuming you can get a permit and the neighbor on the other side allows access and is willing to sell you a little bit of marsh. Chase bank refused to concede the $5,000 the prior buyer asked for ahahahahahahahah. I will be passing. Do never buy never ever ever. I don't think a structural home inspector would ever warrant their services to include assessment of geology or erosion of a creek bed
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Feb 2, 2015 23:30
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| # ? May 29, 2024 17:37 |
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inspection on the house we're trying to buy is in a few hours. I'm feeling a strange mix of excitement and terror. Hopefully it goes well or horribly. I'm hoping I don't have to make any tough decisions.
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Feb 3, 2015 16:29
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When it comes to inspections, I find you want them to go horribly. Better to know there's an awful problem and work with the seller to come to a compromise for remediation or allow you the piece of mind to walk vs living in fear after you buy the house that the whole thing could fall down at any moment because the inspector failed to notice that several of your rafters are patched together with pieces of old ikea furniture.
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Feb 3, 2015 17:02
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couldcareless posted:When it comes to inspections, I find you want them to go horribly. Better to know there's an awful problem and work with the seller to come to a compromise for remediation or allow you the piece of mind to walk vs living in fear after you buy the house that the whole thing could fall down at any moment because the inspector failed to notice that several of your rafters are patched together with pieces of old ikea furniture. If the inspection goes really well, your inspector probably missed a bunch of stuff.
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Feb 3, 2015 18:54
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My inspection went really well and he didn't miss anything noteworthy. And even if the inspection goes horribly, they can still miss serious stuff.
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Feb 3, 2015 19:03
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Spent the last 3+ months getting this 1980 built place in Roseville, CA (Sacramento - NCAL) area updated. Smaller 1750sq foot place but in a very good area. Not much had been touched since 1980 inside and it needed everything from ceilings/floors/full kitchen/full bathrooms/windows/electrical/plumbing/. HVAC was mid-90's and replaced as well and all the registers were re-located. Took down a huge non-supporting wall and some other shenanigans for the master bath (not done yet). Budget got absolutely demolished and I still haven't even started on the exterior yet. Meh....at least it doesn't smell like dust and pee like it used to! I'm still moving in so it's not quite dialed in yet, new shutters are on the way along with crown molding. Cabinets are Waypoint shaker style in off white and counters are quartz HanStone serenity. go away dumb half walls and post things and stinky carpets......  the wall between these rooms was knocked down and also a cutout section was framed in.       go away ugly kitchen, soffits, floors   also added lots of cabs/pantry/small counter for laundry area where you walk in from garage.....  guest bathroom too......master will be similar. Travertine tile and darker shaker style cabinet, same counters as kitchen. Kohler Devonshire soaking tub, Moen fixtures. Toilet was new but I added a new soft close lid  and most importantly a place to store booze (besides wine fridge)  I had to replace every outlet in this place twice..........save yourself the headaches and just install the dumb tamper resistant outlets from the get go unless you want your place red flagged by the inspectors (post 2011 electrical board requirements). I only did the initial demo and cleanup along with various trim/painting/cabinet work and wore the gently caress out of my checkbook/credit card for the rest! I did get $3500 back in PGE/city rebates for the HVAC/whole house fan/windows though. I was lucky enough to float a temp apt place and keep a lot of stuff in storage between selling my old house and while this place was getting rehabbed.   do always* buy *never Keyser_Soze fucked around with this message at 20:50 on Feb 3, 2015 |
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Feb 3, 2015 19:39
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The Caol Ila 12 is one of my favorite not-too-expensive single malts, good job there. e. Oh man, AND you have Aberlour! My favorite speyside! You should really treat yourself to the Abu'nadh if you can, it's amazing. Oh, I guess good job on the reno too
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Feb 3, 2015 20:07
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The impression I get from this thread is that houses that you haven't owned for 20 years with at least the initial purchase value in repairs is a total death trap. Is this a "starter home" thing where people buy whatever and ignore home repairs "because they aren't going to be here forever anyway"? Are homes outside the "starter" field in such poor condition?
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Feb 3, 2015 20:32
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Well, that impression is probably formed by folks mostly posting about the bad experiences rather than the good. But the main take-away to have is that houses cost money to maintain, lots of it. A lot of houses that are for sale have years or decades of deferred/ignored/botched maintenance, so you need to do your due diligence to find out what's wrong with them, and you also need to just assume going in that you'll find more as the years go by and you'll need to be able to afford to deal with it. Most first-time buyers just don't seem to be very aware of the true average cost of home maintenance. The cost varies a lot depending on age and quality of the original construction, the local climate and geology, and the local costs of skilled labor and materials. One of the purposes of this thread is to help inform uninformed goons about those costs, and (especially) to disabuse starry-eyed young first-time buyers of the culturally-reinforced delusion that houses are financial goldmines and the key way to build wealth in America. So we emphasize these costs and problems a lot, because there's a huge weight of what amounts to self-reinforcing propaganda about the joys and advantages of home ownership that has to be counterbalanced.
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Feb 3, 2015 20:38
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Contractor costs are insane, there is a reason all the contractors are driving $65k trucks and living in $500k+ houses. The actual "contractor" will only be there to do the quote and to bug you for a check after it's done and then whine if you try to use a credit card.Leperflesh posted:The Caol Ila 12 is one of my favorite not-too-expensive single malts, good job there. I'm more of a smoke/peat monster Laphroaig/Ardbeg fan but the Aberlour is good stuff as a change of pace. I need to get some more scotch dammit.
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Feb 3, 2015 20:46
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Been in my new house for almost two weeks. Still haven't been royally hosed over by anything yet (except the mortgage  ). Feels good.
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Feb 3, 2015 20:55
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My home inspector said my soon-to-be house built in 1998 was doing better than many houses of its age. I have a 61 point list of items to do though, only 3 of which will be done before closing: http://justpaste.it/j8ei It seems like a lot of crap, but 90% of it could probably go at least a couple of years if I was lazy or couldn't afford it. Forgot to add this to the list:  baquerd fucked around with this message at 21:12 on Feb 3, 2015 |
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Feb 3, 2015 21:04
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baquerd posted:My home inspector said my soon-to-be house built in 1998 was doing better than many houses of its age. I have a 61 point list of items to do though, only 3 of which will be done before closing: Is the weird part that it's just chilling on the insulation instead of being mounted inside? I love my antenna
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Feb 3, 2015 21:16
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canyoneer posted:Is the weird part that it's just chilling on the insulation instead of being mounted inside? I love my antenna I don't think it's hooked up, could be wrong.
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Feb 3, 2015 21:19
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gotta be some lazy p.o. just tossed it up there or left it up there after a roof job.
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Feb 3, 2015 21:38
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Keyser S0ze posted:go away ugly kitchen, soffits, floors Mind posting a couple more pictures/detail of your kitchen overhead light? We have a similar ugly light and are looking for ideas on how to make it not look like horrible garbage any longer. 
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Feb 3, 2015 21:56
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Inspection went reasonably well. We just had a torrential downpour here yesterday and we found no evidence of water intrusion. The only thing that I found concerning was a sag in the living room ceiling. When we went up in the attic to check it out we found the gas hot water heater was sitting on just one joist right where the sag was. Also it looks like they cut a hole there to get the water heater up into the attic. I'm thinking that the best fix would be to replace it with a tankless unit, and replace the Sheetrock. It is unclear if the joist is sagging. The hot water heater has been there for 20 years. I'm trying to figure out how worried to be about all this and what it would cost to straighten out.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:18
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baquerd posted:My home inspector said my soon-to-be house built in 1998 was doing better than many houses of its age. I have a 61 point list of items to do though, only 3 of which will be done before closing: How are houses built in the eighties and nineties falling apart already?
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Feb 3, 2015 22:22
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Fancy_Lad posted:Mind posting a couple more pictures/detail of your kitchen overhead light? We have a similar ugly light and are looking for ideas on how to make it not look like horrible garbage any longer. After demolishing the old cabinets and soffits, I left the old light box intact and after much drywall/ceiling/texture/paint work had 4 5-inch LED's placed in it and 2 4-inch LED's placed in over the largest counter. I re-used an existing 3 way line and installed a dimmer. I'll have some crown molding installed in the light box to finish it off shortly. The great thing with LED's is they have very low electrical draw and you can run a zillion of them off your existing runs, so I can expand to more lights when I need to/can afford to pretty easily.     
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Feb 3, 2015 22:33
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S0ze since you like peated stuff you should try Highland Park. It's a heavily peated Islay, and widely regarded as one of the best single malts, period.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:36
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Citizen Tayne posted:How are houses built in the eighties and nineties falling apart already? Uneducated and unmotivated builders being forced to use cheap material and pushed to complete projects within unreasonable time frames
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Feb 3, 2015 22:37
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Manslaughter posted:Uneducated and unmotivated builders being forced to use cheap material and pushed to complete projects within unreasonable time frames All these posts are making me paranoid about the 115 year old house I'm buying. You don't generally get new construction anywhere near the city here.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:39
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Citizen Tayne posted:How are houses built in the eighties and nineties falling apart already? They're not, it's relatively normal maintenance. You might have looked at my list and thought worst case scenario, but most of these things are pretty minor, expected events.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:42
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I dunno dude, fixing foundation cracks looks like a pretty big deal to me.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:43
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Citizen Tayne posted:I dunno dude, fixing foundation cracks looks like a pretty big deal to me. Only if they're structural. After 20 years, it would almost be a little weird not to have some hairline cracks from what I understand.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:45
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baquerd posted:Only if they're structural. After 20 years, it would almost be a little weird not to have some hairline cracks from what I understand. Is the house on a slab or does it have a basement? The place I'm buying doesn't have any foundation cracking whatsoever and I skipped a lot that did.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:46
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The 2005 built Pulte home I was in previously was built like crap and they used crappy subs that not only didn't bother insulating half of my attic (the part you could see from the tiny crawlspace) but also botched EVERY SINGLE stucco job for miles around. Pulte paid for my insulation and I was on the list to have the stucco re-done as well so hopefully the new owners took advantage of it. My 1980 place, despite the popcorn ceilings and 1980's interior had a kick rear end substructure with very solid framing and minimal slab cracks.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:46
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Citizen Tayne posted:Is the house on a slab or does it have a basement? The place I'm buying doesn't have any foundation cracking whatsoever and I skipped a lot that did. Basement. I didn't actually notice the cracks until the inspection.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:48
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baquerd posted:Basement. I didn't actually notice the cracks until the inspection. Why do you think the cracks are there, and what do you think makes them normal?
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Feb 3, 2015 22:50
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Keyser S0ze posted:The 2005 built Pulte home I was in previously was built like crap and they used crappy subs that not only didn't bother insulating half of my attic (the part you could see from the tiny crawlspace) but also botched EVERY SINGLE stucco job for miles around. Pulte paid for my insulation and I was on the list to have the stucco re-done as well so hopefully the new owners took advantage of it. The place I'm buying has creosote-treated tree trunks as posts in the basement, with branch stubs and knots and all. It's pretty cool.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:52
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Citizen Tayne posted:Why do you think the cracks are there, and what do you think makes them normal? The cracks show no water damage whatsoever and are quite thin. Here's are some guide to cracks: http://www.cfawalls.org/downloads/cfa_cracking_flyer_v08.pdf And a webpage: http://www.cfawalls.org/foundations/cracking.htm Just grabbed the low-hanging fruit there on a Google search, but basically minor foundation cracks are super-common. I saw dozens of places with worse basements/foundations.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:54
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baquerd posted:The cracks show no water damage whatsoever and are quite thin. What do you think causes cracks in the foundation?
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Feb 3, 2015 22:55
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Here, this was literally on the first page of his first link:quote:• Causes of Cracks
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Feb 3, 2015 22:57
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What I'm saying is that you can expect more and bigger cracks as time goes on. I wouldn't touch a place with foundation cracking with a ten foot pole.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:59
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I have a crack in my foundation that was caused by a tree planted too near the house putting lateral pressure onto the concrete. I sent photos to a foundation specialist and they said unless the crack opens up or I see damage occurring in that wall, it's not worth having it repaired, it's essentially a cosmetic problem. Lots of houses have serious foundation problems, and that's worth paying attention to. But one or two hairline cracks over the space of 30+ years isn't always a sign that there's a serious problem, and if the foundation is stable over a period of several years, there's usually no need to make repairs.
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Feb 3, 2015 22:59
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Citizen Tayne posted:What do you think causes cracks in the foundation? A wide variety of things of course, as the links I posted indicate. Could I have found a house with no cracks in the foundation? Sure. Would it have been a better foundation? Hard to say. Would you have spotted this crack? It's the clearest one I can find from pictures I was given by the inspector. 
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Feb 3, 2015 23:01
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Citizen Tayne posted:The place I'm buying has creosote-treated tree trunks as posts in the basement, with branch stubs and knots and all. It's pretty cool. WHAT'S A BASEMENT? I HATE YOU PEOPLE WITH BASEMENTS. I WANT A BASEMENT DAMMIT. we had a sweeet basement in some old victorian we lived in for a while in Monterey when I was a kid. So nice. No basements in California anymore which really sucks. If I was some demented billionaire I'd build 10 stories down with all sorts of tunnels and crypts and poo poo.
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Feb 3, 2015 23:09
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If your foundation is made out of concrete, it's cracked. Period. Careful, high quality concrete work can make sure those cracks occur in ways that are less visible. But residential construction does not involve loads that require that level of quality and hairline cracks are not in any way a red flag.
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Feb 3, 2015 23:10
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Keyser S0ze posted:WHAT'S A BASEMENT? I HATE YOU PEOPLE WITH BASEMENTS. I WANT A BASEMENT DAMMIT. We don't get basements because we have earthquakes and it's much harder (read: more expensive) to make a house sitting on a big hole not fall into that hole when an earthquake happens, than it is to just not have the hole there.
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Feb 3, 2015 23:15
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| # ? May 29, 2024 17:37 |
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I want CT to become a home inspector and go around like an rear end in a top hat with potential buyers asking cryptic rhetorical questions. "How much water do you think you'll lose from that leaking pipe? How do walls get mold? Do you know how walls get mold?"
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Feb 3, 2015 23:15
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