underground houses for sale and Is the realtor trying to pull a fast one to make a sale?
underground houses for sale:
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Question by happydawg: Is the realtor trying to pull a fast one to make a sale?
My partner and I noticed a house for sale and we really like it. We went to look at it and its beautiful. We reviewed the disclosure from the real estate agent. It said a valve needed replaced on the propane tank. We went to the bank and asked for a loan on the home, and paid $ 500 for the home to be inspected by a professional.
We found out the roof needs replaced very soon. There are dozens of shingles missing.
We also found out the underground propane tank has a leak and needs replaced.
The mortgage lender at the bank told me they would not loan on a house which has a bad roof.
She also told me they will be sending out an appraiser to appraise the house.
The real estate agent wants us to put it in the sales contract we will pay ourselves to replace the roof.
I think the seller needs to replace the roof.
I also think this should have been in the disclosure. Why would the agent not know that roof is falling off. He has some very slick comebacks and says the home inspector says the roof is in “need of repairs”, and says the home owners knew the roof was needing some work but believe we should pay for it.
The propane tank has been dealt with.
Who should pay for the roof? Shouldnt it be fixed before the sale?
We offered $ 205,000.00 and asked them to fix the roof. We found a contractor who is well known in our area to give us an estimate for it
$ 8,600.00. The seller wants to pay $ 3,000. and have us pay the other $ 5600.00 It bugs me it was not in the initial disclosure. If the roof is bad and the appraiser from the bank finds out, its a no go. They will not loan on it.
Best answer:
Answer by skr
Everything is negotiable. The real issue is you are putting someone in charge of one of the major financial decisions of your life and you don’t trust them. There are tons, TONS of homes on the market so either you come to terms with what the seller is asking on this home or you find another home….thats right after you find someone else to represent you. (If you happen to be in the SF Bay area I can recommend a few) Best of luck!
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
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The owner has to fix the roof, or adjust the selling price accordingly to mutual satisfaction.
In the latter case, you would sign a waiver agreeing to buy the house with the roof in its present condition – of course, the bank may then refuse the loan, and you’d be stuck.
So, I strongly suggest that you get the owner to fix the roof to the extent it fully passes inspection of an inspector approved by the bank.
I would not put it past the realtor to pull a fast one – sales are generally weak in this poor economic climate, and they need the business, so they have enough “incentive” to cut corners and not do as thorough a job as they should.
In today’s buyer market, you hold all the cards. If you do not like or trust the deal, just walk. I suspect they will not want this to happen.
It depends on how much they’re asking for the house. If the house is being sold for $ 100,000 but with the roof fixed (cost of $ 10,000,) it would be worth $ 150,000 (the true appraised value,) then it’s in the buyer’s best financial interest to pay for it. I’m not sure, however, if the bank won’t give you a loan on it, how you pay for a roof on a house you have no guarantee of owning. If on the other hand, he’s asking $ 150 and it’s still going to cost $ 10K to put the roof on AND have to pay for the propane tank, then the seller is crazy. The price of the house should be marked to reflect the repairs that need to be done.
Often a seller will mark the price way down because they don’t want to fool with it. You’ll have to weigh the costs with the value vs what the selling price would be.
If the shingles that fell off are not in plain sight, most sellers wouldn’t know that there’s a problem (unless it’s leaking into the home). When we had our gutters cleaned, we didn’t know the gutters were clogged and that luckily we had the gutters cleaned in time before it started getting into the home from overfilling. How would we know? We can’t see inside gutters on the roof!
The truth is the seller does NOT have to do ANYTHING. You had an inspection for a reason: to ensure the home you want to buy is in good shape and any issues or potential problems are brought to light. There’s no way that you can prove that the sellers knew unless they had the roof cleaned or some stuff worked on and it was disclosed to them. But how would you prove that?
The thing about sellers and buyers is that sellers always think that they sell too low and buyers think they buy too high. So they get into tiny silly things like who pays for what. We almost lost a deal because the buyer refused to pay for a new microwave and didn’t want to go through with it over a $ 300 microwave! You may feel like the seller should pay, but the seller clearly doesn’t. If it’s that big of a deal to you to pay the $ 5600, then MOVE ON to another home because god knows it’s a buyer’s market! It’s not the end of the world. It’s pretty straightforward:
a. You love the home and you pay the $ 5600;
b. You walk away.
Choose one and get it over with. There’s no point haggling over this. If the seller isn’t desperate to sell and is mortgage free or whatever the circumstance, they can just let you walk and wait for another buyer. Your call.
Just make sure you don’t spend one cent on ANY repairs before you own the house.