One of the greatest mistakes you can make as a home seller is to skip getting your property checked by a professional home inspector. Essentially, there is a good reason behind the fact that home purchase agreements made in California almost always include a home inspection contingency clause. Getting a home inspection is an important safety guarantee to the person looking to become the new owner of the house. Accordingly, we will talk about a few primary reasons you shouldn’t skip a home inspection when selling your house.
You might be thinking to yourself: “Well, the house has been built/inspected a few years ago, and there is probably nothing wrong with it!”. However, relying on what you can see on the outside is hardly a guarantee that everything is in perfect condition.
In some cases, you might need to sell your home as quickly as possible in the frantic LA real estate market. Admittedly, organizing a home inspection can slightly slow down the selling process. For this reason, some sellers decide to skip the home inspection altogether to save their valuable time and money.
Unfortunately, however prudent it may seem at first, this practice is potentially a recipe for disaster. The aftermath of this decision can cost you so much more than a simple home inspection. Alongside this, there are many other benefits that you can reap from a good home inspection. Let’s take a look at what we have in mind.
It is impossible to locate damages just by looking at the exterior of your home
As we have mentioned briefly, it is improbable you will be able to locate potential damages or malfunctions of your appliances or large systems like the heating, cooling, or plumbing on your own. Sometimes it is simply impossible to identify damages without specialized tools or expertise.
Specialist tools and expertise are necessary for a proper home inspection.
A home inspector is a verified and unbiased third party
Essentially, no matter how skilled of a handyman you may be in your free time, there are simply some things that require specialist knowledge for you to call it a proper inspection.
A home inspection’s purpose is to locate any faults that are not easy to see and detect, in addition to finding places of incipient deterioration of certain elements of your home that are undetectable by laypeople.
Furthermore, a home inspector’s estimation of the scale and range of damages can save you a lot of money on repairs. Namely, maintenance specialists can overestimate the home repair service price, and you have no way of knowing this if you do not get a home inspection. Home inspectors are, essentially, unbiased and objective as they have no financial gain from inflating the estimated repair costs.
A home inspector can provide an objective assessment of the faults that exist in your LA home.
You may not be aware of hidden damages and faults in your LA home
Furthermore, there are numerous cases when people are simply unaware that something does not work correctly in their homes. You might be confident that your home does not have any flaws, but in reality, you might be a few months away from, for instance, a major and costly leak without even knowing about it.
So, be wary that the possibility that your home exterior is not a good predictor of the actual state your house might be in. There is an array of hidden problems that could have gradually developed in the roof, foundation, or wiring, which could lead to you having financial and legal issues in the future, which is definitely something any sensible home seller in LA wants to avoid.
A home inspection is an assurance that your home structure is safe.
Alt: a home inspector checking for damages on a solar-paneled roof
A home inspection can locate the potential presence of dangerous substances such as mold or radon
Another argument for getting your LA home inspected lies in the fact that every home should regularly be checked for dangerous substances and hazardous particles such as mold and radon.
What is tricky about mold and radon is that they typically start out small but end up wreaking havoc on the living space if left undetected for an extended period of time. This means you could be selling a house that is potentially carrying a severe health hazard. Furthermore, not only is mold dangerous for human respiratory organs, but it can also inflict damages to the basic structural parts of your home.
You shouldn’t skip a home inspection when selling your home because it can help you with your negotiating power
Any person that has ever tried to sell their home knows that you have to go through numerous showings before you finally sell it at its actual market value. Having lots of showings without getting a single good offer for your home is not something you want to happen to you when you are in the process of selling your home in Los Angeles.
A home inspection allows you to ask for a higher price for your home
Luckily, procuring a home inspection report and placing it into the property listing documentation is one way you can negotiate a better selling price. In this way, potential homebuyers have the necessary reassurance that a verified professional has confirmed that the property is safe. In order for you to sell your home at or over its LA market value, real estate agencies might require this type of confirmation from you.
Hence, if you, for instance, want to get a good cash offer for your home, a home inspection certificate can increase your negotiating power. So, getting a home inspection is worth considering when you do not want to settle for a price lower than the market value. Also, it ensures that homebuyers cannot make requests for a price drop if they have to arrange for repairs after the purchase.
A home inspection allows you to locate and fix potential problems
So, getting a home inspection can also help you work towards increasing the property’s market value. Namely, a good home inspector will note down not only current damages in your home but also spots of potential future hazard. As a result, you will be able to fix anything that could be considered a flaw in the eyes of real estate agents and home buyers.
A comprehensive home inspection in LA for a single-family home costs anywhere from $225 to $550, depending on the service you hire, the age and square footage of the house, the condition of the house, whether or not you have a pool (which can cost you an additional $50 to $395)…
At this point, this might seem like a lot of money. However, this amount of money is only a fraction of the cost compared to what you might have to pay to fix any significant household malfunctions or damages. So, in terms of finances, you definitely shouldn’t skip a home inspection when selling your home.
You should definitely have your pool inspected as well.
If you are in a rush to get a home inspection so that you can finally enter the real estate market with your property, you might want to consider moving out of your LA home before the inspection. The good news is that a good moving company can handle your relocation in no time so that you can get a home inspector to finish the examination in a fewer number of days.
A home inspection allows you to keep your confidence and peace of mind
There are many practical reasons you shouldn’t skip a home inspection when selling your home. However, it is not only for reasons of practicality that getting a home inspection is advised.
Since a home inspection allows you to vouch that everything is the way it should be in your home, this will enable you to keep your confidence in the negotiating process. It also eliminates any specks of doubt about your home’s structural quality, which is, decidedly, a crucial negotiating factor.
A home inspection keeps potential buyers calm as well
So, as we have seen, keeping everything in your home in check carries the advantage of you not worrying about potential price reductions once you enter into negotiations. You can stand by your word that everything in your house is definitely in order. However, this also goes the other way round.
A home inspection certificate is also an excellent way to eliminate buyer’s remorse and make them feel confident and at peace with the purchase. This will also be insurance for you since the buyers will not be able to take any legal action against you due to improper disclosure, that is if something happens after the purchase.
Henceforth, all parties involved can be sure that all of those ‘what ifs’ are no cause for concern, making a home inspection a great way to ensure both the buyer and the seller are content with the deal made in the negotiations. Thus, keeping both your and the buyer’s peace of mind is definitely one of the reasons you shouldn’t skip a home inspection when selling your home.