Originally Posted by
dan orourke
I always let me cleint know this on the phone and say something like: "I'm going to put the pedal to the metal on your home, like I would with a buyer. So hiring me can be problematic as you must disclose my findings and sometimes it makes selling your home difficult. However, often buyers love that you took the time to have a pre-inspection and see that you made a lot of repairs...."
80% of the time the seller doesn't hire any inspector after I explain this to them. Yes, I loose business (short term) but long term, the majority of sellers uses me for their purchase of their new home because they loved my honesty.
Dan,
Only 80% of the time?
I think my percentage of not being hired after explaining that to them was more like 99.99999% of the time.
I think I remember doing 1 or 2, 'maybe 3', pre-listing inspections in a little over 16 years. Most of the time, the seller acknowledged that ... maybe, just maybe, they did not want to know and would be better off 'taking their chances' when the sale and inspection happened.
I did not 'intentionally' convince them 'not to do a pre-listing inspection', but after I explained the facts of life regarding disclosure and what was found on the
inspection report would either need to be corrected or disclosed ... the result was virtually always 'Thank you for taking your time to explain that to me *before* the inspection. I will call you when I buy the house I will move to so you can inspect that one.'
Time wasted? No. I usually got 'their' inspection out of it. And I did not have to worry about them correcting or having to disclose everything I was sure I would find.
Maintenance inspections? I would consider them the same a 'pre-listing inspections'. *IF* they do not correct what you find, they now know about it, and it must be disclosed when they sell. A 'maintenance inspection' is simply a 'pre-listing inspection' done months or years ahead of time.
