Buy a home warranty. We did not for who knows what reason and we are regretting it already. I actually have a call out to my realtor to ask if we can still get in with her discount since it's been less than 30 days (6 days, actually...)
What would you tell home buyers is a must do before they close?
hostess / wonderful persimmon / 25556 posts
@Foodnerd81: your realtor can probably get you a deal on one. They're typically $100 cheaper if bought before closing.
grapefruit / 4321 posts
Make sure you still have a pretty significant amount of savings even after you pay your down payment/closing costs. I always cringe when I hear people pretty much depleted their savings to buy their home. I was AMAZED at how much money we spent outfitting our new house. Things you don't think of before your first time home purchase (like a lawn mower, tools, appliance repairs, etc).
wonderful cherry / 21504 posts
@mediagirl: it sounds too good to be true and like it's just a scheme to get money... But from your posts I take t you've had issues that would have otherwise been covered? Care to share examples (on my wall if you prefer)? We already know some of the appliances are older and they work now, but will probably need replacement in the next few years. And we know we need new windows in short order ($$$$ but at least we know it before we buy).
pomegranate / 3895 posts
@Foodnerd81: You aren't asking me, but we've had a home warranty with all of our homes in the first year and they have covered a whole host of things. You just pay a copay and a licensed technician comes out and fixes it. It even paid to replace our dishwasher with the equivalent when it died! I don't think it would cover your windows (it doesn't cover cosmetic stuff), but it's been worth it for us. You just need to read your policy really well. In our new house our AC went out on moving day and they sent a technician out who repaired it and said if it still gave us problems that they would recommend replacing it - which would be 100% covered under our warranty.
@Truth Bombs: Agreed. I also encourage people to make sure that they have factored in moving costs and all the other stuff that comes along with moving. Even with an inspection, there are TONS of unknowns and inspectors miss things. Somewhat related - I cringe whenever people bring up downsizing as a cost savings (especially when I tell them their retirement numbers don't work) - I've never seen a client downsize and it save money. Window treatments are not cheap, my friend.
wonderful cherry / 21504 posts
@LBee: oh I know Windows wouldn't be covered, plus the issue is already know anyway. So I guess my adding it in there was a little pointless... But thanks, I really hadn't considered the home warranty at all and that does make sense.
honeydew / 7504 posts
@mediagirl: Yes, home warranty. We didn't get one and we REALLY regretted it. Our inspector missed a ton of stuff and we ended up paying a lot of money for stuff that should have been caught and we could have negotiated into closing. At least if we'd gotten a warranty, a lot of it would have been covered by the warranty.
hostess / wonderful apple seed / 16729 posts
@mediagirl: @LBee: @littlebug: For budgeting purposes, about how much is a home warranty? Or is it a percentage of your house or something?
hostess / wonderful persimmon / 25556 posts
@bluestriped bee: it can be anywhere from $450 - $700+. But I think it depends on the area you are in, as well?
nectarine / 2641 posts
Scope the water line...
Our water line backed up due to about 10 feet of it being sunken 10 days after we moved into our old house. There's no evidence previous owners knew, and the house had been bank-owned for at least a few months anyway. It cost us about $5,000.
When we bought our current house, we had the entire line scoped. Our plumber said he's cost people a few sales by revealing what was in the water line. (Luckily, this one was in great shape!)
hostess / wonderful apple seed / 16729 posts
@Jess1483: How much does it cost to scope a water line?
nectarine / 2641 posts
@bluestriped bee: Hm...our plumber gave us a deal (he always felt really awful after that first back-up...), but I think it was $250ish without it. Well worth it for my peace of mind.
hostess / wonderful apple seed / 16729 posts
@Jess1483: That's not bad. If it was above $1000, I would worry about paying of that for every house I considered. I'm assuming you do this before you settle... like during the home inspection, right. Yeah, I'm pretty clueless about home buying. I only got as far as considering placing an offer on a house and we decided we weren't ready to buy a home.
nectarine / 2641 posts
@bluestriped bee: Yes, during the home inspection. We had a couple other things looked at at the same time. We knew the house needed quite a bit of work, and we also wanted some improvements bid, which wouldn't have been a part of the home inspection (gas fireplace installed, etc.)
pomelo / 5509 posts
@mediagirl: I'd also add in to check with the sellers to see if there are any existing warranties that you can take over. For example, the house we just bought, they had a high-efficiency heating system installed recently, and it's still under warranty, so we made sure to ask them to please transfer the warranty to us. Same with new windows that were just installed.
nectarine / 2641 posts
And, for the record, we had a home warranty at the time of the flood back-up, and it was entirely unhelpful. We did not get a warranty with this home (and 6 months in, knock on wood, we haven't regretted it.)
pomegranate / 3244 posts
@bluestriped bee: You can also ask your realtor to write a home warranty into the contract! Our realtor does that as a standard thing...asking for the sellers to purchase a home warranty up to $X (I think it was $500). We haven't had to use it yet but it's nice knowing that it's there if needed. I keep willing my kitchen appliances to die before February when the warranty runs out because they are so ugly, lol.
grapefruit / 4800 posts
Our home warranty was useless. There's 1001 reasons they won't cover things. We had 3 diff issues, they denied them all. One for previous home owner did damage that wasn't covered, one was a pipe failed but apparently wasn't up to code, and one was deemed weather related, which apparently didn't fall under normal wear and tear. We got some money bc I had emailed specific questions beforehand but it was a painful terrible process.
The most helpful for us was getting a re inspection. We had a bunch of stuff that we wanted fixed after the first inspection and the receipts weren't detailed or compressive that they gave us for work completed. So we paid 100 for a re inspection and they ended up Prob having close to 1000 of work not completed.
clementine / 828 posts
Our home warranty was also useless. The seller paid it, I would not get one otherwise. They charged a fixed fee to look at things, and almost everything was not covered, or it would have been cheaper to pay for the repair outright (the repair would have cost less than the fee).
hostess / papaya / 10540 posts
Sometimes you can actually negotiate the warranty as part of your contract so you don't have to pay for it!
I wouldn't buy a house without doing a home inspection.
persimmon / 1132 posts
Like PPs haves mentioned, we got a home warranty ($695 because it covers AC) in the negotiations. It didn't cost us a cent. We may renew it on our own dime when the time comes since the AC is near the end of its lifespan.
@bluestriped bee: I think it's $80 for a tech to come out for us.
Here's my other must-do list:
Home inspection (duh)
Septic inspection
Well inspection
Water quality testing
Roof inspection
Read title report for existing easements (or hire someone to do it; closing attorney doesn't count)
Arborist inspection (if there are big trees on property.
Each inspection is $$$ but, if done during due diligence, you can use the results to better negotiate. We probably spent $1000 in inspections this last time and but saved $5000 - $6000 in things the seller had to repair for us. That's quite a good return on investment! We skipped roof and arborist inspections which would have doubled those savings. Each time we buy, I learn another thing that should be checked! Reading the title report is the latest biggie. We paid for it but never even got a copy... It wasn't until we went to put in a fence that we were told about a drainage easement ... No one told us or probably read the report (closing attorney, our agent). Real estate buying is so hard!!
wonderful pear / 26210 posts
@mdf106: I had the same experience. We tried to use it to replace the fridge when I realized that if you closed the door, the freezer popped open, but they didn't even want to come out for the repair.
pear / 1648 posts
Expanding on what @littlebug: said - make sure your home inspector really does his job! We hired one that was "highly recommended" by our broker and actually did have great online reviews... but my husband had to follow him around and point things out to him! It was such a waste of money and also concerning given what he might have missed. He couldn't even figure out that he should plug in the fridge to make sure it worked (it was unplugged but the sellers had left the plug handy for that reason, I'm sure). We are planning to buy again in the next few months and this issue is top on our list... Sigh.
honeydew / 7504 posts
Also, if you live in an area where radon levels are high, ask for a radon test and then a mitigation system if the levels are high. Our first home was tested and high, so we negotiated the installation of the mitigation system into the contract. I honestly don't know how you know if radon levels are high locally, but I'm sure if you ask your realtor they would know.
ETA: Here's a chart from the EPA https://www.epa.gov/radon/find-information-about-local-radon-zones-and-state-contact-information#radonmap
grapefruit / 4545 posts
Ooooohhh... @Amorini: brought up a great point on looking at the trees! DH and I have always said we suck and noticing massive yard work before moving in. We've bought both our houses in the Winter and therefore the ground was covered with snow...
However - we should have call our tree guy to look at the trees here in our current house. We have five 100' oaks within striking distance of the house...thankfully they are all healthy but still...just trimming them as was needed cost us $2000 right after we moved in...would have been good to pay attention to that! God forbid any of them needed to come down it could be $2K per tree!
clementine / 828 posts
@bluestriped bee: I think in the $50-$100 range, I don't remember exactly. I am sure it varies.
We even had an AC issue which was not covered, because it was caused by an act of nature (a rabbit chewed through an AC line).
grapefruit / 4321 posts
@peachykeen: Its amazing how bad some home inspectors are. We love ours (who actually was recommended to us by our realtor) but the guy who inspected our old home for our buyers was terrible. He didn't point stuff out to them that had showed up on our inspection when we bought the place 3 years earlier, and never did anything about. Our A/C unit was also pretty old (it functioned fine, but would probably need replacing sooner rather than later, and could have stood to be bigger for the size of the house) and he didn't mention anything about it. I'm pretty sure he never even went in our attic.
grapefruit / 4321 posts
@bluestriped bee: You don't do a home inspection until you're under contract (and you can back out if you don't like the findings of the home inspection), so it's not something you would have to do on every house you looked at.
wonderful cherry / 21504 posts
@littlebug: our area potentially has high radon levels and every inspector we called included testing for it as an optional (but recommended) add on. DH wanted to skip it because he does those tests for work anyone and he could easily do it himself but I insisted we keep it included with the home inspection (luckily it was fine anyway).
pomelo / 5129 posts
@Truth Bombs: I had the same experience with inspectors. I think it's acceptable that different people catch different things, but there was literally nothing from my move in report that my buyer's inspector put in their report.
I would also caution that it's important to be there when the inspector is inspecting. I think you get a lot more out of the experience that way and you're able to ask them questions about things you see and they can better explain to you the severity of the things they're writing down.
pomelo / 5509 posts
@Foodnerd81: Same. Our home inspector did the radon test, it was just an additional cost.
@MaryM: Oh my gosh I'm so glad I was there during the inspection. I never would have been able to make heads or tails of the report!
pomelo / 5129 posts
@IRunForFun: I wasn't there for the one on my first house, but I sent DH (we were just dating at the time).
But when we bought the second house, I knew better that he doesn't always hear things the same way I do, so I should probably listen for myself instead of just letting him decide what does and doesn't get done. So glad I did!
He's convinced our gutters need to be replaced because they look crooked. I'm glad I was there to hear the inspector verify that yes, they are crooked, but they slant for a reason. You know, so the rain can drain in the direction of the downspout.
pear / 1622 posts
If buying an older home, I recommend not skimping on the inspection - we got a couple different quotes and wanted a lot of attention to detail. Sure issues can come up after an inspection but hopefully the inspection will catch most issues.
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