When selling your home there are quite a few things that you can do for a little to no cost to help prepare your home for the inspection. Although we were in a sellers market and it may not seem that preparing for a smooth inspection process is that important, it’s worthwhile to take a little bit of time and effort to prepare your home so that the entire inspection process and negotiations are smoother for both parties all around. Here are a few things to do to prepare your home for inspection.
No Cost Measures
This one may sound basic an obvious, but having a clean home goes along way in developing a good impression of the home with the inspector. It’s also important to note that many prospective home buyers attend the inspection, so you are also maintaining the good impression that was set at the showing. It’s also assumed that if someone can keep a clean home, there’s a better chance that they have been good stewards of home maintenance throughout the life of the home.
Secondly, it’s important to facilitate easy access for the inspector to areas of the home that need inspecting such as the mechanical room which would be the furnace and the water heater typically, as well as access to any attics and crawl spaces. Clearing a space for the electrical panel is also important. It’s important that the inspector is able to access all of the important parts of the home so that a complete and thorough inspection can be conducted. Otherwise, depending on the situation the inspector may have to coordinate to return to the property at another day and time to finish the inspection due to limitations such as access.
Another no cost item that a seller can do to prepare for the inspection is to gather and organize any and all maintenance documents and product manuals about the home. It is always helpful to have service records and product manuals that help detail how and when the home has been taken care of and when major appliances have been replaced.
Low Cost Measures
Moving on to some low cost measures, it’s a wise idea to have basic service completed on the major systems of the home such as a tune-up on the furnace and air-conditioning system, a garage door tune-up and servicing, cleaning of appliances, cleaning of gutters, and other general home maintenance items. It’s also important to address minor health and safety items such as installing proper smoke detectors and carbon monoxide detectors, covering any exposed electrical junction’s, and removing any other health and safety hazard.
The reason that it is so wise to have professional trades people service equipment ahead of the inspection is that home inspectors are generalist by trade, so the word of a specific trade professional such as an HVAC technician or an electrician is typically going to trump the word and opinion of the home inspector. If proper documentation is provided by the seller to the buyer regarding any issue and question, that often eases the concern from the buyer. Additionally, if there are specific issues with the home that are included in the seller's property disclosure, such as foundation cracks or past or present moisture issues, it is best that the seller have these reevaluated and pre-addressed. For example, if there is a foundation crack that has been assessed and advanced by a structural engineer, then there’s already an engineers report detailing that item. More information is better in these scenarios so that the buyer is informed and educated in a transparent manner.
There are quite a few measures at home sellers can take in advance of the buyers inspection in order to help facilitate a smoother inspection process that will leave the buyer feeling more comfortable about the purchase of your home. These measures typically will also benefit you in the sense that the negotiations, objection, and general coordination and facilitation of the inspection process will go much more smoothly. Whether you are looking to budget a small amount of funds towards preparing a home or are looking at no cost measures such as cleaning facilitating access and organizing documents, it’s a wise idea to put forth some time, energy and effort preparing for the buyers inspection. We also advise that you conduct a pre-listing inspection in order to gain a better understanding of what items may come up on the buyers inspection so that you can avoid surprises, have a better understanding of the condition of your property and what may need to be done prior to closing.
For more information about general sellers preparation for our pre-listing inspection services, check out our services page and please feel free to contact us with any questions.