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My husband and I are buying our first home (yay!) and we are so confused by the lead law in Massachusetts. We received a disclosure from on realtor, but it doesn't seem to make things any less confusing. The home we are buying was built in 1957 so there probably is lead in the house somewhere. We have a disclosure from the sellers stating they are not aware of lead in the house, which I understand really means they haven't tested for it.
We are pregnant with our first child (due any day now) and so there will definitely be children under the age of 6 living in the house. Are we required to test for lead? And if we tested and came back positive for lead, would we be required to delead the house? I know that if we tested and were positive we would be required to disclose when we sell the house. My understanding of the law (which may be wrong) is that the owners of every home built before 1978 with a child under age 6 living in the home are obligated to delead their home.
I asked my realtor about it and she said that in the past 10 years+ she has only ever had one property that had been tested for lead and she had never had a buyer that tested. From looking at the MA lead testing database, it doesn't seem like very many homes are tested and in the ones that are almost all of them seem to come back with violations.
If anyone can point me in the right direction, I'd really appreciate it.
Edited to add that the house seems to be (have not had the inspection yet) it pretty good condition).
Last edited by Carrie0930; 05-30-2013 at 10:30 PM..
Reason: Additional Information
Lead paint is a serious problem. Consuming it can lead to all sorts of neurological problems for children adults and pets. The disclosure is to cover the present owners butts. When they check off the unknown box it is pretty much saying buyer beware, yes lead is probably present but we are not sure. Chances are since your new house was built in 1957 it will have lead paint and probably some other not nice things like asbestos.
If the paint is in good shape and not chipping, flaking or peeling you should be OK. The trouble is when a child finds a flake and puts it in his mouth it taste sweet so he will want to eat more. Children have been known to gnaw on windowsills and they get exposed that way. You can buy covers for the sills if you are worried about this. Chances are the original paint has been painted over many times since 1957 so you won't have the flaking.
What I don't know is if you test for it and find it are you required to have it removed which can be a lengthy and pricey thing to do. The area that has the paint needs to be encapsulated and anything that is sanded or scraped off is considered hazardous waste and will need to be disposed of properly.
If you don't have it professionally removed remember if you are handy that any time you sand to prep your house to paint you might be releasing the lead dust into the air.
I don't know your age but chances are you are old enough to have been exposed to lead paint as a child and you are OK. I know I am but lead can be a real issue if the person is exposed to a lot of it.
Lead paint is a serious problem. Consuming it can lead to all sorts of neurological problems for children adults and pets. The disclosure is to cover the present owners butts. When they check off the unknown box it is pretty much saying buyer beware, yes lead is probably present but we are not sure. Chances are since your new house was built in 1957 it will have lead paint and probably some other not nice things like asbestos.
Like the OP's real estate agent, I have been a part of many transactions but I've only witnessed two lead paint tests in my career. The reasoning I hear when people elect not to test is that it's a pretty safe assumption that there is lead paint in a house built prior to 1978. I remember once discussing lead paint with a buyer client and they said to me "why should I spend the money to confirm what I already know?"
As the OP mentioned, if you test for lead you are required to disclose the presence of lead when you sell. Additionally, the lead inspector files a copy of the report with the state so it's pretty much public knowledge when you have lead in your house.
Asbestos can be pretty common in older homes as well. I don't see too many of those "octupus" boilers anymore. I assume most have stopped functioning at this point and have been replaced with modern, asbestos free boilers. However, I still sometimes see asbestos pipe wrap in homes and I see a lot of 9" x 9" vinyl floor tiles typically in basements which can be an indicator of asbestos. There are other places asbestos can hide as well and a good home inspector can spot many of them.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cape Cod Todd
If the paint is in good shape and not chipping, flaking or peeling you should be OK. The trouble is when a child finds a flake and puts it in his mouth it taste sweet so he will want to eat more. Children have been known to gnaw on windowsills and they get exposed that way. You can buy covers for the sills if you are worried about this. Chances are the original paint has been painted over many times since 1957 so you won't have the flaking.
I'm not a doctor, but, my understanding is that the lead needs to be ingested or inhaled in order for it to be an issue. If it just touches your skin it's not going to do anything, but if you start chewing on a window sill you'll get lead poisoning.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cape Cod Todd
What I don't know is if you test for it and find it are you required to have it removed which can be a lengthy and pricey thing to do. The area that has the paint needs to be encapsulated and anything that is sanded or scraped off is considered hazardous waste and will need to be disposed of properly.
My understanding is that if you test for lead paint and it is found then you are required by law to delead if there will/is a child under the age of 6 living in the house. If you test for lead and find it but do not delead if your kid later gets lead poisoning the state will levy a hefty fine against you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cape Cod Todd
If you don't have it professionally removed remember if you are handy that any time you sand to prep your house to paint you might be releasing the lead dust into the air.
I don't know your age but chances are you are old enough to have been exposed to lead paint as a child and you are OK. I know I am but lead can be a real issue if the person is exposed to a lot of it.
While it would be a safe wager to bet that not every contractor does this . . . I remember reading that when work is performed in a house built prior to 1978 that prior to doing any demo the contractor is supposed to test with a lead kit. Dealing with lead when performing rennovations certainly adds to the cost of the project. The contractor needs to put in a place a lot of safety measures and and debris is more expensive to dispose of because it's considered hazardous waste.
A big area of concern you hear a lot about when talking about lead paint is windows and doors. These parts of your house have moving parts which rub against each other and can create lead dust in the air should they have lead paint on them. If your house has older windows and doors, I would strongly consider replacing them.
Peeling paint is least of your worries. It is paint dust from old windows and doors that is most dangerous, but invisible.
Make sure windows are new or budget to install new ones ASAP. Also make sure that doors (if painted) are well encapsulated and not releasing dust into the air. Honestly if you need to do any work with newborn it will be super tough, so my advice is not to buy unless you are sure that your bases are covered. Once the house is yours it is your pride, but also your headache. If the place has old windows with peeling paint, replace ASAP or pass.
As long as the windows are new don't worry about it. No one really ever tests for lead and you shouldn't either. It's one thing to say you don't know whether there is lead paint but completely different to say there is, and once you test it you have to disclose the results if you decide to sell later on.
We bought our house last November when my daughter was 7 months old-crawling and licking her hands and anything else she could get, her lead test was normal, I was really worried but everything was ok. If you are that worried you can buy a home lead test from home depot and just test the surfaces where you have chipped paint. This is not official so you don't need to disclose it and it will give you a peace of mind. I think after the 50s they were barely using lead paint anyway.
Good luck, don't let your baby chew on the wall and you will be ok!
I would say test for it. You are having a baby and it's the responsible thing
I know of one person who got lead poisoning and had to be chelated twice.
Extremely painful. And there are lasting effects. She's a bit slow.
We recently purchased a home built in the early 1960's and we opted for the test. This was toward the end of 2012, so the market was still soft enough that we could include a lead contingency with our offer. We'd assumed lead would be everywhere, which would have been an issue given our newborn. The test showed lead in only two secondary areas of the home (one outside) and will be cheap enough to remediate. Between the firm knowledge that the bulk of the house is lead-free, the money we had budgeted and saved on a major lead removal project, and the resulting ease of other renovations such as painting and wallpaper removal that we could now do ourselves, the test was well worth it in our book.
If you are worried about lead in the house and you love the house, MassHousing offers 0% interest loan to get rid of the lead for owner-occupied with a child or children under the age of six; and 2% for owner with child or children over the age of six.
The lead issue is so frustrating. We have two kids under six and I couldn't find a single person who recommended doing the lead test, including our realtor and others who are supposed to be representing our interests. I think because it's such a liability issue, but if I heard one more person give the whole "We all grew up with it and we're fine" or "Don't let your kid chew the walls" or "That's only a problem for bad inner city parents who don't watch their kids and lead them eat paint chips"(!) I was going to scream.
**Vent: the problem with lead paint is not so much about kids eating paint chips, it's from the dust that is released and inhaled or ingested by kids who put everything in their mouths (toy has saliva on it, lead dust sticks to saliva, toy goes back in mouth). Windows with lead paint release that lead dust every time they are opened or closed due to the friction against the paint. Ok, vent over.**
We hired a lead inspector anyway at the time of the home inspection, and even though I was verbally given results nothing was disclosed to anyone, I think so we would be given the choice of walking away or negotiating and the sellers wouldn't be required to delead. It also meant that we technically wouldn't have to delead right away either if we bought the house. It's all both a relief not to be under any legal requirements and frustrating that this all seems to mean so little to everybody whether kids get lead poisoning or not, as long as no laws are broken.
Anyway, we chose this house even though it was built in the 1940s because the outside was covered with vinyl siding and all of the windows have been replaced, two major areas where lead paint would be found and where it would be the most expensive to clean up. We figured that if there were lead paint it might be on minor areas we could afford to have remediated, and sure enough, there were just two areas in the basement which we can afford to have done before we move in. Actually when I spoke with a deleading contractor he said it would cost more to do the cleanup and certification than to do the actual work.
So we got a test pre-purchase and are deleading by choice but apparently we wouldn't have to since the test results weren't reported. The previous owners bought before they had children so they didn't have to test or delead even though kids under six were living in the house. As is my understanding, if they or we did a lead test after buying the house and after having kids, if those tests showed that there were lead in the house, then according to MA law it would have to be remediated within 90 days.
Good luck with whatever you choose and congrats on the new baby
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MA Lead Paint Law
