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I simply refused to buy a flip. It's very easy to find out if you are dealing with one. The seller was incentivised to cut every corner possible and that's not a risk I'm willing to take.
Yes, that's an interesting filter. Do not buy a house that has been lived in under 5 years, then you automatically weed out flippers that way.
I walk through a lot of homes that have been flipped. There is absolutely no reason to avoid flipped homes, especially if you do not have the particular skills or cash to do renovations yourself. I see a lot of homes that need a lot of work and are not financeable as is. Good flippers can take those homes, clean them up, put new roofs on them, and with minimal updates, make them liveable and qualify them for bank financing. Flippers often take fixer-upper’s and make them accessible to entry level first time buyers.
So I have the absolute opposite opinion from that poster, especially for nervous, novice first time owners, like I think you are, OP. You need a nice, turn key house with new fixtures and new appliances, new floors and a good roof. Something that isn't going to cost you a lot of cash right out of the gate.
Inspect all homes carefully, flipped or not. Pay a pro to crawl under and inside them and check them over. But don't avoid flipped homes. No reason to. Get a good agent, and a good inspector.
Last edited by Diana Holbrook; 01-31-2021 at 02:59 PM..
I walk through a lot of homes that have been flipped. There is absolutely no reason to avoid flipped homes, especially if you do not have the particular skills or cash to do renovations yourself. I see a lot of homes that need a lot of work and are not financeable as is. Good flippers can take those homes, clean them up, put new roofs on them, and with minimal updates, make them liveable and qualify them for bank financing. Flippers often take fixer-upper’s and make them accessible to entry level first time buyers.
So I have the absolute opposite opinion from that poster, especially for nervous, novice first time owners, like I think you are, OP. You need a nice, turn key house with new fixtures and new appliances, new floors and a good roof. Something that isn't going to cost you a lot of cash right out of the gate.
Inspect all homes carefully, flipped or not. Pay a pro to crawl under and inside them and check them over. But don't avoid flipped homes. No reason to. Get a good agent, and a good inspector.
Had a very old neighbor die, and the kids sold the house to a flipper. They worked on that house for some months and when it went up for sale I had to check it out. It’s 30 square feet bigger than mine and they manage to fit a second bathroom and a third bedroom in it, and I had to see.
They gutted the house. They decreased the size of the original 2 bedrooms and to me the third bedroom was not much bigger than a small walk-in closet. But that gave them more room in the living areas, and the bathrooms were back to back so they could share pipes. On the kitchen counter they had photo copies of the original permits to do all the work they did. You could see the originals by request.
They did an absolutely wonderful skillful job. To my eyes, though, they ruined the character of the house. But the reality is, people don’t really care about that around here. When I sell my house that’s almost 100 years old with my 6 inch baseboards and my wonderful picture molding and all the built-ins, I’m betting all that stuff’s going to go. I might not like that, but it’s not my house anymore.
The one thing I hate is replacing good quality items, for newer substandard items. Things that were metal, are now plastic.
I replaced a perfect, Kohler Executive chef sink, for some stainless steel, thin apartment crap sink. Just as an example. The price to make "other's" happy...
We won't even talk about the shoddy cabinets/counters...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ultrarunner
Yep... I did a total remodel for my brother... my best job and proud to show it off.
Home sold for a new high in the neighborhood...
The new buyers decided to paint everything white... all the expensive stain grade paneled doors with Baldwin hardware, dovetail cabinets, tile set the old fashion way to last... etc...
Turns out they did much like the white after all... it was latex and rubbing off and ugly-out where touched...
So a few years in gutted everything and had it redone... she couldn't be happier with press wood hollow doors, particle board cabinets, no dovetails... and laminate press and stick flooring... the beautiful Cast Iron tiled in sink gone for a tin stainless that has rust...
Sometimes cheap is good so you don't feel bad tearing it out... on the other hand too many don't know quality when they see it...
Yikes. This would make me so sad.
As far as crappy cabinets...
Our house was not a flip. But we continue to be utterly perplexed by SO many things. The people who owned our house before us had lived in the house for 20 years. They apparently did a very large addition at one point close to the time when they moved in, and that addition itself seems very solid. BUT, every time we have to have something repaired, we're told that something is weird and the plumber/electrician/whatever has never seen something before and don't know why something was done the way it was done.
The kitchen in this house was woefully inadequate. We live in an area where gourmet kitchens are pretty common (Wolf ranges and Sub Zero fridges aren't uncommon). But this kitchen was tiny, AND it had a weird layout, where the refrigerator was kind of blocked from the main work area by a very small peninsula. There was an adjacent dining room that seemed to be a no brainer to combine into a kitchen to make a decent sized kitchen. The house sat on the market for a long time, I'm sure largely due to this kitchen, and that was the only reason we were able to buy it, figuring that we'd redo the kitchen when we could.
What I didn't realize when we first looked at the house was that the cabinets were made of particle board. After 4 years, they are literally falling apart. One of the hinges on one of the doors can't stay intact because the particle board around the screw where it attaches to the door has disintegrated. The two lower corner cabinets, which somehow I just assumed had lazy susans, did not. One of the corner cabinets had the shelf installed backward, with the particle board edge exposed when you open the cabinet (as opposed to covered with melamine/vinyl). The shelves themselves were held up by very tiny plastic hinges, which would in no way hold very much weight. So one of the shelves collapsed not long after we moved in. Some of the vinyl covering on the cabinets near the stove has melted. These are literally the lowest level cabinets you could possibly buy.
Apparently, the people had renovated the kitchen not that long before they moved. I always wonder what on earth the kitchen looked like before that this was an improvement. It's not clear to me if they knew that they would be moving or whether they did this upgrade in some attempt to make the kitchen look better to sell the house, or if they did it for themselves, and they just didn't really care much about the kitchen. I read online that these cabinets are fine if you just need to bridge to another renovation, as they will only last 4 or 5 years. I can't figure out why anyone would put in cabinets for themselves if they were only going to last a few years, so my guess is that they just wanted the kitchen to look updated to sell the house, and wanted to spend the absolute minimum possible.
When we bought the house, I'm not even sure I knew particle board cabinets existed. Even in the crappiest apartments I'd lived in and the houses that had all kinds of stuff that was builder's grade, the cabinets were always made out of plywood. None had ever fallen apart like these cabinets. I suppose they look fine if you don't look to hard at them. But this is something else you could look out for -- if the cabinets are made of particleboard, they probably won't last more than 5 or 6 years.
If you have time, can you post an example or two ?
Thanks!
Just look at realtor.com listings for homes that were bought and then are for sale again within a 6 month period. If the interiors are painted all grey and the floors are "new" laminate, especially the variegated zebra gray and black planks, then you have a genuine flip!
Apparently, the people had renovated the kitchen not that long before they moved. I always wonder what on earth the kitchen looked like before that this was an improvement. It's not clear to me if they knew that they would be moving or whether they did this upgrade in some attempt to make the kitchen look better to sell the house, or if they did it for themselves, and they just didn't really care much about the kitchen. I read online that these cabinets are fine if you just need to bridge to another renovation, as they will only last 4 or 5 years. I can't figure out why anyone would put in cabinets for themselves if they were only going to last a few years, so my guess is that they just wanted the kitchen to look updated to sell the house, and wanted to spend the absolute minimum possible.
When we bought the house, I'm not even sure I knew particle board cabinets existed. Even in the crappiest apartments I'd lived in and the houses that had all kinds of stuff that was builder's grade, the cabinets were always made out of plywood. None had ever fallen apart like these cabinets. I suppose they look fine if you don't look to hard at them. But this is something else you could look out for -- if the cabinets are made of particleboard, they probably won't last more than 5 or 6 years.
They were probably fine and decent quality, just "dated" and they knew buyers would go eww- old stuff and walk away or lowball. So they did what sellers feel they have to do, update with junk to impress naive HGTV watchers.
I went to an open house with my mom on a rainy day one time, and the roof was leaking.
I also don’t like when the paint color doesn’t cover previous color, when the floor have a gap to the wall, when new sliding doors don’t close, when flooring looks like a patchwork, cheap looking wood floors, cheap flimsy looking bathroom fixtures. I hate to think that the flippers knew they won’t have to live there, so they did things as cheap and fast as possible, in the most trendy style. I’m at the point if i see online that the house looks like a flip house, I won’t even go see it.
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Solly says — Be nice!
