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My home inspection revealed mold in two crawl spaces and some in a storage attic area above garage. This is my first house buying experience so I'm confused on what to do next. The inspector said the house(a combination of old house with new additions) looked very good otherwise, just some minor fixes. He recommended a mold remediation expert to assess and make a plan for solving mold issue.
My contract stated owner was selling as is with anything under $1000.00 to be taken care of by me, the buyer. How do I proceed? Should I hire a remediation specialist now? Should I ask the seller to fix and ask for a guarantee on the work? Should I ask for a reduction in sales price based on reasonable estimates for the work? I do like the house and feel the property is of value, but I'm also allergic to mold. It's not in the living spaces of the home as far as we know.
Mold grows because it has access to water. You can't just remediate the mold. You need to know why moisture is getting in there to feed the mold. You may need some venting above the garage and sometimes old homes don't have enough foundation vents to give good circulation.
If you solve the moisture problem, you solve the mold problem. Then you can treat the mold.
Thanks for the replies, Naptowner and Silverfall. The moisture appears to be coming from the ground in crawl spaces as they both have dirt floors. There was some attempt to line one with plastic when new addition was built, but obviously that wasn't enough to solve the issue. We've also had an extreme amount of snow/rain this past season which didn't help though I'm thinking it took more time than that for mold to grow. As for the storage attic, the trusses may have been put in while damp from rain according to the inspector.
My home inspection revealed mold in two crawl spaces and some in a storage attic area above garage. The inspector . . recommended a mold remediation expert to assess and make a plan for solving mold issue.
My contract stated owner was selling as is with anything under $1000.00 to be taken care of by me, the buyer. How do I proceed? Should I hire a remediation specialist now? Should I ask the seller to fix and ask for a guarantee on the work? Should I ask for a reduction in sales price based on reasonable estimates for the work?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
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MSShelley - I'm assuming that you are not buying through a Realtor. It's a bit early in the process to worry about mold remediation. If you have mold, then you have damp. If you have damp then you have a leak, or a drainage problem. Ask your inspector to explain the CAUSE of the dampness/mold and get an estimate to fix that first.
Only then is there any point in treating the mold. Hopefully your Contract is 'subject to' an inspection, so you can cancel without penalty.
Under no circumstances should you allow the Property-Owner to 'fix' the house - you need your own contractors that come with a guarantee.
If you are taking out a new mortgage, then an appraisal is part of the process, so make sure that the appraiser has a copy of the inspectors report. If there's damage, the appraisal needs to be 'subject to repairs' so it will include an estimate of the 'Cost-To-Cure'.
Make sure that your lender gives a copy of the appraisal to you and to the Property Owner.
If there are no other homes that appeal to you, and you are determined to buy this one, you can use the appraisal & the inspection report to negotiate with the Property Owner because, they then have to disclose 'known defects' to any future 'buyers'.
But I wouldn't buy a home that's been 'added to' if I had another choice.
Hope this helps . . . . .
I completely disagree that appraisals done for the sake of the LENDER should include any "cost-to-cure" estimates. This is completely NON_STANDARD and will in all likelihood lead to a massive amount "this is NOT how things are done" on the part of the appraiser, lenders, seller, listing agent. I have literally NEVER heard any such effort in over two decades of being involved with real estate in the midwest.
The rest of the suggestions are actually very useful -- I tend to discourage allowing sellers to "fix" anything that is better done by a contractor obligated to provide a warranty to the buyer when there are longer term consequences, but this is a little tougher to line up / get agreement to. I also realize that if the issue does turn out to be minor it is much easier to get it fixed by the seller prior to closing. I would not say "under no circumstances" either, as for many kinds of loans / buyers it would be impossible to close without allowing the seller to handle the repairs. You should get at least two qualified contractors that can provide reasonably detailed estimates of the primary cause of the moisture problem that led to the mold issue and a more detailed solution with costs. If the seller agrees to give you the credit to remedy these, and the lender is ok with that, that would be the best option. If the seller prefers to get the items fixed (which is some ways will make the property more sellable should the deal with you fall apart) I would work out some kind of agreement for supervision of the repairs / re-inspection.
The idea of the inspection is generally to confirm the condition of the home, it is not to guarantee the value or give a detailed list of causes / remedies. Those are the kinds of things that, should an inspector's report indicate the need, requires further consulting experts / contractors. Typically a real estate sales contract is deliberately vague about such things, because really once a inspection is brought back with issues THAT MAY be serious many buyers will just decide to walk away and find another property which is why the inspection clause often has "kick out" in it. The bottom line is this new information may be easily resolved OR require additional negotiation.
If you have a buyers agent they should have already suggested "next step". If not I would focus "we need to get more info" and if you want to keep that info all to yourself then you need to hire the additional experts / contractors on your own. Their is sometimes and advantage to this. More often, when the problem sounds like it can be solved with out too much hassle, and the seller will probably want the info even in the deal falls apart, the buyer and seller can agree to some split / refundable credit to hire the expert and share the report.
Get that before you decide what do next. This is a step wise process, and cleaning the mold before you know what / how the damage happened is not wise...
Thanks, Chet! Your post was very helpful in understanding the options I have in approaching this with the seller. I realize we need to address the source of the moisture before clean up can begin. Perhaps, I used the wrong word when bringing up remediation. I meant solving the moisture issue as well as eradicating the mold.
I do not have a buyer's agent. I'm working with a realtor. My first instinct was to have a buyer's agent but my co-purchaser wanted to go with the realtor we met when we initially started looking. I should have stood my ground on that one and interviewed several people, but lesson learned. I feel as if I need to be my own buyer's agent now. Our realtor is very cooperative and has been helpful with providing info and understanding where we're coming from, but I realize that each party has their own agenda in the game and that I need to be my own advocate.
At this point, we have not mentioned any issues to our lender as we are still waiting for results of radon testing from the inspection and figured we'd have a few days to decide on things. Now we are going to take even longer getting estimates before we okay the appraisal process to begin. Being our first home purchase we're not sure if or when to bring up the subject with the bank. Will they get anxious, suspicious or annoyed if we wait a few mores days to a week before letting them know we want to go forward with this house?
That brings up one more question. When is it wise, if ever, to involve the lender in the process of issues and repairs regarding the house?
I wonder if they are allowing the listing agent to be a dual agent -- really if they are a good one that might be OK in this situation as it is unlikely that they would either want to let the deal fall apart nor is likely that an smart listing agent would allow any situation that could come back to bite 'em down the road.
The confusion with the "marketing term" of Realtor could be cleared up by refering to the "listing agent" and if there is only that person(team) involved as "dual agent"...
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Mold is only a symptom of a problem . .
