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My inspection report had a scary 'foundation issue' that almost made me walk away
I was at the house in Springfield with my inspector, and he pointed to a crack in the basement wall. He called it a 'foundation issue' and said it could cost $15,000 to fix. I panicked and called my agent, who found a structural engineer to look at it for $400. The engineer said it was just a normal settling crack from 20 years ago and needed a $200 sealant, not a full repair. Has anyone else had an inspection scare turn out to be nothing major?
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max_ramirez485d ago
Hold on, you got lucky but that's a huge gamble. Inspectors are generalists for a reason, and they have to flag anything that looks off to cover themselves. Your guy saw a crack and gave a worst-case cost, which is his job. For every story like yours, there's someone who ignored a "minor" crack and later faced a massive repair bill. Paying for that engineer was smart, but acting like the inspector was wrong is risky. They point out potential problems so you can check them, not so you can dismiss them.
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the_susan5d ago
Oh, I read a whole article about this exact thing last week. Max_ramirez48 is right that the inspector's job is to point out red flags, but the article said the big problem is how they often scare buyers with those worst-case repair numbers. It argued that inspectors should just note the concern and suggest a specialist, instead of throwing out a scary price tag that might kill a deal over nothing. It really made me see both sides of it. You need the warning, but you also need to know when it's just a standard caution.
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