From: "Jim and Jean Spaihts" 
Date: Thu Nov 06, 2003  01:01:08 PM US/Eastern
To: 
Subject: home checkout brain dump

Hi!

Hope you have a little time to read the attached. We've tried to do a fairly comprehensive brain dump for you. This is a painful process, since it involves remembering how we learned all that stuff, but at least we did learn it!

Love and hugs,

Mom and Dad

---

This is Mom and Dad's Guide to Home Shopping!

Your neighboring zip codes, mapped at http://zip.langenberg.com/#ZipCodeMaps. Follow the directions on the first alternative. Anyway, they look kind of like this:

			12203			12206

				12208

					12209
				Lincoln Park
							12202
			12054

						12077

So that's the general map. Everything is on the west side of the river.

We're doing a brain dump here--you may already know most of this stuff, but I can tell you that our knowledge has been learned the hard way in a lot of cases, and we can't really recommend that method!

Good luck on your home search! Keep in mind that the perfect house doesn't exist! There will always be trade-offs, just try to know which problems will cost $$$ to fix, and which can be corrected by $ or $$! Especially if you fall in love with a house, get a good inspector. I think the guy who inspected for our buyers was from Housemaster (check your phone book, I think it's a national organization; he was really well trained and thorough.) Before you go out to look, roll a marble in your own place to see how it works, and poke some inconspicuous wood with a knife blade to see how sound wood behaves.

Your realtor can give you a report on what properties in your area have actually sold for, which is a different thing from what they have been listed for. Ask when the property was listed. If it is new on the market and is over-priced, it will probably come down. If the realtor doesn't want to give you the report, it is probably publicly available. Often, newspapers will publish real estate sales. Also, the local government tax office may let you look at records, or have the information. I think there's a way to check online, too, but I can't remember where it is, and will have to check again.

General house checkout list:

• Look at house after heavy rain, checking basements, windows, ceilings and walls
• Walk around entire house outside, examining
  • chimney (no cracks or leaning)
  • foundation (ditto, plus mud tubes)
  • gutters and downspouts (not rusty, sagging, or leaking)
  • water runoff (should be directed away from house, not just dumped at foundation; ground should slope away, not toward, house)
  • roof (look at some new houses to see how a good roof looks; there should be no obvious curling, missing or damaged shingles, missing or loose flashing)
  • outbuildings, if any
  • windows and doors for caulking around outsides
• Walk through inside, look for
  • ceiling and wall stains or cracks that might indicate water damage or uneven settling
  • tilting floors
  • adequate 3-hole electrical outlets
  • broken or cracked window glass
  • accessible rooms for furniture moving
  • fairly modern appliances
  • adequate heating sources
  • check out basements and attics where structural elements may be visible and where water, heating, and electrical systems are often located
  • check the garage, if there is one, in the same way
• General
  • walk through area at odd times, checking for unusual noise, smells, traffic, dogs barking, etc.
  • if it snows, look at roofs to see how snow is melting, indicating insulation levels (not melting is good)

Just say no if a house has

• Termites (mud tubes on wood or up foundation, often visible outside; sawdust, insect wings in basements, garages, attics, where you can see the structure)
• Foundation cracks (look both inside and outside)
• Wet basement (water damages your stuff, and mildew is a serious health risk, and it is way expensive to fix; look after heavy rain)
• Roof leaks (can cause damage to structural wood not visible under plaster, drywall; check all walls and ceilings for stains/roughness indicating water damage; unless small, around flashing, easy to repair, in which case it should be repaired by seller before sale; go see during/after heavy rain)

Be very suspicious of

• Old roofs (roofs last 15-25 years depending on quality of shingles, cost thousands to replace--find out how old it is)
• Air freshener, especially in basement (often used to mask mildew smell)
• Plumbing that doesn't work well--water pressure should be good, sinks should drain quickly, toilets should flush with that nice gurgle at the end; water should never go down almost all the way and come back up! If trouble, insist on professional plumber repair before sale.
• Decaying window sills (test, especially outside, with knife blade--It shouldn't go in ½ inch; sometimes people paint right over it so it looks okay on casual inspection)
• Holes in foundation sill plates that look like insects made them (round and smooth inside; can be up to ½ "; test randomly with knife blade; nothing powdery should appear, knife shouldn't penetrate; look inside basement at top of foundation)
• Floors that are not level (take a marble with you and put down near edge of room to see whether it rolls toward center, where sag usually is; in old houses, there may be slight tilt, but shouldn't be much, and consistent tilt away from outside walls means bad support in middle of house)
• Old wiring and two-hole outlets (check electrical center; you want to see circuit breakers, not screw-in fuses, which mean amperage is not up to modern usage and you will blow them frequently if you use multiple appliances; outlets should be 3-hole)
• Signs of rust and water leakage around furnace and pipe joints, radiators
• In general, be suspicious of houses that have paneling or something over everything structural, because you can't see whether there are problems, and neither can your inspector
• Doors that don't close or stay open (often means house has settled unevenly)
• Stove burners and oven that don't heat (turn everything on)

A few other points

• Outside terrain should slope away from walls, not toward them, to help keep out water
• Look for protective roofs over outside doors
• Vinyl or aluminum siding can hide underlying problems
• Check whether copper tubing or old galvanized pipe; look for long horizontal waste pipes, which often have 'barnacles' inside
• Wide eaves and snow stops are good things
• Ask to see utility bills from past year, so you can estimate heating costs
• Check ceiling and walls in rooms directly below bathrooms for signs of water leaks

return to ambiguous