Checking The Pulse Of The Kansas City Real Estate Market

I’ve debated other Kansas City real estate agents over the years about whether pre-inspecting a home is a good idea for home sellers. There’s a few agents who agree that there’s more downside than upside to pre-inspecting but the majority of agents are quick to recommend pre-inspections to their home sellers. One of the main benefits to pre-inspections are they provide home buyers reassurance in the home. Another reason home sellers might pre-inspect is to give themselves ample time to address inspection items that may come up — before a buyer gets involved and possibly tries to dictate the repair process. These sound like very decent reasons to pre-inspect but you’ve also got to consider the downside of facing double jeopardy of sorts when it comes the home inspection process.

I certainly don’t recall any home buyer ever choosing a particular home simply because it had been pre-inspected. You can bet that, whether or not a home has been pre-inspected, a home buyer is going to hire their own home inspector to look things over once the home goes under contract. Doing a pre-inspection will cost a home seller several hundred dollars and the seller is then required by law to disclose ALL material defects in the report to future buyers. In most cases, a home buyer is going to expect a seller to have addressed all critical items in the pre-inspection report. Then the buyer is going to do their own home inspection and the seller is going to get to go through the repair process once again after the buyer’s home inspector pours over the home.

Posted by Jason Brown