Buyers are not always experienced and should therefore rely on their estate agent to guide them through the process.
It is however important that the buyer understands that they are buying what they see.
A previously owned house, like a second-hand car, will seldom be perfect and will have a few years of use, wear and tear on its clock.
Buyers must understand that they are buying a second-hand house and not a new one.
New houses come with an expectation that the builder is responsible for the first three months after moving in for minor repairs like loose tiles, cupboard handles and sticking sliding door.
For the first year they are responsible for roof leaks and for five years for major problems such as cracking foundations and badly designed or constructed roof structure.
This is not the case for resale houses.
The seller’s obligation is to tell the buyer about any serious faults that the buyer may not see easily.
They do not have to point out, for instance, that you have to wiggle the toilet handle to make it work, but would have to let you know about dampness on the wall behind the bookshelf or the garage door motor that sticks if it rains.
Other than that, it is up to the buyer to look at the property that he is buying and decide that he is happy to buy it with the minor faults that come with any property that you buy.
If there is something that you think needs to be fixed, that’s fine.
Just add it as a special condition in your offer.
An example might be “subject to the seller replacing the cracked window pane on the lounge window”.
The seller can then decide to accept the offer with this condition or not and if he/she does then they must arrange for the window pane to be replaced, the frame around the pane to be repainted, etc.
This would be done at his cost and not the buyer’s.
You cannot expect the seller to fix problems that appear when you move in.
It is not the seller’s responsibility to fix toilets that are not flushing, taps that are dripping, doors that leak when it rains hard from a particular direction or the like.
Everyone who moves into a property expects to spend the day doing small repairs and washing walls.
So, take time to look carefully at the property you want to make an offer on.
Either put in those items that you want the seller to fix into the contract as a special condition or adjust your price down a bit to allow you to do those repairs yourself.
The seller is not obliged to accept your special conditions and could reject them or adjust the price upwards to cover the cost of these repairs.
The more complicated you make your offer the less likely you are to have your offer accepted or for the seller to accept a competitive offer.
Often it is easier just to arrange to do those odd jobs yourself.
- Mike Spencer is the founder and owner of Platinum Global. He is also a professional associated property valuer and consultant with work across the country as well as Eastern Europe and Australia.