10 Cheats Sellers Use to Hide Major Housing Defects

I just got done showing home and I'm still amazed at what sellers will do to hide the defects in their home. I can't. I just can't. Look I may have been born at night but I wasn't born last night and I'm not stupid and neither are my buyers. So if you're a home buyer, you're in the market looking for a home, this video is going to be an important one because we're going to talk about the 10 cheats that sellers use to hide major defects in their home. So let's get started. Okay look I'm not saying that every seller does these cheats to to hide flaws in their house okay but some do. And reason being is that some sellers just can't be bothered or they don't have the time or do nor do they have the money to make the necessary repairs. So they'll make little cheap repairs on their own but these little cheats, these cover-ups could lead to further problems down the road. So when you're looking at homes, you and your realtor could be looking for these things, jot it down for the home inspector so when you go back for the home inspection you can point the things out that you identified that you want the inspector to to dig a little deeper. I'm also going to share with you some extra tips at the end of this list regarding home inspections and permits and all the things. So let's get into this list right now shall we? Okay the first cheat I want to talk about is the use of roof sealants on say vents, chimneys, and flashings on the roof. Now this might be a little difficult for you to identify from a distance when you're you know looking at it from the ground. So roof sealant is used to prevent water from entering the home. So say the seller has a leak in the flashing or around the chimney, they may just go up there and throw some roof sealant on there to prevent any future water from getting in. So sellers will use this roof sealant just as a quick cheap easy way to just stop the leak from happening and be done with it. So that's the first thing we're going to look for. Number two we're going to look at paint that's covering up things on the wall or in the ceiling. So if they didn't paint the entire wall and you just see like fresh paint on one spot or if you see fresh paint on one spot in the ceiling it's possible that they're hiding a leak okay or there was a leak and there's the yellow stain there and they just painted it. So that's something else we really need to be looking out for and if you see it bring it up to the inspector. Number three if you see something that was recently remodeled like say the bathroom or say something was in the kitchen you know they replaced some cabinets. Sometimes sellers want to do that because they want to like improve the look of the home and hopefully improve the value a little bit which is totally fine. But sometimes remodels will happen because there was a problem that snowballed and they ended up having to replace you know the floor or they had to do major plumbing work and they just ended up like just replacing the vanity because there was a big leak. When you see a remodel ask the seller when was this done? Who was it done by? Okay if it was done by a licensed professional okay great. Ask the question were there any problems that led to this remodel other than you just you know or was it just that you wanted to improve this bathroom before you listed it? Now I don't know if you're going to get a straight answer out of them but just something to think about and if they did it themselves hmm that's something else you got the question too. It could have been a problem again that that was a big problem it snowballed and they had to just redo the whole thing because of one issue of like say a big leak or something. Okay the number four cheat I have for you is we notice any resurfacing of the exterior or the interior of the foundation. Now a lot of sellers would like to resurface the exterior because you know over time it looks kind of shoddy and they want to resurface it make it look all nice and pretty which is great but sometimes sellers will do this to hide any water intrusion problems that have been happening for years or they're hiding cracks. So point it out to the home inspector if you notice this have them like take a look at it and see if there's anything that they noticed that that could be a sign that there is a problem with that foundation. Number five let's talk about the windows. Okay another cheat is if you see windows that were heavily caulked or painted and I'm talking about the exterior of the windows. Now it's important that you maintain the exterior of the windows with caulking just to prevent water from coming in but if you see something that was heavily caulked or if you see the window has been sealed that's a red flag that there's a potential water issue going on there or there's damage into that window. So this is something else you want to point out to your inspector if you notice this. Okay number six another cheat if you notice that they've removed evidence of damage. What do I mean by this? So say you're looking at the exterior of the home and you notice that a piece of siding was replaced okay or you see on the roof that there's like a little patch on the roof or you see like a few shingles or different color than the rest of the house. What went on there? Why do you have that? So is it it's possible that they you know did a quick repair they took care of the damage and they just slapped something over it. Look sometimes sellers will have damage from say water or insects and they just want to cover it up and be done with it. If you notice random replacements of exterior elements like that could be a sign that they were covering something up. So ask the question about you know what happened? Why is that a different color? Why does it look like there's like a new piece of siding there? What happened? Ask the questions and if they said it was repaired ask for receipts and find out who did the work. Don't forget if you're thinking about selling or buying a home in your market you need to be connected to a real estate agent. Click that link down below fill out the forms and I will get back to you as soon as possible and get you connected to an agent in your market. And I wanted to let you know if you are looking to sell or buy here in northern New Jersey and you'd like to work with myself and my team you can fill out that same form down below. Click that and I will reach out to you and we can discuss your needs whether you're selling or buying here in northern New Jersey. Now number seven another cheat not saying this happens all the time but I've heard stories disguising problems with new carpet. Okay where am I going with this? So say you're in a house and there's hardwood floors and then you go into a bedroom and there just has happens to be carpeting in like say one or two bedrooms which okay that's normal that's fine but you'll see that there's brand new carpet which again that's fine that happens but sometimes people will do that to cover up an issue with the hardwood floor. Now I'm not saying you got to go rip up the carpeting okay but if you notice carpeting in bedrooms always ask the seller is there hardwood floors underneath this carpet and if there is okay great why is there carpeting in here did you just decide to put carpeting in there was there did you replace old carpeting that was in here now I'm not saying they're going to give you the 100% truth we hope they will but just something to think about it's possible that they could be covering up some damage it could you know there could have been some water damage it could be pet stains on the hardwood floor could be any of that another thing too area rugs people like to use area rugs to cover things up especially stains so area rugs you can definitely lift up so do that for sure okay the next cheat this this one's funny it's when homeowners will place artwork or furniture in front of a wall like where there was damage to to hide that from the buyer like you think we're stupid I mean come on so if you see like a piece of furniture like in a random spot on the wall like it's it's like off-centered it's not like you know it's not supposed to be there and you're like why the heck is that there they could be covering something up so you can have the home inspector ask if he can move the furniture to see what's behind that piece of furniture or that random artwork that's like off to the side of the wall it's not on the center of the wall like what are you doing so if you see something like that yeah they're hiding something okay number nine this is another good one if the homeowner tells you that they did their own home inspection prior to listing and they insist that you don't have to do your own home inspection I did my my home inspection you could just use my report no we're not going to be doing that nowadays a lot of home sellers will do what's called a pre-listing home inspection to help them identify any problems with the house and I think it's an excellent idea highly recommend home sellers do this sometimes the sellers will want to just offer up their home inspection report to the buyer and you don't need to do your own home inspection because what they're fearful of is that maybe there are some things that that was identified in that report but they never repaired it and then if you bring in your own home inspector they're going to identify it they're going to find that you know the problem was never repaired so if the home seller is trying to push that inspection report on you that they did prior to listing don't go by that get your own home inspection next we have this other cheat is where they downplay the issues that you raise so if you're bringing up like little things like say you have dirty air filters you know there's rust on the furnace rust on the ac you know you're questioning like the age of thing of you know components of the home and they downplay it or if you say you know what you know this isn't working properly or and they and they tell you well you know it's always been like that i get that answer a lot oh it was like that when i bought the house not an issue it was never a problem never a problem for me it was always like that that's a problem and you need to dig deeper on that so point that out to the home inspector and make sure that he evaluates it to see if it's not a more serious problem okay so now i'm going to share with you some extra tips to to help you with identifying problems with the home number one go to the local town hall municipality where the home is located and ask the town clerk or the building department for any permits that were pulled on that home this is public record so you have every right to go and ask for those records for those permits so either you could do it your realtor or your attorney can ask for that now here in new jersey we do this all the time the attorneys will call the town hall and request all the open permits closed permits whatever permits are on the home what this tells you is that you know any work that they did that required a permit it's right there in black and white and it assures you that if it's a closed permit that it was done by a licensed contractor and the town building inspector came and inspected it and verified that that construction met all current town code so that's what we want to say we want to see those closed permits if there's open permits mr seller has to go back and get those permits closed so if there's any projects that are outstanding he said town has to come back and re-inspect it make sure everything was done up to code and then they can close the permit now i want to dive a little deeper into the home inspections now i don't solely rely on the home inspection itself a couple of other inspections you want to consider is number one the oil tank sweep now if you're buying a home here up in the northeast you know i've talked about this before the oil tank sweep is so important many years ago a lot of these homes were heated with oil and a lot of those oil tanks were buried underground in the backyard so we want to see even if there was a decommissioned oil tank if it's a decommissioned oil tank you want to get that out of the ground spend the money bring in an environmental company to do the oil tank sweep another inspection you should consider is doing the sewer line inspections this is a popular one a lot of buyers are doing these days and what it is is they run a scope through the sewer line to see if there's any cracks or any tree roots coming through the sewer line and if that's identified and that's something the seller is going to have to address one more piece of important advice i want to give you if your home inspector identifies problems that are beyond his scope say if he suspects there could be a structure problem or there's a problem with the chimney and he recommends that you get it further evaluated by a professional meaning a engineer or chimney professional take his word on that and spend the money and get the other evaluations done by the professionals that specialize in those areas because if you ignore it and say no i don't need to do that he may have been right and you could be looking at thousands of dollars of work in the future once you own the home so trust me on that one if he's making a recommendation to do further evaluations on things you got to do it and i also want to say to anyone who's watching that's thinking about selling your home i hope this is a little bit of an eye-opener for you do not attempt to do these cheap fixes to hide problems in the house because we're not dumb we can see right through it and it could cost you a lot of money and it guarantee you it'll come back to bite you so i hope this list is helping you as well of things that you need to think about not doing when you're prepping your house for sale thank you so much for watching me today to get your dose of real estate reality my name is jackie baker and i will see you next time