Buyer has asked for $5K after inspection AND now is asking for repairs

5 years ago

Hi,

I know that Houzz is about house decor but I really don't know who else to ask for advice and Houzz community has been so great to me in the past!

We are selling our house and 2 months ago we accepted an offer below asking conditional to inspection. Inspection took place and buyer asked for $5K off which we accepted and signed ammended contract. Now they just contacted my agent and are insisting that we make some of the repairs immediately because they are worried that without repairs house will rot. We are closing in February...

My agent is telling me I should just do the repairs which are about $1k. I don't agree since I gave them $5K off for this already. What are my options? What should I do? Please any advice will help.

Featured Answer

User

5 years ago

So you agreed to come down $5k for various repairs and they want them repaired now instead of after possession to minimize damage to the house?

I would set a new agreement subtracting the cost of these repairs from the original $5k So they get $1000 in repairs now plus $4k at closing.

Or or tell them to stuff it (which is what I would do).

Sort by:Oldest

Comments (14)

sambah006
5 years ago
I understand where you are coming from.

That being said, what percentage of the house sale is $1K?

Is it the equivalent of a car salesman throwing in a new set of floor mats to close the sale?
millworkman
5 years ago
Are you willing to lose the sale of the house for 1k? If you cancel and put it on the markety how much more will you lose if it sits for a period of time?
Related Discussions
Who to ask about repairing first or sell as is
Q
Comments (9)
You need to call a couple of local realtors and have them do a fair market value on the house as it exists, and a guess as to what it might bring when repaired. If the location is a good one, it might make more sense to market it as a teardown rather than as a residence. If the home is in poor repair in a low dollar area, then you're really not going to recuperate much in the way of repair expenses, and need to do the absolute minimal required to maintain a certificate of occupancy. That may mean that you "give" the home away at a very low price to account for it's defects. If the home is in a higher priced market and is considered an interesting style with many original features, then it may appeal to the old home lovers crowd, and you may be able to get by with just fixing the foundation and doing the roof because the new owners would want to do much of the work themselves. There are a lot of variables here, so you need the blunt opinion of several realtors as to whether or not it's worth putting any money into. After you get the realtors opinions, call several home improvement contractors. Ask them what the home needs besides the obvious defects you've mentioned. (Is the electric panel too small, what about rusted out galvanized plumbing, termite infestations, etc.) There are some structural things that will need to be done in order to even put a home on the market, vs making it "remodeled" with cosmetic changes like painting the whole place. Get ready for sticker shock. After you have both sides of the coin on the repairs vs current market value, then you can decide which route you want to take. If you have family here in this country that can help to deal with your mother on the downsizing/sentimental clutter issue that would be extremely helpful. If she's lived there a long time, she's apt to resist any changes to the home, and it might be more helpful if you were to relocate her to the end residence before you began any of the projects at the house.
...See More
What strange things have buyers asked after inspections?
Q
Comments (18)
"I kid you not the buyer of my first house asked me to specify that the house was not haunted. I told her it was not. I lied." Uh oh! Hope this lie doesn't come back to haunt you". No it hasn't. The owner has lived there for 15 years now. Obviously she was afraid of ghosts but how could I explain the ghosts were helpful? I could not so I let her find out herself. I never would have believed in ghosts due to my cynical nature until I lived in that house. I tried to find logical reasons for all that happened for years. Until the day I was awakened by a black figure at my bed. I told it to go away and reminded it that we had an agreement for no visualization. But it would not go away. So I got up and checked the house (that seemed to be what it wanted) and found that my paralyzed dog had her tail stuck in a baseboard heater and it was starting to smoke. We called the dog "scorch" after that. So a real tragedy was averted by either a ghost or my vivid imagination that woke me up at exactly the right time to intervene before a tragic situation developed. The new owner ( a young lady) developed cancer and she survived the disease and treatment. I can't think of a better house for her to have lived in during that trying time. The house was built in the late 1800's and it had an energy I cannot describe. The PO before I bought it turned down a higher offer because he "felt" the house wanted me to own it. My buyer made an offer before the house hit the market and I had the same feeling so I did not entertain other offers. It was weird like that.
...See More
Buyers backing out, but it was their idea! Now what?
Q
Comments (18)
millworkman Yep it is the sq footage. Only certain things truly matter * sq footage (around here if you have to adjust u or down for sq footage on a comp, it is NOT the sold price divided by sq footage x differing amount - it is $25/ sq ft + or - * number of bathrooms - $3000 for full, $2250 3/4 and $1500 for 1/2 *basement vs crawl vs slab ($4000-5000 for full basement vs $2500 for crawl vs slab) * garage bays $4000 per bay * fireplace $3000 wood stove $1500 *decks and porches - $1000 * garden sheds etc $1000 per * additional acreage (1/2 -1 acre ) $4000 if not dividable. If dividable,, market value of lot Conditions - difference between average (big box appliances and laminate counters and linoleum and above average (some tile in places, solid countertops, wood floors) is 10-15% overall at most. So no your choices of lamp fixtures or how much you put into it really don't matter. _____ whit cpartist is 100% correct - appraisers only can go with SOLD homes and 'pie-in-the-sky hey It should go up in value' does NOT count. Nothing you can do about the buyer's backing out because it did not appraise. D O E S N O T matter what your appraiser comes up with -- only thing that matter is what the buyer's LENDER'S appraiser came in with. It is not the buyers who are saying they don't think it worth the price -it is the buyer's LENDER and thus the lender will not loan enough for the purchase. And unless you have it in writing that they will make up the difference between price and loan in cash, you can NOT make them do it. Other than using the appraisal you paid for to get an idea what to list it for with a realtor, you wasted your money. Nothing you can do short of offering to carry a 2nd mortgage - and have real doubts their lender would go along with that. Better have someone - like a lawyer - look at your contract. Seriously doubt you can keep their deposit if they gave timely notice that they can not get financing. I am a retired lawyer - never saw a standard real estate contract to purchase form that did NOT require seller to return the deposit if the buyers couldn't get a loan commitment for financing and gave the seller timely notice. Who said this and who said that means ZERO in a real estate sale. Only thing that counts is what was put down in WRITING in the final signed document. Doing DIY contracts on something like real estate is not a good idea - an incompetent has a fool for a lawyer drafting the documents
...See More
Buyer asked for 63 fixes on Inspection
Q
Comments (66)
I can bet that out of that $40,000, the government gets a large chunk of it now. Yep, between permits and engineering reviews and inspection fees, regulatory departments have become governmental profit centers. It started as "don't worry about the cost of this new proposed department, we won't raise your taxes, we'll fund it with user fees." So Joe Taxpayer feels ok, because hey, the department is going to regulate something which will keep me safe. And it won't cost me anything. So Joe Plumber pays the user fees. So he has to raise his rates, so Joe Taxpayer now pays more for plumbing. But hey, at least his taxes didn't go up. :-/
...See More
functionthenlook
5 years ago
Since they knew the repairs needed done and they signed off on the inspection/contract I would tell them that the repairs can be done now with their contractor or yours and the cost will be take off the $5K. If they back out now they will loose all of the hand money and all the money they put out for inspections. They are just trying to get more money out of you. Our last house only had a few minor issues at inspections and they were corrected right away. At the time of the inspection (yes, we were requested to stay during the inspection since it was a custom built house) the wife also brought in different trades to give her prices on all these grandiose ideas she had for the house. They signed off on the inspection and then the wife started trying to nickle and dime us. Wanting us to pay for painting all the walls, cleaning the duct work, etc I guess she got the estimates back for her grandiose ideas and they didn't fit into her budget and wanted us to pay for some of it. We just told her flat out no. I left 4 labeled cans of paint when we moved out in case they needed them for touch up. The day before the closing they did the walk thru she called my agent and said that for disposing of the paint she wanted the hot tub and the $$$ ladder that my son was picking up later that day for his house. She was a real piece of work. I just had my son also take the paint with the hot tub and ladder.
zouye
Original Author
5 years ago
Well we won’t lose anything. They are contractually bound to buy our place. They signed off on inspection report. Them asking for this extra after everything is just right out greedy. I am not backing out of the sale and if they do I know I can sue them. Having said that, it all comes down to do I want to put my house back on the market? I don’t have to move for a while so I can absolutely catch spring season. I just find it is very unethical of them. They did inspection, they asked for $ to wave repairs, we gave them discount, they signed off, and now 2 months later they want us to do repairs on top of the discount. You can’t have your cake and eat it too! Our house was on the market for 3 days when they offered for it at the beginning of the fall season. I have lost entire season because of them so I can definitely sue them but it’s just such pain all of it and over $1000!!! It’s a matter of principle though.
functionthenlook
5 years ago
Zouye, That is the decision only you can make. I knew they were not back out of the sale, because they jumped on the house even before it was listed. A neighbor tipped them off we bought a new house and were going to list ours.
zouye
Original Author
5 years ago
@functionthenlook I know. I really appreciate you sharing your experience. I don’t think they will back out and if they will it will be their loss cause our house is great and I won’t have trouble selling it. We are going back to them with a no to the repairs.
annied75
5 years ago
We've sold many homes over the years and have found that if you constantly jump at buyer's demands, then they will just continue to ask for more. We always sell "by owner" so we build a rapport with potential buyers. It's always friendly, but firm.
sdello
5 years ago
Some buyers take the attitude that once the sale is complete they'll never see the sellers again so "who cares if I pi$$ them off" and they just push for everything they can get. Truthfully you never know until you ask. the OPs agent is taking the easy way out for him/herself by telling the OP to just do it.

zouye: I agree, just say no and end the madness.
K R
5 years ago
I would probably do Cleo’s idea, offer to have the repairs done (out of the kindness of your heart, because that’s already asking a lot) but subtracting the $$$ at closing. Let’s see what they want more, cash or repairs.
annied75
5 years ago
The issue that you'll encounter if you make the repairs would be that they may not be to the satisfaction of the buyer. This is pure speculation, since the OP didn't indicate the items needing repair.

The agreement is already in place and the $5k will be given to the buyers. They can wait until they obtain possession of the property to make the repairs.
functionthenlook
5 years ago
"who cares if I pi$$ them off"

I think some buyers have that attitude. What they forget is that the owner still is living and taking care of that house until the closing. Do you really want to piss off someone who is taking care of one of the biggest investment you probably will make in your life?

It don't think it work out good for our buyer. As I said before, ours was a custom home built by us and using commercial electrician and plumber. There was valves and switches all over the house that a normal house did not have. I was going to label everything for the new owner until the princess started trying to squeeze money out of us. Heck there was switches I didn't even know what they were for, but my husband did. Then my attitude changed to "figure it out yourself." The last straw came when a few days before the closing when she wanted to inconvenience everyone to change their schedules to move the closing up by a day so she wouldn't be inconvenienced and could have some work done before they moved in on Saturday. Of course we said NO. That is when I really lost it. It was not nice, but I sabotaged the house. I knew she didn't know how to do anything and I don't think he he knew a hammer from a screwdriver. I didn't do nothing petty like taking light bulbs or damaging the home. I made sure every switch and valve was off. I know they probably ended up calling in trades to figure out why the doorbell didn't ring, or why the gas fireplaces and grills didn't work, or why they couldn't program the garage and front door, etc. Well the doorbell had a hidden switch to turn it on and off and I shut it off. There were extra safety valves for the gas fireplaces and grills in the basement ceiling at different locations that were turned off. The codes they were given to open the garage and front door was a guest code not the master code. The garage door didn't open because it was also on a switch and the same with the outside garage motion detector. The outdoor plugs didn't work either unless a switch was on. Somehow they got my son who lived close by phone number and tried calling him several times. He just ignored them. I know it wasn't nice to sabotage the house, but looking back I still have no regrets, because she was a royal bit_ch. We move to our new house a week before the closing and after all we were just protecting the empty house from theft or gas leaks. lol
Cathy DiVello
5 years ago
It depends on the local housing market. if there is high demand for homes in your area, you can take a stronger position. If you live someplace where houses sell slowly, it might be best to get the repair done and get the house to closing.
zouye
Original Author
5 years ago
Thank you everyone for your comments. We told them no through our agent. No news for now. Since the work is external and minor I offered them access to the outside of the house where “repairs” need to take place and that they organize and pay for repairs themselves. They will need to take on full liability for the work and the house during that time and they will need to let us know who and when is coming and we have to approve. This way the work can be done to their standard. This was already too nice of us I think. I doubt they will take it upon themselves. So far we heard nothing back. I will keep you updated.

Buyer has asked for $5K after inspection AND now is asking for repairs

User

Comments (14)

sambah006

millworkman

Related Discussions

functionthenlook

zouye
Original Author

functionthenlook

zouye
Original Author

annied75

sdello

K R

annied75

functionthenlook

Cathy DiVello

zouye
Original Author

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

Buyer has asked for $5K after inspection AND now is asking for repairs

Comments (14)

Related Discussions

zouyeOriginal Author

zouyeOriginal Author

zouyeOriginal Author

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

zouye
Original Author

zouye
Original Author

zouye
Original Author