Today we tackle a slightly more controversial topic, the pre-listing home inspection. Let me start with why some would say that you should not do a home inspection before listing. The reason is that it may turn up something you were not aware of and any reports you have need to be disclosed to the buyer. So what you are telling me is that if there is evidence of significant mold under the home and you don't "know" about it you are hoping that the buyer's inspector does not find it and you can offload your home to someone that certainly doesn't expect mold to be forming under there new purchase. This to me feels a little like the used car lot and not showing a lot of confidence in your product nor transparency in the transaction. So I think its much better to know what you are dealing with before you list your home than to try and deal with it during a time of stress and pressure to make a decision (like when its under contract and the buyer is asking for large credits on a repair request).
You will likely do a bunch of other work to your home to get it to picture-perfect and ready to sell to get the highest possible price, that is very smart. You should not stop however at painting the walls, replacing carpets, and putting a little money into the landscaping. You should have a pre-listing home inspection and get a list of the deficiencies. Then you should hire licensed, bonded, and insured contractors to make the repairs that the inspection uncovered. This is something TheQwikFix can do for you and we can even take our payment from escrow out of the proceeds of the sale, so why wouldn't you want to present the best product for sale?
Once the work is completed it you should have documentation available to demonstrate to interested buyers that you have already done an inspection and you have corrected a variety of issues. In fact, TheQwikFix system makes this easy by making our quote/invoice mirror the items called out on the inspection report. If we now go back to the used car analogy we appear more like a reputable car dealership with professionally trained mechanics that provide a certified used vehicle for sale which includes a list of all the items checked and the ones that were corrected. As the seller, this should give you confidence during the contingency period that the great price you received from the buyer is something you can hold firm to since you know the product you are offering is quality.
If the property does have significant issues, I promise there are other very interested buyers for this as well and they will be chomping at the bit, the thing is that most homes fall in the middle and have some issues that will need to be corrected before they are transferred, so take control of the transaction and get a pre-listing inspection.
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