Hi, I’m Steven Mills, and welcome to another episode of Inspect This House, the one show that focuses on the home buying experience in San Diego! If you’re looking to buy a home soon or want to know about the process, make sure to subscribe to my Youtube channel!
Today, I’m going to take you along for the ride! We are going to be inspecting a 4 bedroom, 2 bath home on a raised foundation right here in the La Mesa area. We were hired by the new homeowners and everything from the outside looks great. The house is freshly painted and the roof appears to be fairly new. Let’s see what we can find out about this property!
Although this home looks brand new from the outsides, this home was originally built in the 1950’s so we are most likely going to find some issues that date back almost 70 years such as an original cast iron system, 70-year-old electrical, etc. Let’s find out what the guts are under the hood!
First, let's talk about the home’s major electrical system. When I look inside the panel, I can't see that our dead front cover is missing and when you take a closer look, you can see that several wires are spliced together. I can tell that this home has undergone a major electrical system change. Now that we have identified the electrical issues, my recommendation is going to be to have a certified electrician come out and install a new, larger panel in order to have adequate room for the new electrical system.
After checking out the crawlspace, I can see that even though the house has had it’s entire cast iron system replaced, several connections have not been fully sealed together so there are active leaks right under the toilet which is causing damage to the home’s subfloor system. For this situation, I would recommend having a licensed plumber come to the home, pull up the toilet, put down a new wax ring, and water test these areas to ensure that there are no leaks.
After finishing the inspection, I always meet up with the buyer’s agent and we talk about the next steps. Once I provide the inspection report, the buyer’s agent will then take it back to the buyers themselves and the buyer and seller will both negotiate on the major issues that were found. Sometimes the seller will fix the issue or they will provide a credit.
It is because this buyer decided to do a home inspection that we were able to uncover these issues with the electrical panel and cast iron system replacement BEFORE they were able to purchase this property.
Did you know that the average buyer spends less than 20 minutes in the home before purchasing? That means these buyers were unaware of the issues that this house had! If you’re thinking about buying a home here in the San Diego area, call Sea to Sky inspections so that we can make sure you’re getting the best deal possible!
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