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Strategies & Market Trends : The Residential Real Estate Crash Index -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Mick Mørmøny who wrote (61418)	9/9/2006 8:34:08 PM
From: Mick Mørmøny	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

Buyer beware: Trust your instincts By Vay Ashby Today's Local News Saturday, September 9, 2006 A La Costa friend has lived in a home for the past seven years that she likes, but feels like it was a rush purchase. It’s a twisted tale as to how she’s gotten there and it begins in an ocean-view Leucadia townhouse where she and her family had lived for 10 years. They wanted more space, found a property they liked, listed their home, and, as a complete surprise to them, it sold within hours of putting it on the market. In the due diligence of their potential purchase, all the inspections, disclosures and paper-shuffling began. “I had an off feeling about the place from the start,” she said. As they saw more of it, things struck her as just wrong. Toilets had not been flushed. There was no attention to detail, even though it had been owner-built five years prior. “There was a strange feeling of abuse inside,” she said. It would seem only appropriate that if one wants to sell their home, one would think to flush the toilets. Also, care is usually taken to create a lovely, clean, clutter-free atmosphere. In today’s market, homes generally reflect a model-like image. Sometimes, the seller will have their real estate agent “stage” their property. This is usually done with a professional, who works from the furniture pieces at hand and brings in showroom furniture or both, to really make it come alive and look its best. The termite inspection came back with damage, which is not uncommon. It is traditional for the seller to pay Item One repairs, which corrects damage due to active infestation, but that depends on the seller. Item Two repairs may need attention, but are more for preventative measures, and the seller may prefer the buyer pay for those. Termite inspection aside, this buyer felt a nagging concern about the potential purchase and hired a forensic specialist to check for builders defects. The specialist looked it all over and said with full confidence that they were looking at approximately $100,000 worth of defects. They had to hire a real estate attorney to get out of the deal, and, in the meantime, they had sold their townhouse. It became more complicated as the same realty office was representing them as a buyer and seller. On a good note, they got their escrow money back and that house sat on the market for years. This individual would have preferred to rent and take her time, but there were not a lot of good rentals then, and many were not ‘kid friendly.’ Her husband was driving around La Costa and found the home where they now live. It had just fallen out of escrow and become available. The family talked her into it and so she went along, though she didn’t feel it had a good design flow and didn’t like the room sizes. The good part was not having to move the kids twice. Next time, she gets to pick. A real estate agent for Prudential California Realty, Vay Ashby writes a weekly column that appears every Saturday. She can be reached by e-mail at vashby@prusd.com. todayslocalnews.com