Meet Terry Allard, retired senior inspector from the City of Winnipeg and owner of Independent Building Inspections.
Terry has been my inspector of choice since the day I met him.
Terry has taught me almost everything I know about assessing the true condition of a property. He is as passionate about his work as I am about mine and I look forward to putting his superpowers to work for you.
You can find out more about him at his website the-ibi.com.
My Offer to Buyers
Short Story
When you are successful in purchasing a home, I will reimburse you half of your inspection fees up to a total of $500.
Longer Version
More often than not in the current market, you will be in competition for the next home you write an offer on.
If you write a home inspection into that offer, it is almost certainly going to be set aside, unless, of course, you offer so much more than the other buyers that it is worth the risk to the sellers.
Why?
It isn't so much a concern that the buyer will discover a sinister flaw in the property but that the buyer will use the clause as a way to walk away from the deal just because. The inspection condition is essentially a get-out-of-jail-free card - buyers do not have to explain why they are walking away, just that they are.
So are buyers just supposed to roll the dice, not have the house inspected and hope for the best?
Not in my world.
When you find a property that feels like it could be the one, and it has passed our initial sniff test, we will call in an inspector to perform a walk-through inspection before the offers date.
An inspection like this is similar to full inspection but does not come with a written report, and therefore costs half of the usual rate - $250 instead of $500 (plus GST).
Could it come to pass that your bid will lose and you will have spend that inspection money for nothing?
Not really and here's why:
when you are successful in purchasing a home, I will reimburse you half of your inspection fees up to a total of $500. That means that even if you have to have 4 home inspections before yours is the winning bid, you won't have paid more than $500 in total, the cost of the single home inspection you would have paid for anyway.