Disclose, disclose, disclose. This is an agent’s mantra when advising sellers during the process of listing their home. Hiding defects is not only foolish (since the home inspector will more than likely find it anyway) but deliberately withholding information about defects in the property is also fraud.
So, what happens if you are just careless in filling out the required Louisiana property disclosure?
Let me tell you a quick story.
A young lady purchasing her first home contacted us recently. She had very specific criteria for what she was looking for, from the number of bedrooms and bathrooms to the neighborhoods she was interested in. One of her hot button issues was the flood zone. She was adamant that any home she purchased must be in flood zone B or flood zone X and did not want to see any home outside of those zones, no matter how beautiful or well priced it might be.
Since many sellers don’t bother to complete that portion of the disclosure statement (I don’t know why, it’s not a secret!), lots of time was spent calling listing agents to have their sellers check their records for the flood zone. Flood zones on the West Bank can vary from block to block within the same community, so we cannot just assume that one house is zoned the same as another in the area.
Finally, we found several homes that met her needs AND were located in the right zones. She narrowed down her choices, picked her absolute favorite and successfully negotiated an offer with the seller. Inspections were done and repairs were negotiated as well. Everything was going along just fine.
Until she started pricing flood insurance.
It turns out that the home she had fallen in love with was not located in a B or X zone and she could not get a preferred rate on her premiums. As a matter of fact, her flood insurance would be about 3 times more expensive than she had planned for. I did mention that she’s a first time home buyer, right? This turned out to be a deal breaker.
The end result was that the contract was canceled and the seller is now out of pocket several hundred dollars for the cost of inspections in addition to losing marketing time while the home was under contract. Why? Because the buyer argued (and rightfully so) that she would never have even looked at this particular home, much less made an offer on it, if she had been given accurate information from the beginning.
Don’t fall into the trap of just assuming that you remember everything about your home. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard sellers say “oh we just replaced that hot water heater a couple of years ago” only to find that the tag on it is 10 years old. Completing your disclosures can be a long and tedious process, but doing it correctly can save you money in the long run.
Ready to sell your West Bank home? Contact the West Bank Living Team for professional guidance through the entire marketing and sales process.
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