There are several possible benefits sellers can receive by performing a pre-listing home inspection, especially for older, larger homes, and especially since home sales often fall apart during the buyer’s own home inspection process.  By performing a pre-listing home inspection, you will obtain a clear understanding of your homes condition and any issues or defects which may affect the sale of your home.

Here are a few advantages of obtaining a pre-listing home inspection:

1. Assistance in pricing your home correctly – The price you set for your home is one of the most important parts of the sales process, but how do you price your home properly when you do not know it’s exact condition?

2. Help alleviate the stress of selling your home – The home inspection will be one less reason why your sale could possibly fall through.

3. Reinforce buyer confidence – It is typical for buyer’s to be suspicious of a home’s condition given the fact that it is typically the largest single expenditure they will ever make, and if they have any inclination that the home might have hidden issues, their offer will take these suspicions into account. A pre-listing home inspection can help alleviate these suspicions surrounding your home.

4. Avoid the need for renegotiation – If issues are discovered in the buyers’ home inspection, this may lead to the buyer(s) and their agent attempting to renegotiate a discount from the accepted offer price, or even walk away from the deal entirely.

5. Expedite the sales process – An inspection will help support your claim that the home is in great shape and well worth the list price. Also, if there are issues that you do not end up rectifying for some reason, you can be upfront about them and explain to buyer(s) that the list price has taken these factors into account.

If you do decide to proceed with a pre-sale home inspection, keep in mind that the buyer(s) will most likely still want to perform their own inspection.  Make sure that you insist that your Realtor attend this inspection as it is very important that the buyer(s) and their inspector do not exaggerate any issues that they may identify given that it is a common strategy for buyers and their agent to attempt to negotiate a lower price after they’ve received their home inspection if it does indeed flag unanticipated issues.

With the possible benefits that are associated with a pre-sale home inspection, it is important to note the possible downfall related to the disclosure of material latent defects to buyer’s.  In British Columbia, a seller, and correspondingly, a seller’s agent, must disclose all known material latent defects, which are defined as those that are not visible upon ordinary inspection, but which materially affects the property’s use or value.  Therefore, if you do not have the money to make repairs to your home, doing a pre-sale home inspection could potentially put you at a disadvantage given the fact that you are required to disclose all such defects identified in the pre-sale home inspection.