Philadelphia Weekly

REAL ESTATE

5 buyer-beware real estate scenarios

Mood of the Market

By Inman News Feed

Add Comment | Comments: 0 | Posted Apr. 2, 2012

In some ways, these scenarios do buyers the favor of encouraging them to avoid the potentially treacherous prospect of relying on a seller's disclosure.

In these cases, buyers are more likely to go above and beyond in terms of getting property inspections and repair estimates and doing their own investigations of the property, asking around the neighborhood to gather any anecdotal information, searching the property address online, and going down to the city and county records houses to make sure they understand all the permits and citations that have been issued to the address over time.

Basically, it's about doing all the things "regular" homebuyers should do but commonly don't when they receive a hefty set of seller disclosures.

Tara-Nicholle Nelson is author of "The Savvy Woman's Homebuying Handbook" and "Trillion Dollar Women: Use Your Power to Make Buying and Remodeling Decisions." Tara is also the Consumer Ambassador and Educator for real estate listings search site Trulia.com. Ask her a real estate question online or visit her website, www.rethinkrealestate.com.